Miss Chapleau 2022 advocating for change
By Kelly Anne Smith
SAULT STE. MARIE— Katrina Keech has set her sights on the Miss North Ontario Regional Canada scholarship pageant crown. As Miss Chapleau 2022, Keech has been working to fulfill her delegate responsibilities as she studies at Algoma University.
In conversation from the Algoma University Sault Ste. Marie campus, Keech says she is concentrated on the environmental aspect of the biology sector.
“I’m more interested in the environmental part of it. I’m taking some environmental science classes as well to focus a little bit more on my interest,” says the 19-year-old member of Mississauga #8 First Nation. “I’d like to be possibly a biologist for the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry (MNRF) at one point because I’ve worked with them as a student in the past. And I enjoy doing that.”
Keech already has years of experience.
“I’ve done ranger positions as a student ranger through Ontario Park and I’ve also worked in an assistant technician position through the MNRF. I started working with them when I was young.”
With the Miss North Ontario pageant on the weekend of May 13-15 fast approaching, Keech is fulfilling her pageant obligations.
“There are a couple of things we do beforehand. One of them is that we have to host a fundraiser to raise donations for Northern Ontario Families with Children with Cancer, which is a charity Miss Northern Ontario is associated with. Every year they do the pageant, all the delegates have to produce some type of fundraiser.”
NOFCC‘s mission is to provide hope, support, advocacy and education to families who have a child with cancer. Miss Northern Ontario has raised $336,000 for NOFCC since 2006.
The COVID-19 pandemic has forced delegates to get creative, says Keech.
“I’ve been fundraising online. Normally there would be a lot more time to work on it. This year with COVID-19, it ended up being pushed back all the way until last November. So, it was around Christmas that we were becoming delegates and know that we were going to be involved in this,” she recalls. “So, what I’ve done is, my mom makes beadwork. Anyone who wants to donate can e-transfer to put funds towards my donation. I’m going to have a random name generator, I’ll put everybody inside that and someone will win beadwork of a set of earrings, a popsocket, and a lanyard that my mom has beaded.”
Winning the contest will be great to help with university tuition, Keech points out.
“If you win, you get scholarship money. They have different awards and each award you would get different amounts of scholarship money. It might be $2,000 if you win the Miss North Ontario title. Then you can go onto higher pageants and win even more later on.”
Members of the public can sponsor a delegate of the Miss North Ontario Regional Canada Scholarship Pageant, where self promotion is encouraged.
“They recommend pageant promotions, so the more people that hear about it the better.
You can make a Facebook page or Instagram page (@misschapleau2022) to share what you are working on. It let’s people know about yourself which helps for the People’s Choice Awards in April. It also lets people in your community and other people know about you and know that you are participating and that they have the option to vote.”
New to pageantry, Katrina has reached out to 2017 Miss Chapleau who won Miss Northern Ontario.
“Emma Morrison won Miss Teenage Canada and went on to Mexico to participate in a big, big pageant. I asked her a few questions on what to expect, how she’s done things, and asked her opinion on a few ideas I’ve had. It is nice to have someone to ask.”
Miss Chapleau 2022 says growing up in Chapleau definitely had a lot to do with choosing Biology for a career.
“There is not very much to do. There isn’t a theatre. There isn’t anything in a building to do if you wanted to hang out with your friends. It almost had to be outside or at somebody’s house,” she explains. “I learned skiing with my friends and with my dad and my uncle, we would always go fishing or hunting. I spent a lot of time outside camping and doing all types of outdoor activities. That sparked the interest for me.”
Keech has a message for everyone about climate change: find out what is happening in the world.
“The one thing I can say is do your research and know what is happening. With my courses, I’m learning how little I knew about the climate and how things have been changing. We are losing different species, completely extinct, at a rate of 10 every single day.”
Keech will speak out out on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls with her pageant platform.
“We all get to pick our own platform and we get a couple of different opportunities to talk about it. I’m going to be representing Indigenous women’s issues. I get a chance to do a speech in front of everybody. The main thing I want to talk about is Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls crisis.”
“Indigenous women are five times more likely to experience violence than any other Canadians and four times more likely to be murdered than non-Indigenous female victims. This is a national crisis! It affects Indigenous women throughout Canada and the United States yet it is still an underrepresented issue. More needs to be done to bring our sisters home,” she writes on her Facebook page.