At the end of the year, associate vice-president of Indigenous Relations Jean Becker will be retiring after decades of shaping Indigenous education and advocacy at UW. Starting early on in her life, she has actively been thinking about Indigenous communities and the true history of Canada. Becker is Inuk and a member of the Nunatsiavut Territory of Labrador, while living in Ontario for the past 50 years.

As a young student in university, she was in an institution with only one Indigenous professor whose class she never had the chance to take. There was virtually no Indigenous presence in her community. 

During her time in university, she began questioning everything she knew about Canada’s historical roots and how everything she was taught began with Europeans, making her feel like Indigenous peoples and history were treated secondary to the European history taught. 

Recalling her visits to reserves and speaking with Indigenous community members, she states, “I remember an old man that talked about our culture and population as being poverty stricken, but he said, ‘We were not poor, we had everything we needed until they came and killed our animals. We lived in these resource rich conditions, it was a rich life. Food was easy to find.’ There were stories about being able to walk across the backs of fish across the river because there were so many.”

As she continued her education, Becker began incorporating Indigenous topics into everything she did, like essays and assignments, as a way to forge her own Indigenous education. Then, in the late 1990s, she began her journey at UW, teaching an Indigenous course at United College, previously named St. Paul’s. “Teaching the course was the first opportunity to explore what an Indigenous education looks like. I was also learning from elders and knowledge keepers about an Indigenous perspective on the country and politics. [It] helped me come to a different understanding of the country and who I could be in the country.” 

Becker’s career continued at the Wilfrid Laurier University (WLU), as she was offered the opportunity to develop an Indigenous-led social program. By working with elders and Indigenous scholars, her goal was to ground it in “Indigenous methodology, scholarship, knowledge and to make it a different experience for Indigenous students,” Becker explained. 

Then, in what was a significant moment that she continued to recall throughout her career, Becker was approached by a student who told her it was the first time she entered the classroom and felt like she could truly be herself in the class. This student’s comment continued to motivate her throughout the years to keep trying to ensure that there are spaces for Indigenous peoples where Canadians understand the country’s true history. 

When she returned to UW in 2020, a task force recognized that the university needed an organized, Indigenous operation integrated throughout the campus. As she was hired on her own, she began building a team while creating and further understanding why Indigenous knowledge and services were needed for the whole campus. 

A big challenge she recognized was tackling the curricula at UW and seeing how students can come and go without encountering any Indigenous-related education. She voiced the need for more Indigenous faculty and curricula at UW. “The curriculum is still not designed. You can’t go from ‘Indigenous 101’ into more detailed Indigenous courses. That would be my goal, to work towards curriculum development.” Becker also believes that what works for Indigenous students works for everyone. Methodology that promotes discussion and interaction, as she had previously done in her classrooms, is conducive to all students and humanizes space.

What is the proper way to do it? It would require working from the foundation, with Indigenous consultation and partnership. It would also mean providing better training for researchers and scholars on what Indigenous knowledge actually is and how to effectively work with the community which requires building relationships. She hoped that the future of Indigenous education will be more integrated into Canadian education and that the inclusion of land-based learning will become a part of standard education. Scientists, scholars, and researchers should recognize Indigenous ways of knowing and being as a legitimate way of being educated.

Throughout her time as associate vice president, Becker advocated for the hiring of Indigenous peoples across campus. She also worked on building better relationships with treaty holders with the territories that UW stands on. UW is situated within Treaty 3 and Becker states, “[The] Six Nations have handkerchief sized pieces of land and the rest of their land is occupied by us.” 

Another notable accomplishment during her office is creating greater physical presence for Indigenous peoples on campus, including the Indigenous Outdoor Gathering Space outside of PAC. “Visible signs that Indigenous people are here and we exist is an important part of what we’re doing. Hopefully, [it] paves the way for more acceptance that we have a role and have a place here,” Becker says. 

Becker has helped bridge a relationship for the university and Indigenous communities, having implemented a tuition waiver for students from Six Nations, Mississauga of the Credit, and the Haldimand Tract. As she visited their communities, she recognized the need for this implementation, observing massive waiting lists for education, coupled with a lack of funding to help students. 

UW has been supportive during her time in the role, and Becker recognizes the importance of being in the executive level of leadership in terms of impact and decision making. She has been able to make suggestions and changes to the institution authentically. As senior leadership changes with the appointment of a new university president, Becker states, “I hope that those changes don’t impede the progress we have made so far. And people that come into these roles recognize the importance of what we’re doing in this office.” 

As for advice to her future successors and everyone in general, she importantly and simply states, “Believe in yourself. Believe in other people. We don’t get anything done by ourselves in reality, there’s always other people that help you and other people that get things done. Believe in yourself and other people. Believe that the vision you have for this work is the right thing to do and it’s going to make better lives for other people.” 

Throughout her time in the role, she learned to stop limiting herself and making assumptions about how people would react to her thoughts, visions, and suggestions. She consistently reminds herself as to why she does this, reflecting on visiting young children at reserves and working to create opportunities for them. “It is about the community and it’s about our people. Doing something to restore culture and community and build a different world so we can be in the world as ourselves and don’t need to adapt to the world and other people.”

This is greatly reflected throughout Becker’s journey. Her path was intertwined with Melissa Ireland’s journey. Ireland works as the director at the Office of Indigenous Relations along with Becker. But before that, Ireland was an undergraduate student at UW and met Becker in 2003 when she was an Aboriginal student counsellor. “She supported me [in] finding community and culture, helped with home sickness, gave me strength and confidence to be who I am outside of my community and it was life changing,” Ireland said. 

They continued to work together at WLU and at UW they worked on student association pieces and planned their first Powwow together. Ireland states, “Jean is a force, an inspiration, [and has] made so many important contributions to the University of Waterloo and across post secondary across the country. [She has] inspired students, created innovative programming, and formed connections that have been life changing for Indigenous inclusion.” 

And for Becker’s final message to share with UW? She wants everyone to think about interconnectedness. “You have to recognize that your health is directly [related] to the health of the planet, to all things to other people but also to the life on the planet. Struggles of the butterflies? You should be worried, you should ask yourself, ‘How can I help?’ Looking for ways to help others in the end benefits you. We don’t recognize that we have to look at ourselves. Tied to all the rest of it because we’re interconnected which is a beautiful thing to be given this life — to be alive and experience the air and water and fire and earth.”

Becker has been fundamental in trailblazing a path for Indigenous communities, creating change across UW that will impact future generations of Indigenous students and the UW community as a whole.