Category: connecting the dots

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Indigenous Knowledge Impacts on Microbiology, Genetics and More!

Years ago, I started a thread on an online platform that I no longer use.   I would add articles and information to this thread every time I came across an example of Indigenous ways of knowing intersecting with western science.
I started the thread with a focus on microbiology and genetics. It all kicked off when I read about how bear population genetics match up along the same borders as Indigenous language families. This continues to blow my mind and I wondered what other traditional knowledge is finally being supported by science.
It’s a mind blowing list that keeps on growing!  The hunt for researchers looking into wild rice genetics and three sisters microbiome …

Antimicrobial Kisameet clay

Bison genomics project

The bear genomics project made me wonder whether there was anything going on with bison genomics. Turns out the answer is yes! 
Moose genomics project

So if there’s a bear project and a bison project, is there a moose project? You guessed it! DYK that the reason there is no plural for moose is that moose is a partial translation from Anishnaabemowin?

More than one = moozog! 
J.B. Williams is an ethnobotanist who dedicates himself to keeping traditional knowledge of native plants alive.
The fabulous JVN gets curious about Indigenous science with Dr. Jessica Hernandez
Rock pile or clam garden?
The next time you’re on the rocky west coast, consider how those rock piles ended up where they are
Now that we know Stonehenge is an ancient calendar that divided the month into 10-day weeks and accurately recorded 365.25 days in a year, it’s time to take a closed look at North America’s 28-spoke medicine wheel
Indigenous Guardians
Where government doesn’t reach with conservation policy, Indigenous guardians from the Kitasoo/Xai’Xais, Heiltsuk and Wuikinuxv First Nations are monitoring wildlife populations, fisheries, oil spills and illegal logging an approach that is spreading! 
How to limit human salmon harvests to ensure the bears have enough to eat:
raincoast.org
Research: Fisheries management of the Wuikinuxv bear-salmon-human system guided by n̓àn̓akila and…
Guided by the Wuikinuxv principle of n̓àn̓akila (to keep an eye on something or someone; a protector or guardian), a new study shows how fisheries managers can allocate salmon for wildlife…
New paper from @ClaytonTLamb and West Moberly + Saulteau First Nations co-authors on bringing back Klinse-Za mountain caribou from brink of extirpation. Link esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ea
Ancient DNA Boom Underlines a Need for Ethical Frameworks
The field of ancient DNA, which combines archaeology and anthropology with cutting-edge genetics, is requiring scientists to have frank conversations about when research is justified and who it…
I am so happy to have been able to connect @AAFC_Canada
 research scientist Mehdi Sharifi with

@uviccoopcareer

students who helped get

Westbank FN Indigenous food growing in Summerland! A great step towards decolonization for this federal facility 
First federal Indigenous demonstration garden opens in B.C.’s Okanagan | CBC News
A federal agricultural research centre in Summerland, B.C., has opened its first Indigenous garden, a project aimed revitalizing food plants that are traditional to local Indigenous communities like…
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Student to Worker – A Reflection

I wanted to take a moment to reflect on the advice I gave to the attendees at the Career Paths Outside of Academia Panel hosted by Co-op and Career.

My first piece of advice:

Don’t compare your achievements to others.

In school, you are mostly among peers going through the same course work. But when you start working, you meet new people with different backgrounds and experiences.

After I graduated, I had friends who were in med school, friends starting their own businesses, friends who were making double what I was. It was hard to know where I fit in. I was not happy with myself because I wanted to be able to feel the same sense of achievement as I thought these friends felt. But what was acutally making me unhappy?

I was comparing myself on a scale that was not meant for me.

As a student, it was easy to know if I was doing well. But after graduation, there’s no universal quantifiable scale for everyone, and I was just blindly comparing, trying to seek some feeling of reassurance. Once I understood that, the next step was to feel sure of myself without making comparisons.

This leads to my next piece of advice:

Define your own success.

I thought hard and long. At what point should I consider myself successful? How do I even approach this question? How would I know what I will want 10 years from now? And that’s when I realized that success is different at every stage of your life. It’s a constant re-evaluation.

I decided to define my current success as doing something that I am good at and something I am passionate about.

And then I felt… easier and lighter. Because now all I had to do was to be good at my job, and maybe do something on the side, like contiuning with volunteer work.

