Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Earlier this week I did a Member’s statement on the legacy of

Members in this House who have served for this government. Today I’m going to talk about a different legacy: building a legacy in our youth, in our communities and in our future leaders.

Today I want to talk about the Northern Youth Abroad Program. The Northern Youth Abroad Program specifically is designed to meet the unique needs of youth living in isolated communities in Canada’s North, specifically the Northwest Territories and Nunavut. This program was initially designed to help find Nunavut teachers to help with the success in education. Yesterday we went through a little theme day here, talking about the challenges that we have in the Northwest Territories, and yet we have an organization down in Ottawa that’s providing these types of services to our youth in the Northwest Territories.

Today was the deadline for applications for the Northern Youth Abroad Program. There were 44 applications across the Northwest Territories; however, the group will only select 20 moving forward when they’re putting the program on. Some of the successes that this program has done for students in the Northwest Territories is increased graduation rates, it’s given students high school credit and it’s also given people the opportunity to volunteer in the North, allowed volunteering in the South as well as create volunteer abroad students, specifically in Africa.

This program works on developing leadership development, healthy living, producing self-confidence and self-esteem in our northern youth. Like I said, although today was the deadline, they are going to accept applications until November 12

. I encourage all Members to speak to their

youth in the communities, as well as all educators to get their students signed up for this program. Thank you.