Stacey Sinclair (MFA’ 93, MBA ’99) has been a lifelong advocate for music education and music’s ability to teach and inspire. As the executive director for the Coalition for Music Education in Canada, she empowers educators throughout the country to incorporate music as part of their teaching.
The Coalition was created by music educators and parents who were concerned about cuts to Canadian music education. What began as a grassroots organization is now a registered charity that has continued their advocacy efforts for the past 30 years with more than 275,000 students participating in their programs.
“Advocacy is at the core of what we do,” says Stacey. “We are trying to save music programs across the country that are being cut and we step in where people may need an extra voice.”
The Coalition runs music-centred programming in schools across Canada to support the growth of music education and take on initiatives that help support musical needs in the classroom. In Fall 2024 one such need inspired the Coalition to launch Ancestors Voices: Music and Learning for National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, a music program designed to allow students to reflect on the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation (NDTR) and inviting them to explore a song chosen by the Coalition that involves the Indigenous experience. Since the program’s launch, it has helped create important dialogue in classrooms from coast-to-coast-to- coast.
“We talked to various teachers across the country and many of them identified that their classes were in need of programming for the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation,” says Stacey. “In response, Ancestors Voices was initiated for students to listen and have a dialogue around NDTR and hear songs from Indigenous artists to learn about their stories.”
Included in the program is a series of artist videos, artist guides, lyric and chord Sheets, and a curriculum-based learning guide developed by Indigenous music educators providing their own experience and expertise to accompany the music. This provides teachers a full toolkit to share with students who want to learn more about Indigenous history and issues that are still existing today.
“There are all kinds of discussions that are had about the songs,” says Stacey. “It gives people the opportunity to understand the “truth” part about truth and reconciliation and it starts all kinds of conversations about reconciliation.”
The first song shared was created by another York alumnus, Julian Taylor, whose song ‘S.E.E.D.S. was written after the discovery of the 215 uncovered remains of buried Indigenous children at a former residential school in Kamloops, British Columbia. The songs touch upon Indigenous history and issues while demonstrating the value of music as a tool for storytelling and its importance in Indigenous culture.
“ This past year we featured artist Adrian Sutherland, a First Nations singer-songwriter who lives in the far north,” says Stacey. “His song Kiyash is a Cree language song that has inspired classroom discussions about issues that are important to the Indigenous people living in that area, such as access to clean drinking water.”
Ancestors Voices has grown quickly since its inception. Within the first month, the program reached 84,000 students across Canada and has organized school visits with the artists to perform their song live, with a video recording sent to all who have registered for the program. As of today, 200,000 Canadian students have participated in the program. Stacey hopes to continue the growth of this program and looks forward to share more Indigenous artists and storytellers to Canadian youth.
“The response has been incredible,” says Stacey.
For the upcoming 2026 National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, the Coalition will feature artist Dee Dee Austin, and her song Buried Truth. DeeDee is an Indigenous artist and sister of the Abegweit First Nation on Prince Edward Island (currently resides in Nova Scotia) who embraces contemporary and traditional Indigenous music which she creates and implements into each one of her performances. When Dee Dee was 15, she used stories from her great-grandmother’s experience at Shubenacadie Indian Residential School to write Buried Truth, honouring the victims and the survivors of the system. Stacey and the Coalition look forward to featuring Dee Dee in the program and spotlighting other East Coast Indigenous artists.