Description
Sheila Cote-Meek is Anishinaabe from the Teme-Augama Anishnabai. She is a professor and interim vice-provost, Indigenous Engagement at Brock University. Dr. Cote-Meek co-edited Decolonizing and Indigenizing Education in Canada (2020); Critical Reflections and Politics on Advancing Women in the Academy (2020); and Perspectives on Indigenous Pedagogy in Education: Learning from One Another (2023). She is well-known nationally for her work in advancing Indigeneity, equity and inclusion in higher education. Jacqueline Ottmann is Anishinaabe (Saulteaux) from Fishing Lake First Nation in Saskatchewan. She was an elementary teacher and high school teacher and principal. In her post-secondary career, Jacqueline was the Coordinator of the First Nations, Métis, Inuit undergraduate teacher education program, Director of Indigenous Education Initiatives, and Provost, Indigenous Strategy at the University of Calgary. Jacqueline is also the first Indigenous person to become President of the Canadian Society for the Study of Education. She has been recognized as an international researcher, advocate, and change-maker whose purpose is to transform practices inclusive of Indigenous leadership, methodologies, and pedagogies.
In the wake of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, Sheila Cote-Meek examines how post-secondary institutions have responded to demands for reconciliation, Indigenization, and systemic change. Drawing on the voices of Indigenous students and professors, the second edition explores both the progress that has been made since the TRC and the enduring challenges that continue to shape Indigenous experiences in higher education. Important institutional post-TRC shifts include curricular and pedagogical changes, increased Indigenous faculty and staff and Indigenous spaces on campuses, expanded student supports, and heightened awareness of Indigenous histories and contemporary realities. At the same time, Indigenous students and professors continue to navigate racism, tokenism, and the burden of representation within institutions that remain grounded in colonial structures. Performative responses to reconciliation can reinforce, rather than dismantle, systemic inequities, while placing disproportionate labour on Indigenous faculty.
Grounded in lived experience and rigorous scholarship, the second edition of Colonized Classrooms offers a powerful analysis of the tensions and possibilities facing post-secondary education today. Cote-Meek challenges institutions to move beyond symbolic gestures and toward genuine, accountable, and transformative change.