Project Team
The Project Team
Dr. Rob McMahon
Dr. Rob McMahon is an Associate Professor in the Media and Technology Studies program in the Department of Political Science at the University of Alberta. He teaches in the Master of Arts in Communication and Technology program. Rob co-founded the First Mile Connectivity Consortium, a national nonprofit association of Indigenous technology organizations (see: www.firstmile.ca).
Dr. Diane Janes
Dr. Diane P. Janes is an Educational Developer (Scholarship of Teaching and Learning) with the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology (SAIT) located in Calgary. From 2015-2019 she was an Instructional Designer with the Learning Engagement Office (LEO), Faculty of Extension, University of Alberta. In her career, Diane has worked in senior teaching and academic positions in educational technology and instructional design in both Education and Business. She has served as President of the Canadian Network for Innovation in Education (CNIE) and currently serves as Secretary-Treasurer. She is co-editor of “Making the Transition to E-learning: Strategies and Issues” (2007).
Dr. Diana Steinhauer
Dr. Diana Steinhauer is from Saddle Lake Cree Nation in Treaty No. 6 Territory. She is a former President of Yellowhead Tribal College with over 30 years of experience in teaching, curriculum development, and administration in K-12 schools and post-secondary institutions. Recognizing the value and work of iyiniw pimātisiwin, Diana’s work as a change agent in language, education, and governance is grounded upon her late father’s adage, pimātisîtotetân kimiyikowisiwininaw, Let us live life the way our Creator intended us to live.
Stewart Steinhauer
Stewart Steinhauer is self-taught as a stone sculptor / foolish person, beginning his adventures in stone sculpture the day after the birth of his first child, in July 1973. For uncounted millennia before the beginning of the colonial period there was a Turtle Island; that is where his creative work springs up from, working under the direction of the Rock Spirit. For more information on Stewart's sculptures, see: www.stonesculpture.ca
Amanda Almond
Amanda Almond is a recent graduate of the MA in Community Engagement program at the University of Alberta. She is Métis and a descendent of Chief Papaschase, who signed an adhesion to Treaty 6 in 1877. Amanda's thesis explored building Indigenous-settler relations through the co-creation of augmented reality stories situated at Treaty 6 marker sculptures.
Greg Whistance-Smith
Greg Whistance-Smith is a designer that joined this project while he was a graduate student in the University of Alberta's Digital Humanities program. Building on a background in architecture, his graduate work explored the design of virtual spaces and their possibilities for communication and expression.
Acknowledgements
Thank you to the Faculty of Extension colleagues and friends who advised us along the way: Dr. Patricia Makokis, Dr. Fay Fletcher, and Dr. Jason Daniels, as well as to all those who reviewed the guidebook and offered invaluable feedback, including Dr. Lana Whiskeyjack and Dr. Jennifer Ward.
Thank you to Jennifer Wemigwans, Jane Anderson and Catherine Bell, as well as the Alberta First Nations Information Governance Centre for your support and guidance. Thanks also to our videographer Billy Smale and Research Assistant Nigel Robinson. Further thanks to Ben Steinhauer, Anthony Johnson, James Makokis, and Eugene Makokis for welcoming us and facilitating sweat lodges with students creating AR stories. Hanne Pearce did the layout and design for the student guidebook and teacher handbook.
Thank you to the Fall 2018 COMM 597 students who created AR stories with this process and shared their feedback and learning.
Thank you to our project funder, the Teaching and Learning Enhancement Fund at the University of Alberta.