Then, a couple of weeks ago, I was rewarded with positive feedback from my manager after a challenging year. I have learned so much this year, and now I am left with feeling relief (weirdly) and satisfaction — relief from having felt so terrible about myself in the past, and satisfaction of being good at something.

Try not to see your career as linear.

During the panel discussion, I was asked: “Do you think you’ve made the right choice with your career?”

I don’t think I have made the right choice, because saying so would indicate that there was only ever a single correct path for my career to follow.

The notion of the right career, the one job that you find right after school and settle down into, has made so many unhappy. If there’s anything I learned over the past decade, it’s that you can’t start out limiting your choices, and expect life to turn out.

I could offer another personal experience as example: I was doing an internship that to my great surprise, didn’t turn into a full-time position. I was left without a job right in at the end of my undergrad. I remember being miserable. But a few weeks later, I found the job that led to my graduate postion.

Back to that non-linear career

There is just so much in the world, so much available to you. The need to find the “right choice” is something that, in my opinion, we no longer need in 2022. We have so many options that we have the privilege of experimenting with our career. And to me, that’s the most exciting thing about career. Because today I am in co-op, yesterday (not literally) I was in the lab, and tomorrow I may be in IT, the point being: I have options and it’s never the end of the world if the first career I choose does not end up working out.

I have been out of school for more than a decade now, and it took years to feel like I was lifted above heavy clouds — finally able to see clearly part of why I had been unhappy, and how I could start to get better. I am still working on my way to my own success and I hope this post inspires you to do the same!

Disclaimer: I have presented a lot of personal opinions here and in doing so, I do not intend to represent anyone else or any organizations that I am affiliated with. This is purely a personal reflection.

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Short Story: Animals for a Better World

mixed bathing cats and dogsThe warm summer sun hung silently over the huge grassy meadow where a  very large gathering of animals discussed various worldly issues in many languages. Great Lion surveyed the assembly. Most of the delegates were there. A few had refused to attend, and others had become extinct since the last summit. However, he recognized most of the old faces as friends and allies. It seemed like years since he had seen some of them, ten years to be exact. The United Society of Animals for a Better World met only once a decade, because it was so difficult to gather a representative from each species.

Dozens of the earth’s most intelligent species had spent months compiling the seating arrangement. Cat and Mouse no longer sat near each other after the last meeting’s incident. The thoughtful lion recalled the funeral, and what a poignant ceremony it had been. The new mouse was not permitted to sit by Elephant either; she would have to sit by the microphone, near the insects in order to be heard.

Lion scanned the long agenda before him. They would be discussing some very heated issues, and he estimated that the debates would last well over a week. “I hereby call this meeting to order,” he roared. He had everyone’s undivided attention, save for a few multi­visioned insects and reptiles. “The first topic on the agenda is the housing problem in South America. I believe Macaw has a report on that.”

The brightly plumed parrot tipped his head and shuffled through numerous important-looking documents. “Aauk! Yes I have,” the distinguished bird began, “the housing problem in South America has gotten considerably worse, particularly in the rain forests. Our homes are savagely burned daily; whole species are dying out as I stand before you. The cause of all this destruction has been pinpoi … ”

All this time Lion heard the faint sound of chewing. It was slowly growing louder, and it was beginning to distract some of the less focused delegates. He scanned through the throng of animals. “Stop that immediately!” he roared. Embarrassed, the young blacktail deer paused, his mouth agape with a succulent corner of leaf hanging from it. “What rule do we have about eating while the discussions are in session?” the lion growled, showing his teeth.

“It’s only a little cabbage,” the nervous buck stuttered.

“Listen,” Lion sighed patiently. It seemed that he always had to
bring this up, “If we allow the herbivores to eat, we have to let everyone eat, including the carnivores.” The deer glanced at the bear and the leopard beside him and mumbled an apology.

“Ahem.” The now slightly displeased parrot cleared his throat as loudly as possible. “The cause of all this mindless death is the humans. They are burning our homes and killing millions. They destroy entire species without a second thought. Of course, killing is natural to many species, but only to survive. There seems no point in their wiping out everything.”

“Apparently,” Lion said, “this is going to overlap the other issues concerning the humans. It will be taken up again at a later date. I suggest that we move on to the next order of business.”

As the days passed, laws were approved and committees were formed. Lists of newly evolved and recently extinct species were read. Finally, the last day of assembly arrived. There was only one area of discussion left, but it was one that caused much tension among the delegates: The humans. “It was decided that at the end of our last decade’s meeting that,” Lion said, trying to enter the touchy subject as delicately as possible, “we should continue our attempts to reduce the human population. Our main plan of action has been studied by our Diseasing Committee. They have a report.”

