In my first year at McGill University in Montreal, I found a home and community around the long table in the university’s four-story, red stone First Peoples’ House. The house serves as a residence and gathering space for Indigenous students, and by the time I completed my first year of university, the Wednesday soup and bannock lunches were part of my routine. It was a good way to get to know other Indigenous students on campus, and it has helped me to build that Indigenous community.
First Peoples’ House was more than my gateway to feeling at home at McGill — it was also how I first learned about the school’s AISES College Chapter. Early in my first semester, First Peoples’ House organized a welcome dinner, which allowed me to get to know other Indigenous students at McGill. There, I met the former McGill AISES College Chapter president. Once he learned I was interested in math and computer science, he encouraged me to join AISES and consider attending their annual conference.
I thought that a science conference for Indigenous students and professionals sounded pretty great. I attended the 2019 AISES National Conference in Milwaukee, Wis., and was really amazed being in a place where everyone was interested in STEM and we all shared a common background. I wanted to be more involved after that conference because I think the AISES goal to increase Indigenous representation in STEM is really important. When I was younger, I didn’t really see Indigenous people in STEM, much less in mathematics.
I’ve been particularly interested in mathematics since high school, when I’d stay after class to ask my functions teacher questions like “Can I do this?” or “Am I allowed to do that?” I enjoyed math class the most, and I continued to study it in CEGEP (the Quebec equivalent of a junior college) before starting my bachelor’s degree at McGill.
I’m currently living at home in Châteauguay, a town just outside of Montreal, where I grew up, and I’m glad to have my extended family close while I work on my degree. But my Indigenous roots are in the Cree community of Calling Lake, Alberta, where my grandmother is from. Growing up, I didn’t identify with the Indigenous communities surrounding my hometown, so I was relieved to find a strong community at First Peoples’ House at McGill where I could meet people from all over, some also with the same interests in STEM.
After my first AISES conference, I got more involved in my College Chapter and later ran to be the Junior Canadian National Student Representative for 2020. After I was elected, I pitched in to help organize the virtual 2020 National Conference. I hope to work toward increased Canadian student representation in AISES during my term. Last year at the National Conference, we had a supper with the other Canadian students who had come, and it was a bit sad not to see more people there. That was why I wanted to be involved with AISES as a student representative — to help to get the word out throughout Canada.
My life at the intersection of STEM and the Indigenous community has given me a front-row seat for the unfolding conversation surrounding the Indigenization and decolonization of university education in Canada. It’s definitely something that AISES at McGill is trying to work toward, and I think there’s more that can be done to make universities more inclusive. For example, an AISES member at McGill is currently working with the university’s engineering faculty to Indigenize some of their courses.
Last summer I was offered an internship with Calgary-based TC Energy, a position I heard about through a 2019 National Conference connection. While the pandemic prevented me from living in Calgary for the summer, I was able to complete the internship remotely. The internship introduced me to cloud operations and computer infrastructure, and I was able to promote AISES to another intern who studies at Acadia University in Nova Scotia.
Going forward, I’d like to find a job in industry or the public sector, but I’m keeping my options open. Data analysis is interesting, and parsing ever-growing amounts of data is an in-demand skill. Or I could do something like operations research, using modeling, optimization, and statistics to improve processes. I’m excited about the opportunities that a degree in mathematics can bring.
