Mentors of the Faculty of Human and Social Development

Anastasia Mallidou
Associate Professor
School of Nursing
I was born, raised, educated and worked in Greece before coming to Canada for doctoral studies bringing work and life experiences from a certain culture and perspectives. Coming to another country and continent was overwhelming initially and the whole experience was intimidating. The biggest challenges were my assumptions and culture shock. However, I had great mentors through my career so far and I would like to give back and support the new generation of students. My experiences include health systems, health policies and politics, and how to navigate the unknown and still maintain your identity.

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Farah Mawani
Assistant Professor
School of Child and Youth Care

 

 

 

 

 

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Jaehee Yi (Not currently available)
Professor
School of Social Work
I am Jaehee Yi in School of Social Work. I was born and raised in Korea. My family was very poor. My parents did not even graduate from elementary school. Their hope was that I graduate from middle school, learn abacus skills, and get a job at a bank. I met many mentors through my life, who inspired, encouraged, and supported me to go to high school, college, and further beyond. While working in the U.S. as a professor for 11 years, I have mentored many first generational students. I just arrived in Canada in August 2022. I hope to meet many students at UVic! P.S. I am queer.

 

 

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Lorelei Newton
Assistant Professor
School of Nursing
I am an Assistant Professor at the School of Nursing but my background is mostly as a practicing nurse. When I was a student (undergraduate and graduate), I was sensitive to the many implicit and explicit messages I received that I probably did not belong in academia. The whole process was mystical and challenging to negotiate with no guidance — or even someone to ask simple questions (I felt stupid asking the questions that others thought obvious). I also seemed to make so many mistakes! Now, my goal as an educator is to de-mystify postsecondary education and research.
Marilou Gagnon
Professor
School of Nurse
I grew up in a small town outside of Montréal. My first language is French. I completed a professional nursing degree in Cégep. I worked as a trauma and ER nurse during my undergraduate in nursing at U de Montréal. After my first year at the master’s, I fast-tracked to the PhD program at U of Ottawa. I worked as a nursing prof at U of Ottawa before coming to UVic in 2018. In 2020, I returned to school to complete my LLM in Health Law. I’m passionate about mentoring students because I was lucky to encounter a lot of great mentors in my life. I know (first-hand) that surrounded by the right people, anything is possible 🙂

 

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Richard T. Marcy
Associate Professor
School of Public Administration
I grew up in a really great, small village in upstate New York. I come from a military family (father, two uncles, grandfather, great uncles all served) and I joined the Marines after I graduated high school. After my enlistment was up, I went to the University of Buffalo and studied video art and media. After graduating from UB, I worked for an international consulting firm, where I was first exposed to the field of Industrial-Organizational (I/O) Psychology. This led me to get a MS and PhD in I/O. After earning my doctorate, I did a postdoctoral fellowship with the Center of Creative Leadership, and was later offered a position at the University of Victoria.  For many of these experiences, I was initially flying blind, but I met a number of great people along the way and Im extremely grateful for their helpful thoughts and advice. In thinking of them, I’ve decided to participate in this program, hopefully helping somewhat where I can.

 

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Valerie Jefferd
Adjunt Assistant Professor
Nursing
I am an Indigenous Nurse Practitioner (Family) and work and play in the beautiful Cowichan Valley. I work in two Indigenous communities as a primary healthcare provider for the Coast Salish Peoples. I am Haida, from the Saagwii Gitanee Eagle Clan on my mother side and 2nd generation English settler on my father side. I started my post-secondary studies in dental as a dental assistant, then I migrated over into nursing where I attained my Bachelor of Nursing degree from Malaspina/Uvic. Then 12 years later I obtained my Masters/Nurse Practitioner Degree at Uvic as well. The reason I want to be a mentor because I was the first in my family to seek post-secondary education and it was not an easy process. I didn’t have family that had attended university or many friends at the time that were pursuing post-secondary education, so I didn’t have many people I could fall back on to ask questions, and what to expect when the unexpected happened in navigating the many roads and paths of post-secondary education and university. I look forward to assisting and helping the First Generation Mentee’s navigate the many roads and paths they will travel.