A large swarm of flying, buzzing, and biting insects approached the microphone. They squeaked and wheezed various phrases with enough effort to make their report coherent. “We … we … have attempted to in … inject many diseases into … to the human environment. Un … unfortunately, they spread slow … ly. The humans are somehow avoiding … and even eradicating the diseases. We suggest a continuation of our program … for another decade,” and with that the committee flew back to their places.

“I say,” Garter Snake hissed, “I say we attack ’em in their sleep!” Garter snakes are a rather pitiful species of snakes, but they like to sound tough.

“I think we should leave them alone,” Dachshund yipped.

“That’s because you live with one,” Zebra rebuked.

“That has nothing to do with it,” stated the diminutive dog, trying to hide her dog tag. At that very moment, her owner was wondering what had happened to his poor pooch. Never would he have guessed that his prize-winning dachshund was arguing in favor of the human race.

“I agree that something has to be done about those humans,” Elephant remarked, “but I think that total extinction is not what we are looking for.”

Suddenly, Yak exclaimed, “Banishment!”

“Where to?” Ground Squirrel asked.

“To the deepest, darkest corner of a bottomless pit where every one of their wretched souls are eternally trapped,” Cockroach spat, followed by a crazed laugh. Cockroaches are a bit odd.

“That won’t work,” Sparrow chirped.

“Well, I guess we’ll just have to go with my idea,” the garter snake commented, sounding very self-satisfied.

“So!” the animals chorused, “They must be destroyed! They must be wiped out!” Animals clucked, screeched, growled and roared their agreement that the humans should be done away with.

Suddenly, Lion realized that he was authorizing the almost pointless  destruction of an entire species. He quickly regained control of the assembly with a loud roar. The delegates sat in a stunned silence as he revealed his startling discovery. The lion went on, “I say we continue our previous plan of action for another decade. All those in favor say ‘Aye.'” The animals, still shocked with what they had proposed, mumbled aye. “Meeting adjourned,” concluded Lion.

The tiring days of debating were over. The animals had not accomplished as much as they had hoped, but they learned something about each other. Of course, with the way that an animal’s mind works, the controversial topics would soon be forgotten by the next decade, and there would be many new problems to discuss.

A short story that I wrote in Grade 11. First published in The Environment: exploring fiction, poetry, and non-fiction (1995, Harcourt Brace & Company) 

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10 Days on Kauai: What to do on the Garden Island (with kids)

Having enjoyed our Spring Break on the Big Island in 2017,  we were determined to trade in the west coast rain and wind one more time for a dose of tropical sun and sand.

We booked our flights to Kauai in August and then my mom was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. We decided to carry on with our plan to find our tropical paradise.

Once again, we loaded up the kids’ iPads with games to keep them busy on the 6-hour evening flight.

Kauai is the second Hawaiian island for my family and we were excited to explore.

We spent 10 days on Kauai and we took a very chilled-out island-life pace to our activities. I believe we found some of the best family-friendly adventures that Kauai has to offer.

If you’re planning a trip to Kauai, below are my recommendations on what to do with your young family and where to eat on the Garden Island:

Day 1: Wednesday

Poipu beach & Pool

We stayed at the Parrish Collection Regency at Poipu. We woke up early and headed to the nearby Living Foods Market for some breakfast essentials like a gorgeous white pineapple, some cute apple bananas and some fresh roasted coffee.

We kids walked down to Poipu Beach Park, about 10 min away, and saw a pod of dolphins playing.  Our condo was stocked with beach chairs and an umbrella, so we planned to return later on.

We spent the rest of our first day lounging by the one of the resort’s pools, rehydrating with cold drinks, and nursing jet lag. There were two family pool areas, one just steps from our condo that was a good size, but chilly.

We picked up more groceries from the Koloa Big Save Market including pretty much every packaged item that mentioned it was Hawaiian – Maui onion chips, Kauai Plantation rum punch, cases of delicious Kona Brewing Co. and Maui brewing beer, Hawaiian BBQ sauce.

Day 2: Thursday

Poipu beach, Brennekes, Glass beach, Port Allen, Kauai Kookie Co, Kauai Coffee, Fire Show

We headed back to Poipu Beach for the morning to play in the waves before the tropical sun got too hot and high. We were so lucky to have some turtles swim right onto the beach. We cooled off with shave ice from Brennekes and then headed back to the townhouse.

