Mike DeGagné appointed Professor of Sociology

Mike DeGagne
Mike DeGagné. Photo by Elizabeth Beddall

Mike DeGagné, President and CEO of the Indigenous charity Indspire, has joined the Department of Sociology at UTSC as a professor.

An Ojibway from the Animakee Wa Zhing 37 First Nation, Professor DeGagné’s storied career has seen him working with the federal government in management of Indigenous programs and as a negotiator of comprehensive land claims, as well as becoming President of Nipissing University. In 1998, Prof. DeGagné was the founding Executive Director of the Aboriginal Healing Foundation, a national Indigenous organization dedicated to addressing the legacy of Canada’s Indian Residential School System.

Prof. DeGagné will be teaching a course in 2023 examining the social response to the problem of Indian Residential Schools, including the class action lawsuit that was brought against the government in the 2000’s. This resulted in the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement and the creation of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, as well as Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s apology in 2008. “It will be an examination of the settlement agreement as the largest class action settlement in the history of Canada, what elements were included, what discussions led to those decisions, and how it sheds light on how we can resolve other questions of that magnitude,” says Prof. DeGagné.

Prof. DeGagné is pleased to be returning to UTSC, where he studied in the late 1970s and early 1980s. “Things change,” Prof. DeGagné notes. “Back then it was a largely white campus, with maybe less than 5000 students. Obviously, it’s much richer in terms of where people come from now, with people from all over the world. It’s a real multicultural event to be on campus, and it’s three times the size it was. It has become something quite different.”

A key development has been the increase in Indigenous students. Prof. DeGagné points out that up until 1975, for an Indigenous person to study at university they needed to enfranchise themselves and give up their status as Indigenous people, not only for themselves but their family and subsequent generations. This was one way that the system discouraged Indigenous youths from taking up post-secondary education.

Even more different is the fact that now Indigenous students might even be taught by Indigenous faculty. “There are so few still, perhaps three percent of the professoriate, but we are there,” says Prof. DeGagné. “You can actually take a course and there’s a chance you’ll have an Indigenous professor, perhaps with a slightly different take on things.”

Although opportunities have improved for potential Indigenous students, barriers still remain, including financial barriers and a lack of access to the prerequisite courses required to go to university. This is an issue that confronts Prof. DeGagné in his other role as Special Advisor to the Principal on Indigenous Initiatives. “When an Indigenous student arrives in the foyer of the university on the first day of September starting their post-secondary education journey, they’ve been on quite a journey already,” he says. “And good for them for being there. Shame on us if we don’t help them graduate.”

“A lot of this work is about revealing excellence. It’s about making sure the barriers are swept away for them and giving them a chance to show off what Indigenous scholars can do.”

But Prof. DeGagné notes that a key plank of reconciliation is making knowledge about residential schools accessible to non-Indigenous students: “We’re not going to get to where we need to go without the rest of Canada, and we need them to understand that history. As an Indigenous community we need to bring our allies along with us.”

Course Description
SOCD44H3: Advanced Seminar on Issues in Contemporary Sociology - Addressing Historic Wrongs and the Path to Reconciliation: The Indian Residential School Settlement Agreement
The course uses as a framework the Indian Residential School Settlement Agreement. It remains the largest class action settlement in Canadian history. IRSSA brings together some of the recent history of residential schools, the RCAP report and the government response, and the establishment of the Aboriginal Healing Foundation. It will also cover the Law Commission Report upon which the settlement is based, and the deliberations and intentions for the settlement which in some cases went astray.  The elements of the settlement, such as financial measures and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and how each part manifested itself in the following decades will also be discussed. Finally, the absence of Apology in the agreement, and its later impact, will be presented.
Other courses on Indigenous studies and settler colonialism at the Department of Sociology:
SOCC52H3: Immigration, Citizenship and Settler Colonialism
SOCC61H3: Sociology of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission
SOCD02H3: Global Field School: Indigenous Costa Rica
SOCC49H3: Indigenous Health