Pic Mobert citizen named Fellow of the University
By Rick Garrick
THUNDER BAY—Pic Mobert’s Beverly Sabourin was named a Fellow of the University during Lakehead University’s June 1 convocation ceremony at the Thunder Bay Community Auditorium in Thunder Bay.
“I am truly honoured and very deeply touched because I feel like this has been a great place for me,” Sabourin says. “I am a graduate from Lakehead and I have a lot invested in this place.”
Sabourin graduated with a BA in Sociology from Lakehead University in the early 1980s after studying part-time beginning in the late 1970s.
“I was working and did my degree part-time,” Sabourin says. “At that time I wasn’t really sure what area I should have gone into.”
Sabourin later studied social work at McGill University in Montreal and graduated with a BSW and a MSW.
“My lifelong goal was to become a social worker,” Sabourin says. “And I have done a lot of work in the social services field throughout my life, but mostly concentrating on education.”
Sabourin was employed as the first Indigenous coordinator/counsellor for Indigenous Support Services at Lakehead University from 1986-1989.
“My job at the time was to establish Native support services, which now is known as the Aboriginal Cultural Support Services,” Sabourin says. “It was the time when more and more young Aboriginal students were wanting to seek higher education. And student organizations at the time were recognizing there was a need to establish some supports for those students.”
Sabourin was also the first vice-provost of Aboriginal Initiatives to be appointed at Lakehead University, from 2007 until she retired in 2012.
“I like to believe that I am a seed planter,” Sabourin says. “Back in the mid-1980s, I planted several seeds in terms of what needed to be done in the institution to attract Aboriginal students, to recruit Aboriginal students, to retain Aboriginal students, and that was to set up those kinds of services and supports, not just social, cultural and academic, but even Aboriginal programming and curriculum and content courses and faculty and staff and community-based research and an advisory council, which now is the Ogimaawin-Aboriginal Governance Council.”
Sabourin adds that she worked with the Faculty of Education in 1987 or 1988 to set up a summer access program for young Aboriginal students to get into the education field.
“Coming back in 2007, I saw now that the [Native] Access Program was developed in the 1990s,” Sabourin says. “So to me, that was a seed planted that grew.”
Sabourin also helped initiate and develop Lakehead University’s Gichi Kendaasiwin Centre, a hub for Indigenous students and the wider community that the provincial government announced plans to invest $10 million into over three years on May 7.
Sabourin was named as a Fellow of the University along with Jim Symington and Pentti Paularinne, who were named during the June 2 convocation ceremony at the Thunder Bay Community Auditorium. Ron MacLean, a Canadian sports broadcaster, Robert Deluce, president and CEO of Porter Airlines, and Sheldon Levy, former Ryerson University president and deputy minister of Advanced Education and Skills Development, were also presented with honorary degrees during the June 2 convocation ceremony.
“These individuals are being recognized for their exceptional accomplishments along with the achievements of our students who will graduate this year,” said Moira McPherson, interim president and vice-chancellor at Lakehead University.
Lakehead University celebrated more than 1,700 graduates from the Thunder Bay campus and more than 400 graduates from the Orillia campus this year.