After lunch back at our townhouse, we hopped in the car and headed west to Glass Beach and Port Allen.  Glass Beach is at the end of the road that used to lead to a municipal dump, so we had to pass through a relatively industrial area in order to get to the parking area. Just over the bluff, there were two endangered ring seals that had hauled out for a rest. Glass Beach also has some black sand at the westermost end.

We explored the small shops in Port Allen and watched folks who had signed up to do boat tours glug their dramamine.  We had a snack at the most western brewery in the world and we enjoyed a flight. The brewery sold these giant cans instead of growlers (a crowler?) so we picked up a couple to enjoy later. IPAs have made it to Kauai, but they didn’t have a single sour on their menu!

The road to Port Allen goes right past Kauai Coffee Co. So we stopped in for a self-guided tour and a tasting. We also picked up 4 lbs to enjoy at home.

After dinner, we walked towards the Poipu Hyatt where there was an incredible fire show. We watched from the public walkway and were wowed by the grace and strength of the dancers as their poi reflected in the koi ponds and swimming pools of this incredible hotel.

We watched the full moon rise over Shipwreck Beach and then headed back up the hill to the townhouse.

Day 3: Friday

Waimeia Canyon and Salt Ponds

This was our last day on the south part of Kauai. We took one last walk down to Poipu Beach and then packed up and headed back

Day 4: Saturday

Hanalei and Princeville

Surfing the North Shore.

Day 5: Sunday

Kilauea, Sushi

Day 6: Monday

Day 7: Tuesday

Tubing

Day 8: Wednesday

Hanalei, Fancy Dinner

Day 9: Thurday

Anini beach, rainstorms and so many turtles!

Summary

What to Do on Kauai:

  • Brenneke’s beach
  • Surf Hanalei
  • Shopping in Hanalei, Princeville and Kapa’a
  • Waimea Canyon and Falls
  • Tubing
  • Kauai Coffee
  • Snorkeling – Poipu Beach, Salt Ponds, Anini Beach

Where to Eat on Kauai:

  • Kauai Juice Co
  • Koloa fish market
  • Big Save (?)
  • Princeville Resort
  • Shave Ice
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Not the Mayo Clinic guide to death by pancreatic cancer

I am writing this down because the month of October was a tragedy of proportions that I do not want to ever repeat or revisit.

My Dad was frustrated with by the dearth of descriptions for what happens to people who are diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. I hope that this countdown will help answer questions that others out there facing this diagnosis may have.

A couple of days after my Mom’s 71st birthday, my parents left Victoria for a cycling holiday in France. I am so fortunate to have parents who are healthy and active and able to travel.

I kept track of their adventure on Facebook as my Mom never managed to update her email contacts after I changed my address a couple of years ago. They were enjoying all of the food, wine and culture that the city of lights and the surrounding countryside had to offer.

32 Days

For me, the nightmare started with an email from my Dad. I was getting coffee with friends when I read this:

Immediately in shock, I stood there dumb, showing my friends the message until one of them herded me into the sun outside and then back to my office. The ride home felt surreal as my legs had lost all their power and I couldn’t catch my breath even though I was going so slowly. I probably looked drunk.

Once I got home, I texted my aunt who was in dialysis to tell her to check her email. She called me as soon as she knew and we decided to meet at her house.  My other aunt and uncle were already there when I arrived and we hung out like zombies until it was clear that we had done all for each other that we could do.

31 Days

I headed out to the airport hours early to pick my parents up. The waiting was awful because I didn’t know how to expect my Mom.

Relief flooded into every cell of my being as my parents glided through the arrivals gate – they looked the same! My Mom’s always been a very fast walker and I felt my own stress ratchet back step by step as I chased after her across the airport.

The next couple of days passed normally as I gave my parents space to get over their jet lag and my Mom waited to hear back about the results from her blood tests.

28 Days

We invited my parents over for Friday night pizza and made plans for my daughter to come over after school the following week to work on a craft project. Here’s the last text she sent me nagging me to pick up the right type of card stock:

I look back fondly on this week as the brief period that my Mom “just” had cancer.

24 Days

My Mom was asked to return to the hospital for a needle biopsy on the Tuesday after Thanksgiving.

