She’s Here Mentorship Program: reducing barriers for Indigenous individuals
On Mar. 25, RaiseHER Co. and U of R Champions of Change came together to host the fifth annual She’s Here Mentorship Program. This year, the theme of the project is to reduce barriers for Indigenous youth, women, and Two-spirit individuals across communities, workplaces, and schools. Women and gender-diverse post-secondary students or new professionals were paired with working professionals to design a solution that was launched in January.
Towards an equitable future
The program was developed in partnership with Lori Campbell, vice president of U of R’s Office of Indigenous Engagement, and Michelle Okere, executive director of the Indigenous Prosperity Foundation. Both advisors were present during the final showcase to give their thoughts and advice to the groups.
Campbell says that she was excited to be invited as an advisor for the mentorship program. “They focused on not doing things about Indigenous people for us, without us.”
For Campbell, the projects showed that the participants did their research in partnership with Indigenous people and it resulted in uplifting their voices.
“I think that’s really a strong way of showing what reconciliation is, and what ally support is,” said Campbell. “It’s about leveraging a non-Indigenous person’s position to elevate Indigenous voices and support Indigenous needs.”
Campbell shared that she feels confident in how the group is going to work alongside young Indigenous women. “I’m 53. When I see young women gathering from many different backgrounds they’re having conversations that we never had the opportunity to have.”
When I see young women gathering from many different backgrounds they’re having conversations that we never had the opportunity to have.” – Lori Campbell, Vice President, U of R Indigenous Engagement
Types of presentations
Nehel Iqbal and Yewande Irediran were amongst the presenters at the event. They presented data on Indigenous women’s lower access to healthcare providers and statistics on reported cases of discrimination and unfair treatment by healthcare professionals.
They spoke about their thoughts as researchers, using literary reviews and conducting interviews, revealing what culturally sensitive care looks like. It means respecting the knowledge and cultural practices of the patient, treating the patient as an active participant and partnering with them in decision-making, and letting the patient decide what is safe.
Lara Dixon and Arla Cameron presented on how to empower Indigenous women, youth, and Two-Spirit peoples through sports. They spoke about promoting health, social inclusion, and development of life skills. They argued that sports can help Indigenous students ease into the transition to post-secondary, which will also help them achieve better academic outcomes.
They proposed ideas, like building a Kinesiology Indigenous Youth Engagement Program that will promote building awareness of pathways to sports at the university and expanding on U of R sport connections through UR recreation services, UR Athletics, the Centre for Continuing Education, and the ta-tawâw Student Centre.
I think leadership is so important, especially having people see women in leadership roles, because that representation does make a difference.” – Anneka McLaren, Champions of Change
Success for RaiseHER Co. and Champions of Change
Skylar Gerard, co-founder of RaiseHER Co., says one of the biggest successes that came out of the program is the growth in leadership skills for the participants. She says that they see an increase in confidence, public speaking skills, mentorship, and collaboration every single year. Secondly, there is the success from the outcomes of the project and the impact they can make.
“This year, with a more narrowed theme and support of our advisors, we’re able to make sure that we can see more outcomes from their project,” she said. “It’s really up to the mentorship groups to continue to take it forward, but now we have the support in place to help them do that.”
In picking this year’s theme, Gerard says that their biggest push as a collective was around their commitment to reconciliation and taking action in the community at the grassroots level.
“I think leadership is so important, especially having people see women in leadership roles, because that representation does make a difference,”said Anneka McLaren, incoming president for U of R Champions of Change. “It shows [them] that they can do these things and that they belong in these spaces, where a lot of the time, they’re made to feel like they do not belong.”
As someone who also participated in the mentorship program last year, McLaren says that the program exhibits that people can make tangible change. “This program shows people that they can go ahead and make a project, make resources for people, and actually implement policy.”
Next year, she hopes to further the presence of Champions of Changes on campus and recruit more students into seeing possibilities in leadership and advocacy. Applications for 2027 will open in November of this year. To learn more about the She’s Here mentorship program, visit their website: raiseherco.com
