In June 2015, MGEU member Valdine Flaming was selected by her union to attend the Prairie School for Women, an intensive four-day course where union women develop their personal and leadership skills.
“I was still young, but I’d been living with multiple sclerosis for some time,” Flaming says. “Learning how to be an activist helped shift my focus from being a sufferer of a chronic illness to advocating for disability rights in general.”
Once elected to the union’s Equality and Human Rights Committee, her passion grew. In 2016, she decided to take a leave from her job and pursue a Master’s degree in disability studies.
“Receiving a $1,000 MGEU bursary to help with the cost of my U of M courses was a great launching pad,” she says. “It helped give me the confidence to apply for other funding, including the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Scholarship (QES).”
Thanks to the QES, she spent three months last year in New Zealand, working to evaluate health programs aimed at preventing chronic conditions among the Maori people.
“It was life-changing,” she says. “I’d always struggled a bit with my Metis identity, not sure how explain it, or speak up. Thanks to my experience with Indigenous people in Whanganui, I’ve come back unafraid to lead.”
Now finished her coursework, Flaming is back at her job as UCN’s Executive Advisor to the VP of Strategic Services & Development and has just started her thesis research.
“I’m hoping to focus on the lived experiences of Metis women with chronic illness,” she says.