23 Days

When we went over on Wednesday evening to start the craft, my Dad met us at the door to say that Mom had been throwing up all day possibly due to some of the pain medication and that her family doctor was doing a house call.

The dread pressed down heavily as we worked in my Mom’s studio without her there but surrounded by her presence. I tried to put on a brave face for my daughter, but there’s no way she missed it.

22 Days

Shaken up from Wednesday, I avoided my parent’s house in the morning, but decided to go over at lunch. Witnessing the toll that whatever had happened on Wednesday took out of my Mom turned me into a useless worker drone that afternoon.

I would need to find a better time of day to visit. It was clear that I would need to see my Mom every day from now on, but I wasn’t sure how to fit this into my children and work-filled day.

21 Days

My Dad had been invited out on Friday night, so I ordered White Spot and headed over to their house with my box of yam fries.

I found my Mom cocooned on the couch in my Dad’s office, where she’d been since Wednesday. She was lying on her side wrapped in quilts she had made and sat up when I joined her. Her eyes were blinking out-of-sync like a baby owl and her proprioception was way off – she couldn’t itch her nose or get the straw to her mouth.

She showed me the needle biopsy bruise as well as the bruise on her mid-back – a harbinger of what was coming down on us if any of us (including her family doctor) had known what to look for.

I also noticed that she had a lot of other small bruises the size of dimes on her arms as legs as well as pinprick hematomas under her nails. I’m sure I’ve read somewhere that both are signs of serious health problems and I wondered how long that they had been there.

Mom had an MRI booked at the hospital that was about 30 min away, so I stayed with her until the medi-van came to whisk her away. I spent the evening axe throwing to celebrate a friend quitting her job. Never was there a more perfect time to be throwing sharp objects!

19 Days

A ray of light shone, as it was the day that we had planned to make the bulk of the crafts for my daughter’s school project. We picked up her best friend and crowded into my Mom’s studio.

My Mom joined the girls and directed the production line from under a pile of quilts in her rocking chair. I shared tea with my Dad and when I checked in, they were singing Guiding songs together as they worked. It was absolute magic.

I noticed my mom’s dexterity was making her fumble as she prepped the card stock for stamping, but it was so subtle that the kids didn’t notice anything was off.

18 Days

I played the part of the peanut gallery while my parents met with the doctor who carries out medically-assisted death in Victoria. A two hour meeting, with about an hour spent assessing my Mom. She did about as well as I would with spelling things backwards and counting up and down by multiples. The doctor had her draw a clock face which is something that I had read about in ‘Brain on Fire’. This was difficult for her, and even though it was hard to sit quietly while the testing went on, I was relieved to see that the cancer was leaving her mental capacity alone even as it ravaged her physical being.

I returned to work that afternoon in the strangest head space having just met the person who would potentially be ending my Mom’s life.

I think this is the day that my parents got the official results of the liver biopsy – a diagnosis of pancreatic cancer with metastasis to the liver.

16 Days

Having decided that the most effective as far as being helpful/ least upsetting time of day for me to visit was after dropping off my youngest daughter at school, I headed over to my parents.

My dad texted a heads up that my Mom had lost mobility on one side of her body and that I would need to be prepared to help her even more that I had to get her ready for the day.

13 Days

Friends delivered pumpkins

10 Days

I got a text from my Dad in the middle of the night letting me know that he had called an ambulance and that my Mom was in emergency. I told him to try and get some sleep and that I’d head over there as soon as I was able.

I held my Mom’s hand as we waited. She was in so much distress -overheating and clammy and felt like she had an elephant sitting on her chest. My Dad arrived as we waited in a hallway to have a CT scan that would diagnose a clot in her carotid artery. This is probably what had be causing the stroke-like symptoms.

9 Days

Mom spent the night in emergency and received Plaxil, a type of anti-clotting agent that stops clots from forming. Her condition was too fragile for her to receive the other type of anti-clotting drug that could break up the clots that had already formed.

Mom moved into a bed in Hospice, which I immediately started referring to as “The Hotel” because it’s more like home than a hospital.

8 Days

I visited my mom after dropping my daughter off at school. We were both so sad and absolutely not ready to say goodbye.

She said “I met your friends” which I chalked up to the effects of the many drugs she was taking. But then I learned that I have three (!!!) friends who work at Hospice. One of whom kindly gave the grief counselor a heads-up that we would be returning the next day with our kids. Much respect to their work! 

