Organizational Name Development: NCAFE National Council for Aboriginal Federal Employees

Our presentation "NCAFE - Past, Present, and Future" may be found here.

The idea to establish a national group similar to the National Council for Visible Minorities (NCVM) was discussed by Gail Gallagher and Sydney McMillan in Edmonton, Alberta in 2001.

In the beginning, a few names were tossed around and discussed. In fact, the very first name that ANNI used for its first few meetings was referred to as 'Strengthening the Aboriginal Circle". Some Aboriginal employees did not like this name, so other name options were examined. In the end, Gail and Sydney held a brainstorming session and came up with the name ANNI and this name was used for all future discussions/meetings. In June 2001, ANNI had its first meeting, in Edmonton, Alberta.

On March 28, 2003 when a discussion meeting was organized on Parliament Hill, in Ottawa, the name Aboriginal National Network Initiative was still used. The reasons we selected this name was that we wanted others to know that is was an initiative and also that it would be a national network. We wanted to find out if other federal government employees also saw the need for a national council for Aboriginal employees within the Federal Public Service. The overwhelming majority clearly saw the need for such a group. The ANNI name was used for the December 5 and 6th 2005 ANNI Forum to March 2006 inclusive. ANNI was directed by the participants at the inaugural Forum held December 5 and 6, 2005 to change our name, stating it was no longer an initiative. After a process which included NCAFE's list of constituents via the contact list the name voted on was: National Council of Aboriginal Federal Employees (NCAFE).