University of Alberta

Faculty Member, Educational Policy Studies

Associate Professor

Educational Policy Studies, Faculty of Education

About

My research and scholarship are shaped by a passion for issues of global transformation, the preservation of the biosphere and the contribution of Indigenous ontologies and epistemologies.
Current funded research: 
Energy Development and the Prosperity and Wellbeing of Aboriginal Communities in Northern Alberta. P.I. Co-investigators: Professor Mark Nuttal, U. of Alberta, Assoc. Professor Clifford Cardinal, U. of Alberta. (Social Sciences and Health Research Council of Canada Northern Research Initiative Grant).

Previous funded research:
Global Citizenship, Regional Integration and the Revitalisation of Traditional Languages and Cultural Knowledge: Responses to Declining Post-Modern Imperialism. P.I. (Social Sciences and Health Research Council of Canada Standard grant).
I was appointed to the University of Alberta as an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Education in September 2004 and promoted to Associate Professor with tenure in July 2007.
In addition to foundations in education, current teaching includes graduate courses in Indigenous research methods; critical pedagogies for transformation; Indigenous ontologies in the global context; the revitalization of Indigenous languages; contemporay issues in Canadian education; and Issues in First Nations education as an undergraduate course.

Previous to arriving in Canada I held positions at Te Whare Wananga o Awanuiarangi, a New Zealand Maori post-secondary institution where as the Acting Head of Post-graduate Studies I spear-headed the development of a postgraduate program. Courses taught included graduate courses in International Relations, Indigenous Studies and Education.

My Ph.D. was obtained at the University of Auckland under the supervision of Professors Michael Peters and Graham Hinengaro Smith. While undertaking my studies, I taught in limited full-term positions at the University of Auckland and the Auckland College of Education and in short-term positions in the Faculty of Maori and Pacific Development at the University of Waikato. Previous full-time teaching positions in Auckland included Manukau Institute of Technology where I held a full-time lectureship position, Tangaroa College where I served some months as acting-HOD of the Maori Bi-lingual Unit, and Hillary College.