Panel

The Indigenous Institutes Consortium (IIC) partnered with Regional Assessment Resource Centre (RARC), Find Our Power Together, and the IIC Wellness Implementation Working Group to co-develop an online Wellness Resource for students to take leadership of their wellness journeys, and apply their learnings in the classroom. In our presentation, Marsha Josephs (IIC), Marie McCarron (RARC), Taylor Smoke (Iohahi:io), and Hailey Thomas (Six Nations Polytechnic) will unveil the final version of the Pathways to Wellness course in a live demonstration and discuss how this resource will be impactful to the Indigenous Institutes’ students.

Last year, a Wellness Toolkit was developed as a resource guide for each Indigenous Institute that was customized to reflect each of their community traditions, cultural practices, and incorporate local community resources. This year, Indigenous Institutes are implementing the Wellness Tool-kit and have co-developed an interactive online resource, the “Pathways to Wellness” course, for students to manage their mental health and overall wellness. This resource can be adapted to support the wellness for staff and community. This will ultimately contribute to the Indigenous Learner Success stream of the symposium as students are able to build and reflect on their mental health and wellness journey through this resource from a culturally relevant perspective.

The learning outcomes that will result from this presentation include: gaining knowledge on how to develop an interactive wellness resource that reflects Indigenous culture and symbology, apply various communication techniques and activities to increase engagement and to support the development of self-advocacy of Indigenous learners.