This presentation begins with a meaningful territory acknowledgement, along with steps to getting past this process in order to build meaningful relationships with Indigenous staff, faculty, students, and leaders in the university.
The workshop is conducted by two PhD students from EDST (Department of Educational Studies) and LLED (Language and Literacy Education Department), both invested in Indigenous Education and committed to reconciliatory and decolonial practices while creating culturally safe spaces for Indigenous peoples.
The facilitators include their own positionalities by sharing their lived experiences. This relates to how they became involved with graduate studies, research, Indigenous-led podcasts, and university EDID projects while helping communities make meaningful connections with non-Indigenous peoples.
In addition, this workshop will assist educators in understanding the relevance of various policy directives, such as 94 Calls to Action, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, the Declaration Rights Action Plan, and the UBC Indigenous Strategic Plan. Participants will have the opportunity to be included in a conversation around meaningful steps for moving forward.
Facilitators
Frances Macapagal Maddalozzo
Frances Macapagal Maddalozzo is currently a 3rd year PhD student at UBC in LLED. She also holds Bachelor of Arts (2000) and Bachelor of Education (2001) degrees from UBC. She left her teaching career to pursue motherhood. Ambitiously, after being a mother to 8 children, she decided to go back to school to pursue graduate studies.
In 2022, she completed her Master of Education at Thompson Rivers University (TRU), it was there that her first encounter with reconciliation and decolonization took place, through her research supervised by Dr. G. Ramirez and Dr. Mukwa Musayett Shelly Johnson, Canada Research Chair for Indigenizing Higher Education. Her autoethnographic research involved the nuances of her positionality as a second-generation Filipina-Canadian. The qualitative research led her to want to give back to the TRU. Maddalozzo was appointed to spearhead a graduate-led podcast titled, Indigenous Podcast Series: Privileging Indigenous oral traditions past, present, and future. She also co-authored a chapter with Dr. Johnson on Leadership Reflections for an upcoming publication (2025) in the Canadian Association of Teacher Education e-book.
Her doctoral research focuses on developing Relational Listening practices for pre-service teachers, utilizing podcasts as a tool for social scholarship. She was appointed as a graduate academic assistant by Dr. Jan Hare, Dean and Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Pedagogy, for the International Indigenous Teacher Education Symposium. In this role, she gained valuable insights into the needs and perspectives of Indigenous communities through active listening and engagement.
Maddalozzo is deeply committed to empowering the next generation of educators. Her research has earned significant recognition and funding, including the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Doctoral Award (2024-2027), UBC’s Public Scholars Initiative Award, the President’s Academic Excellence Initiative PhD Award, the Joseph Katz Multicultural Award, and UBC’s Four-Year Fellowship.
Naomi Narcisse
Skel7áw̓s (Naomi Narcisse) is a current PhD student at The University of British Columbia within the Faculty of Education Studies. She completed her MEd in Educational Administration & Leadership at UBC & Nicola Valley Institute of Technology in 2021, a Bachelor of Arts degree at Simon Fraser University, and an Associate of Arts at NVIT. As a lifelong learner, protecting & sharing traditional knowledges, Skel7áw̓s is a leader in sharing innovative pathways. She fosters an environment of encouragement while nurturing holistic spaces. She is guided by her Mentors, Matriarchs, Ancestors, tmicw (land) and Nxekmenlhkálha múta7 nt’ákmenlhkalha (traditional laws and way of life). Skel7áw̓s shares from a St’át’imc and Secwépemc women’s perspective, on the interconnection of traditional laws, education, lands, and language through oral stories.
