The Circle Project is a registered not-for-profit charity supported by the City of Regina, Regina United Way, Provincial Departments, Service Clubs, and the community at large.

Since its beginning in 1988, the Circle Project has engaged and worked with the Aboriginal community, helping individuals and families reach their full potential. Individuals and families are given access to a broad range of programs and services delivered in a community setting by the Circle Project, an Aboriginal organization, so that they may enjoy the benefits that are a natural outcome of education, employment, and firm attachment to the economy.

With Saskatchewan leading the country in family violence, their interest is also in helping individuals who are at risk of detachment from the economy as a result of lifestyle or relationship issues or family violence. They have begun the work of identifying and responding to the risks that lead to economic detachment by individuals and families. They plan to continue working in this area because reattachment to the economy is more difficult to achieve and brings with it a whole different set of complex challenges for individuals and the community.

 History

In the early 1980s, Regina’s Catholic Church leaders recognized they weren’t reaching the Aboriginal community where unemployment and welfare dependency were around 90%, the high school drop out rate was above 85%, and the suicide rate was one of the highest in the world.

Aboriginal people were caught between two cultures, and they didn’t have their extended families and communities to lean on.

There were nearly 40 agencies in Regina providing a wide range of services to the Aboriginal community, but none seemed able to alleviate the situation. After consulting with some Aboriginal agencies, the Catholic Church leaders and Aboriginal Elders went to the people for guidance. Fifteen participants, mostly Aboriginal people representing a variety of agencies and groups in Regina, participated in the dialogue. The result was the formation of a new agency in 1988 — the Circle Project. The Circle Project would belong to the native people and serve the real need for community development through self-healing.

Today the Circle Project is a highly successful, urban based, Aboriginal organization that provides programs and services in Regina and surrounding areas. Although program participants are both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal, the Circle Project’s focus is working with Aboriginal people in a community-based setting.