Dr. Debby Wilson Danard (PhD, MEd, BEd) is Anishinaabekwe traditional knowledge practitioner, visual and performance artist, lecturer, writer, water protector, life promotion ambassador and sturgeon clan member from Rainy River First Nation. Growing up, she was raised with her grandmother’s love and commitment to sharing traditional Anishinaabek teachings and way of life. She has actively advanced traditional knowledge, Indigenous research and land as pedagogy, sovereignty and autonomy working with many urban and on-reserve communities and organizations, and several post-secondary institutions. 

Debby is currently a Postdoctral Fellow at Dalla Lana School of Public Health (DLSPH) with Dr. Angela-Mashford Pringle supporting the New Respect Cultural Safety Training. In 2019-2021 she was awarded a University of Toronto Provost Postdoctoral Fellows for Black and Indigenous Scholars to expand the work of her original doctoral research, “Medicine Wheel Surviving Suicide-Strengthening Life Bundle” (2016) that focuses on traditional knowledge as a way tried and true (evidence informed practice) to mobilize life promotion community bundles. Responding to the pandemic, Debby initiated the raising of the Mother Earth Learning Lodge located at New College Quad at the University of Toronto as an opportunity to connect to learning on the land and create space for engaging Indigenous knowledge/teachings/ceremony as an essential aspect of learning. She is the owner of Union Star Consulting Life Teachings Lodge and Matriarch of indigipedia.ca #uncededknowledge

Jessica Penney (she/her) is a Nunatsiavut Inuk researcher whose family is from Rigolet, Nunatsiavut and Carbonear, NL. She was raised in Iqaluit, Nunavut, and for the last 9 years has lived, studied, and worked between Scotland (University of Glasgow), Labrador, and Nunavut. Jessica’s work focuses on the intersections between Inuit health and wellbeing, the land, water, and ice, and settler colonialism. Jessica is also a Research Associate at Qaujigiartiit Health Research Centre and sits on various research review and ethics committees which promote Inuit involvement in research. 

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Jessica’s PhD in Sociology from the University of Glasgow focused on the lived experience of the Muskrat Falls hydroelectric project in Rigolet, Nunatsiavut, as well as community health and safety concerns related to traditional food contamination and changing ice and water conditions. She has a strong interest in Inuit research methodologies and ethics, culturally-informed health risk communications, and settler colonialism’s impacts on social determinants of Inuit health. During her Provost’s Postdoctoral Fellowship, Jessica hopes to continue expanding her research on environmental contaminants amongst young people using creative methods, and she also intends to explore methods for evaluating Inuit health programming and policies.

Dr. Amy Shawanda is an Odawa Kwe from Wikwemikong, ON. Amy obtained her PhD at Trent University with a focus on Anishinaabe Motherhood. She is a Provost Post-Doctoral Fellow in the Dalla Lana School of Public Health in the Waakebiness-Bryce Indigenous Health Institute working with Angela Mashford-Pringle. Amy’s research interests primarily lie within strengthening the Indigenous health and well-being, Indigenous methods and methodologies, Storytelling and Anishinaabe thinking, doing, knowing, living and reclaiming our ways of life. 

Dr. Tammy Maclean is a CIHR Post Doctoral Health System Impact Fellow (2021-2023) working to understand the influence of Indigenous-led policies and practices at Women's College Hospital towards organizational efforts on Reconciliation. For the past year, her research has focused on the development and evaluation of an Indigenous Cultural Safety Training for health and social services professionals. She is  currently based at the Centre for Wise Practices in Indigenous Health, at Women's College Hospital and at the Waakebiness Bryce Institute for Indigenous Health at the University of Toronto.