Melissa Anderson says her academic work at the University of Manitoba is right in line with her “extreme interest” in engineering and physics. Anderson is Ininew, from the Fox Lake Cree Nation in northern Manitoba, and her path into higher education reflects her consistent passion for STEM studies.
A mother of four, Anderson says her interest in science was “ignited” in the seventh grade when a teacher observed that she had great math and science skills. Anderson remembers this teacher’s confidence in her to this day, and she used that energy to complete her undergraduate degree in physics at the University of Winnipeg in 2020. In her second year, she received a National Science and Engineering Research Council award, which included a summer research assistant position. “I was unsure what path to take for my master’s degree,” she says, but that experience in research proved to her that work in the lab can be both fascinating and fulfilling.
During her undergraduate studies, Anderson found that her passion for the sciences was doubly fueled by her involvement in AISES. Another student at the University of Winnipeg had introduced her to AISES and encouraged her to travel to the .caISES 2019 Second Annual National Gathering in Montreal with a small group of three students. “Prior to that, I thought that we Indigenous students in the sciences were few and far between,” Anderson says. “I was amazed at how many other Indigenous students are in sciences, and the resources and opportunities that were presented to us.”
When she got back from the conference, she worked to help start an AISES student group at the University of Winnipeg. The group has continued throughout the coronavirus pandemic, meeting online to provide volunteering opportunities, support, and cultural teachings. Even though she’s at the University of Manitoba now, Anderson has hopes that the chapter she founded will continue for years to come — and she has attended their online Netflix viewing parties, and medicine teachings via Zoom.
When a professor from her undergraduate program suggested she look into biomedical engineering, something clicked. “The opportunity to use my imagination, creativity, and intuition fit my medical and engineering passions,” she says. “Ultimately, I would love to be a researcher, studying an illness or a disease that is crippling Indigenous populations.”
Starting graduate studies during the coronavirus pandemic has been a challenge for many students, Anderson included. “I am used to talking to professors in person, especially about assignments,” she says. But she has found the academic world willing to help and meet via Zoom whenever she needs. She has also been working to establish a new community and meet new people with social distancing in place. “You don’t get to know classmates in the same way,” she says. “If you mishear something, you can’t lean over to other students and ask for clarification. But, thankfully, social media has made it possible to stay connected to people far away.”
