Urban Indigenous Governance in Health Research: Pathways for engagement, data sovereignty, and knowledge translation explores how existing research standards and governance models shape health research in urban Indigenous contexts, with a focus on engagement, data sovereignty, and knowledge translation.
Through a scoping literature review, expert interviews, survey, and sharing circles we are exploring health research governance models, data concerns, and knowledge mobilization strategies. The end goal of this project is to develop an Urban Indigenous Research Toolkit which can help guide researchers who work with urban Indigenous peoples.
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Project Director: Dr. Gabrielle Legault
Co-Investigators: Dr. Skye Barbic, Dr. Peter Hutchinson, Dr. Alanaise Ferguson, Dr. Shawn Wilson and Lindsay DuPré
Collaborators: Fancy Poitras, Dr. Krista Stelkia, Dante Carter, Keyara Brody, Dr. Sarah de Leeuw and Judy Sturm
Project Staff: Karlyn Olsen, Rebekah Ferguson, Lily Packo and Deanna Necan
Project Governance
The project is guided by an Urban Indigenous Research Advisory Circle made up of Indigenous community leaders, researchers, Elders, youth, and young adults with urban Indigenous living experience from across British Columbia. We are very grateful to our Advisory Circle members for helping us to do this work in a good way.
Meet the Advisory Circle:
Elder Bill McKenna
Bill is Secwepemc and a member of the Stswecem’c Xget’tem First Nation. After 39 years working for the BC provincial government Bill retired and began working in a new direction. For 3 years Bill participated with a group of Elders supporting Indigenous families who were involved with the Ministry of Child and Family Development. For a time Bill was also the Vancouver Urban Outreach Liaison for the Northern Secwepemc te Qelmucw. The Tribal Council representing the 4 northern Secwepemc Nations. Since relocating to Kelowna Bill has become a Board Member for the Ki-Low-Na Friendship Society and has recently been named as a KFS delegate to the School District 23 Indigenous Education Council.
Melanie Nelson
Dr. Melanie Nelson (she/her) is a proud member of Samahquam First Nation (St’at’imc) with roots in the Jimmie family of Squiala (Stó:lō). Currently an assistant professor in School and Applied Child Psychology at UBC, her research is focused on Indigenous education and mental health and wellness, with a specific focus on caregiver experiences with psychological services, inclusive education, literacy screening, and support for Two-Spirit and queer youth. She has been learning from Saa Hiil Thut Elder Gerry Oleman (Oldman) about supporting people with Western and Indigenous ways since 2017. She is also a member of the Board of Directors for the Nicola Valley Institute of Technology (NVIT).
Jagger Kembel
Jagger is a mixed Sylix and settler undergraduate student at UBCO. She is pursuing a PhD in psychology where she hopes to work with Indigenous communities, focusing on mental health and substance abuse recovery. Her research interests are how the use of animal assisted therapy may help recovery within residential treatment center contexts.
Geraldine Manossa
Geraldine is a member of the Bigstone Cree Nation in Treaty 8. She is a PhD student in the Interdisciplinary Graduate Studies: Indigenous Knowledge stream. Her research focuses on how land-inclusive reconciliation efforts can be implemented with Indigenous communities. She has worked with both the First Nations Health Authority and En’owkin Centre in developing Indigenous transformative, community-based and Nation-led initiatives, services and programs.
Paula Morrison
Paula holds a Bachelor of Business Admin, an Advanced Certificate in Health Leadership and is a yoga teacher. A proud member of the Tahltan Nation of Northern BC, she values people and improving systems to serve communities. Paula's experience includes long term care research, labour market research, evaluation, community consultation and a passion for population health, including youth, elders/seniors and people of diverse abilities. She is honoured to have advocated for parents’ in their end of life journeys in BC and the Yukon; while raising a healthy family in the beautiful and unceded territory of the Syilx Okanagan Nation.
Brian McLean
Brian is a member of Long Plain First Nation in Treaty 1 Territory and is based in Kamloops, BC. He holds a Bachelor of Health Science and is currently completing a Master of Arts in Leadership at Royal Roads University. Brian is passionate about advancing Indigenous health equity and supporting greater inclusion of urban and away from home Indigenous Peoples in healthcare planning, engagement, and decision making. His experience includes Indigenous health advocacy, cultural safety and humility, relationship building, and supporting partnerships between First Nations and healthcare organizations. In his current role with BC Cancer, he supports relationship building and partnership development with First Nations across British Columbia to strengthen Indigenous engagement and improve cancer care experiences and outcomes. His previous work included supporting collaborative processes and partnership development between the Secwépemc Nation and Interior Health. Guided by the principles of Two Eyed Seeing, Brian believes that cultural humility, respectful engagement, and Indigenous oversight are essential to creating meaningful change and advancing culturally safe health systems for Indigenous Peoples.
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Ian Cull
Bio coming soon
Carmen Carriere
Bio coming soon
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Will Georgelin
Bio coming soon
Anthony Isaac
Bio coming soon
Project Resources
Research Governance Information Sheets
The Research Team developed a series of information sheets on existing Indigenous research principles and governance frameworks to share with the Advisory Circle. These information sheets are shared here as a learning resource for anyone looking to learn more about Indigenous research governance, data sovereignty, and community-specific research principles.
More coming soon...
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