Engagement Sessions
Bring community conversations together, with each speaker choosing how their words are held.
About this module
How it works
The engagement — opened by the Chief from the community dashboard as a named piece of work (housing, governance, health, land use), or proposed by a project proponent who enables it on an approved project and invites the Nation. Whichever door opens it, acceptance is the Chief’s, the audience is the Chief’s to set, and the record it produces is the Nation’s. It is held as a series of sessions in community — a hall, a kitchen table, a band office — planned and facilitated by Chi Mino Ozhitoowin’s forward-deployed facilitators or by the Nation’s own people, with the questions written down before anyone travels.
The room — a facilitator captures what is said as it is said, one line at a time, and every line carries a choice made in the room: offered for the record, where it may later appear unattributed in what the Nation reads; sealed for Council, so only Chief and Council can ever read it back; or withheld entirely, in which case IRIS holds only the bare fact that something was shared and kept off the record — not a word of it. Who is in the room is recorded as counts, never names. Each line saves the moment it is captured, and waits out a dropped connection rather than being lost to it.
The return — when the sessions close, the Chief may generate a what-we-heard account: sessions held, attendance as counts, the themes that emerged, and the lines offered for the record. Sealed words are counted, never quoted. The account goes to the Chief, who decides whether any of it leaves the community — and nothing does until they do.
Who takes part
COMMUNITY OR INDUSTRY-INITIATED MODULE
Whichever door opens this engagement, the record belongs to the Nation. What is said in the room lives in rows the community owns: lines offered for the record, lines sealed to Chief and Council, and the bare fact of words withheld — counts, never names. A facilitator’s hands do the writing; the speaker’s choice decides each line’s fate. A proponent who proposed the engagement sees none of it. Nothing flows outward unless the Chief signs a what-we-heard account, and the Chief may withdraw the Nation’s participation at any time.
The Chief opens it; sessions are held in community.
The Chief opens an engagement from the community dashboard and names the work — housing, governance, health, land use. A facilitator plans each session’s questions before travelling and captures the room’s words under the speaker’s own terms.
An organization proposes; the Chief decides.
A proponent enables the engagement on an approved project and invites the Nation. The Chief accepts or declines; on acceptance the Chief sets the audience and the record is held in the Nation’s name. Sessions, the room’s words, and the account of them are the Nation’s — the proponent sees only what the Chief discloses, and the Chief may withdraw at any time.
The Nation receives the account, and decides its reach.
When the sessions close, the Chief may generate a what-we-heard account — attendance as counts, themes, and the lines offered for the record — and decide whether any of it leaves the community. Sealed words are counted, never quoted.