I called a nurse to help her go to the bathroom because I was afraid that I would drop her and she would bleed out internally because of the Plaxil. Mom was being encouraged to drink massive quantities of the same laxative that my cat uses.

7 Days

My girls stayed home from school so we could all go visit Grammy. We showed up way too early and had to wait in the lounge while the nurses helped her wake up. There were some great puzzles that the kids didn’t want to leave.

My Mom’s family doctor got the whole family together to get us all on the same page. He patiently answered all of our questions and made it clear that there was a big risk of blood clots causing more stroke symptoms and my Mom could lose her ability to consent to a medically assisted death.

6 Days

I was heading out the door to Hospice when both girls asked to come along. As they put their shoes on, I marveled at how comfortable Hospice must have felt that they wanted to return.

My daughter’s 11th birthday party. Gratitude for the foresight that we had planned a low, low-key party. 12 girls, pizza, Netflix.

5 Days

Dad noticed Mom’s left foot was not a normal colour. I had the great idea that I wanted to get my Mom to read one of those books you can get at Hallmark so that we would always be able to hear her voice.

4 Days

My daughter’s 11th birthday. Last time complaining to my Mom about family drama. Mom looked quite jaundiced when I came into her room. Her leg was quite painful

3 Days

Mom started a Fentanyl pump and adult diapers.

2 Days

Halloween. As the kids headed down the street to trick-or-treat at neighbours that live close to my parents, my Dad let me know that they had picked a date two days out for my Mom’s death. 9 pounds of candy collected. Heart pumping backyard fireworks.

Dad requested that my sister and I figure out some kind of ceremony for the death. We had an extremely dissatisfying conversation where nothing we came up with seemed right. How could it?

After we got of the phone, I jotted some notes and texted them to her. This became basically what we did.

1 Day

We let the girls know that this would be their last visit with Grammy. We took a little while to let them figure out how they wanted to say goodbye. My little made a book about a horse that was mistreated and then finally made a friend with a cat. They escaped to freedom together.

My eldest chose to sign “Riptide” which was how my Mom’s ukulele band always closed out their shows. She’s got a great voice and we all balled hopelessly as she sang.

My husband took a photo of me cuddling with my Mom in her Hospice bed and it wasn’t until I saw the image on his phone that I realized how frail she looked.

Event Horizon

The Day of the Dead.

Things my kids have said that have broken my heart:

  • I’ll never get to go to France with Grammy
  • Be gentle with me – I’m so sad right now
  • I makes me too sad to talk about it (leaves room)
  • My eyes just start watering for no reason

Things that I’m trying not to regret but are haunting me daily

  • I was always annoyed that my Mom left me voicemails instead of texting. Where it would have been so simple to save just one, I deleted them all.
  • There was just no time. Mom started fentanyl the day I realized that I wanted to get a recording of her reading a book to my kids
  • Two women my age who are leaders in the community called my Mom their mentor. What the heck was I missing?

Things I’m grateful for

  • That we let the relationship between my children and their grandparents grow organically
  • That my Mom was a prolific maker. I sleep under a quilt she made and her handiwork is all over the house.
  • That my Dad is a popular guy – he has a big, strong friends network that can help support him while he figures out what it looks like to have the house to himself
  • That my family all lives so close by
  • That my sister is on maternity leave so she can give me a hug on my lunch break
  • My perfect little lap dog
  • My husband who was able to intercept some of the drama and diffuse the intensity when I couldn’t even

Links to resources

 

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UVic Speaker’s Bureau

Through the UVic Speakers Bureau, I volunteer to speak to community groups, schools, clubs and other organizations throughout Greater Victoria and southern Vancouver Island.

The topics that I put forward this year that I think will appeal to audiences ranging from middle school to seniors are:

Becoming a Competent Digital Citizen

Digital citizenship goes beyond simply using the internet.

Technology needs to be used to create, share, tag, comment and contribute to the online world in positive ways to leave a digital footprint that you can live with.

I will  show you the elements of digital citizenship and how you can be a good digital citizen.

Presented

  • Silver Threads Saanich, September 2018

Shooting Videos for Social Media on Your Phone

Wondering how to film and edit awesome short videos to use on social media?

Learn why short videos work and how to create a hook that captures your viewers’ attention.

You’ll also discover tips for lighting and editing your videos.

Presented

  • Spectrum High School, September 2018

Crafting Your Elevator Pitch

Take a step-by-step approach to building your own elevator pitch that you can use to introduce yourself in a professional setting.

Learn how to describe who you are, what you can do, why you are doing it and what your goals are.

The Non-linear Career Path

While I started out in the sciences, she made a series of career hops to land in the online communications field.

Follow along my career journey to learn how she figured out how to get paid to do something she loves.

Book me to speak to your community group, school, club, or other Greater Victoria organization from September to April—for free!

 

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Shooting videos for social media on your phone

The Office of Student Life invited me to meet with a group of student bloggers who are keen to start storytelling using video. I ran through my top tips and I hope that they will be able to put the put tips to use making their blog engaging and informative!

Useful Apps

This list was provided by the UVic video coordinator:

  • Cinematography – Flixel, Cinemagraph
  • Special Effects – Super Power FX, Efexio
  • GIFs – Boomerang
  • Timelapse – Filmic Pro
  • Stop motion – Stop Motion Studio
  • Whiteboard animation – VideoScribe (useful to explain more complex topics)

Tips

  • Plan before you shoot: get a handle on the story you are going to tell, the locations you will use, your power supply, editing and accessories you will need
  • If you are interviewing subjects, make sure you have high quality sound by using a Rode mic or Lav mic
  • Keep each clip to under 15s
  • Keep your camera oriental horizontally
  • Use a tripod and image stabilization software
  • Don’t zoom in
  • Keep videos for Facebook and Instagram under 30s
  • Keep accessibility in mind: If people are speaking, turn on closed captions in YouTube; if you have captions, add these into the CC file in YouTube
  • You can use the YouTube captions to generate an .srt file and then use this as your subtitle file if you’re posting to Facebook
  • The libraries have lots of AV equipment for students to borrow like microphones and tripods

Editing your video

  1. Import clips
  2. Order the clips
  3. Add text
  4.  Trim clips
  5. Add music (make sure it’s under the creative commons license or Youtube will lay adds over your video).
  6. Export as an MP4 file for upload to social media

Useful links

 

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Top tips for using Hootsuite for Twitter

My Hootsuite Dashboard

I use the free version of Hootsuite and have set up my dashboard with four tabs:

Hootsuite dashboard

  • Interactions – Keeps track of my scheduled tweets, retweets and mentions. I make sure to acknowledge every person that takes the time to interact with me.
  • Listening – Has all the keywords I’m following and is dynamic. For example, I follow #HESM and #hootchat so I can follow along when people chat about these topics
  • Apps – You want to talk when your follower are listening to you, which means that you need to find out when they’re online. I have a number of apps installed on this tab and will cover my favourite one below. To see more of the app I like to use, go here.
  • Lists – This is my “social listening” tab. I have curated a list of the students who follow me in order to gage what they want to know without following them back.

Figuring out when to tweet

There are a huge number of apps to help you figure out what’s going on with your audience.

I rarely use the Hootsuite autoscheduler because it chooses a time for your tweet to go out based on when your tweets have performed the best. As this is based on historical tweet performance, I prefer to use the Audisense app.

One of the most useful features in Audisense is their ‘Best Time to Tweet’ report. The free version analyzes the timelines of your top 100 followers and then generates a weekly report that shows when you should be tweeting to reach the most people. You can then schedule your Tweets accordingly. Audisense also tells you more where your followers live and the languages they speak.

Because I schedule most of my posts way in advance at times that I can be sure my audience is paying attention, I can spend more time engaging with my followers.

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5 free tools for social community management and growth

Here’s a list of my favourite free social media tools of the moment. I use these tools in addition to Hootsuite.

Here are my tools, what I think their most useful features are and how often I check in:

  1. Crowdfire – Currently my favourite tool because of their recently updated Android app that perscribes actions once a day to increase engagement on Twitter and Instagram.
  2. Tweepi – Find Twitter followers from interesting accounts so you can follow them too. Many search metrics and filters to narrow your target. I log in to this page once a month and then watch my followers climb.
  3. Audisense – Analysis of Twitter follows/followers for any account. Learn basic characteristics such as location, demographics, and online activity by the hour, and the always useful Best Time to Tweet report that uses a
  4. Commun.it – Follow Friday helpers, shows who your biggest new followers and most engaged followers are. Very spammy auto-DM.
  5. Meshfire – uses AI to suggest new followers and possible posts. The mobile app is buggy on Android.

Want to see how I set up my Hootsuite Dashboard? Go here.

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Getting ready to be a “Career Paths Outside Academia” panelist

Pathways to Success is a graduate student conference hosted by Co-op and Career Services. The number of students finishing graduate degrees outpaces the opportunities in more traditional academic career tracks, and UVic has to help new grad prepare for this reality.

While I have an MSc in biochemistry from UVic and I worked in the field for almost a decade, I transitioned to a career in student affairs six years ago. People are often curious to hear how I managed this transition. Co-op and Career Services contacted me to help out on a panel discussing how to transfer skills from an academic environment to other opportunities.

I’m going to use this post as a whiteboard to store my ideas as I prepare for the panel. First, the moderator will ask me and the other two panelists to situate ourselves in terms of education, career and current role.

My role

Web and Communications coordinator for the Office of the Registrar (OREG). This office belongs to Student Affairs, so I consider myself to be a student affairs professional. This helps me to tap into the professional organization associated with this role. My communications role is both external and internal facing. I manage the content at uvic.ca/current-students, /registrar, /safa, /summer, and askuvic.ca as well at the @uvicregistrar twitter account. I also edit a newsletter that goes out across campus every month. I also produce print and digital material to let the campus know how OREG can serve them.

Work environment

I work in an open concept office with lots of pods of desks. I have my own office but it can get noisy as some groups prefer to have standup meetings in their clusters. It’s a big office, employing over 100 people.

One thing that surprised me when I started was that everyone was wearing headphones. I had always interpreted this as a red flag for problems in the office, but in this case it appears to be just a mechanism to cope with the noise.

Of course it goes without saying that working on campus lends itself to a great work-life balance. It’s easy to head over to CARSA or around the chip trail at lunch.

Work culture

Everyone in OREG worked together to develop a team charter and one of my first jobs when I joined to office was to put these values on a poster that is prominent all over the office, so I feel like people are very aware of how they fit in to the bigger OREG picture.

Three employee groups work together (two unions and management), so you need to know what is appropriate timing-wise. Some people work longer hours and others are on a modified work week. It can be difficult to co-ordinate meetings or even a coffee break with colleagues.

There’s a lot of committee work, and at first I was surprised by how this affected the pace of work.

How my workday is structured

I work about 35 hr/week Monday-Friday. Because I look after the social media for the office, my phone never really leaves my side. I check in at breakfast and then throughout the day until about 10 pm. Because these check-ins generally take less than 5 min, I don’t count overtime. I spent most of my time either in my office working on projects and triageing email. I spend a couple of hours per day in meetings.

Recruitment process

UVic posts jobs on all the common job boards, but I was first hired through a personal connection. I started on a three-month contract that got extended into a permanent position. I leveraged the experience I gained in that role to get my current job.

toolkit

Questions to expect

Please describe your work and how it contributes to the success of your organization

My work help future and current students find the information they need to earn their degrees.

What are some of the most valuable skills in your work? Which kind of experiences enabled you to develop these skills?

My most valuable skill is to be able to listen to what people need. I am in one or two meetings a day where I am gathering requirements. I am helping to get information online for a procedure and rule-oriented group. Being able to translate what needs to be said into a format that is friendly enough for a first-year student to understand while still being accurate. My work as an academic advisor helped hone this ability as I heard the common types of questions over and over.

I have administered a number of large surveys, so an affinity for a giant Excel spreadsheet is valuable when it comes to analyzing the results. My science background is definitely an asset here.

What are some of the challenges and rewards in your line of work?

Feedback about my work can sometimes feel overly negative. I certainly experienced it this way when my first website went live. I now know to expect this and that it is simply a way that feedback sometimes comes in.

Rewards come in finding the heroic student stories that are out there and getting the word out. One of the OREG work-study students stopped by the office to say goodbye on her graduation day. She brought along her Mum who had flown for the first time from Nigeria for the ceremony. We were able to get a photo of her standing with UVic’s Chancellor and Registrar to share.

What are some of the important steps on your career path?

Deciding to leave science and get into a field where I could interact with a bigger variety of people. Gaining a technical skill set. Always learning. Being honest with myself.

Please describe how your graduate studies influenced your career development.

It helped me to mature and become confident enough in my skills that I know I’ll succeed along whichever path I choose.

What kinds of experiences would you encourage for anybody pursuing a career in your field?

Figure out what the trends are and teach yourself these skills. Either through one-off courses or on your own time. Build a portfolio of projects.