#SenecaProud

Pat Perdue  00:00

Hi, I'm Pat Perdue, and I'd like to welcome you to Season Three of the Seneca Proud podcast. This is a co-production between my company Ycastr and Seneca College in Toronto.

These days because of the global pandemic, yep, that's still a thing. So, much of Seneca is remote from working to teaching to studying. But hey, Seneca College has always been more than a place or a bunch of buildings. Seneca College is an idea. It's a vision for a better future. And it's a challenge to do what it takes to transform that vision into reality. And that is exactly what Season Three is all about. Seneca College is transforming, there are really exciting changes in the works. And this season, we get to take a close look at some of those changes, as well as the people who are helping make those changes happen. So, if you haven't already, subscribe, and download and join me as we discover the changes and meet the people who are transforming vision into reality. Because the next episode of Seneca Proud starts now. 

Welcome back to the Seneca Proud podcast. I'm Pat Perdue. And I'm really glad you're here. You're going to love today's episode. So, you know about the Au Large project, right? To catch you up, i's a super ambitious project that is basically taking a solid look at everything Seneca and asking the question, how can we do this better for today and for years to come? Classes, classrooms, technology, everything is on the table. And a big part of doing better is something called EDI, which stands for equity, diversity and inclusion. What can Seneca do differently to foster an overarching culture of equity, diversity and inclusion? Where are the blind spots? And by blind spots, I mean, those aspects of the Seneca College process that exclude cultures or genders or abilities, because those processes evolved without the input of everyone who should have been at the table so, to speak, but weren't. So, more voices need to be at the table. And those voices need to be heard and listened to in such a way that it leads to real change. So, how does a huge institution like Seneca College do that? A big part of that is finding someone to lead that initiative who has both the experience and the perspective to make it happen. That person is Mark Solomon, and Mark is our guest today.

Let me tell you about Mark Solomon. Mark is the chair of the Equity Diversity and Inclusion committee at Seneca College. And as you can imagine, that's a huge mandate, which we'll be talking about in our conversation. Mark Solomon is a proud member of the Henvey Inlet First Nation, located one hour south of Sudbury, and he's born and raised in Sioux Sainte Marie. He often claims to be an economic refugee from Northern Ontario living in Toronto. Mark has two undergraduate degrees from Laurentian University in Music and Native studies, and MA from Brock University in Social Justice and an M Ed from York University. Mark has held a number of roles at Seneca College and currently serves as the Dean of Students and Indigenous Education. Mark is also, honored to serve as the President of his professional association, the Canadian Association of College and University Student Services. He is the first Indigenous person to hold that role. And in his bio, he makes it clear that all of this pales to the role he's most proud of a father to a 13-year-old. We caught up with Mark at his home office because it's the pandemic. In our conversation, we talked about the Seneca EDI initiative. And also, we talked about blind spots and how to look beyond our own culture, gender abilities, and potentially privileged perspectives and to try to see from a different angle. 

We join our conversation with Mark talking about the mandate of the EDI initiative and what it means for Seneca College. Okay, here is a Seneca College Dean of Students and Indigenous Education Mark Solomon. 

So, tell us about the Equity Diversity and Inclusion Committee. It sounds like a massive massive project at Seneca College.

 

Mark Solomon   04:35

It feels like it and it should be. It's going to be a great project that comes out of the Au Large report which David Agnew was mentioning in a previous episode. The Equity Diversity Inclusion committee is based upon three recommendations that came from our community. The Au Large report was a survey of our community and what did we learn from COVID. But Equity Diversity Committee was seen as something we all need to happen. There are three key tenants I've been calling the pillars of the work of the committee in its first initial years. The first one is awareness. That's everything from training, to curriculum development to events. The second one is a census. So, understanding who makes up our community, both students and employees, obviously voluntary self-identification, per se. And then finally, the last one is policy and process mapping, making sure that we're taking an equitable diversity and inclusion lens through everything that we do. But first focus on our HR and our student practices.

 

Pat Perdue  05:43

Got it. And this sounds like it's a long project. It's not something that you're going to accomplish in the next couple of months.

 

Mark Solomon  05:51

No, and it should always be ongoing. I think we always learn more about equity, diversity and inclusion every step of the way. I think we were always striving to be better definitely at Seneca that is always our mandate, but we want to be as best as we can for our community and building great citizenry.

 

Pat Perdue  06:09

For sure. And do you have it? It sounds so, huge? How do you even start? Is it, you mentioned, the census? Is that the beginning point, or, you know, you wake up and you say, okay, how do we do this?

 

Mark Solomon  06:23

Yeah, that's a great question, Pat, I think one of the interesting parts is we've already been doing a lot of this work. But we're not really telling the story. Student Services is doing a bunch of events, there's a lot of amazing faculty doing events, there's been a lot of things happening in HR. So, it's kind of getting it together, making sure that we can package it, and making sure that people who want to be a part of it are a part of it, So, if you're a member of our facilities team, and you haven't had a chance to go to an event, because your work takes you wherever driving truck or doing whatever. Now you have the ability to kind of get together, participate, have your voice heard. So, really kind of getting it together. That's the first part. So, again, we stand on the shoulders of others who've been doing this work for a really long time. The second one is and I think to your point is we don't know what we don't know, we don't know who makes up our community colleges and universities. Canada has been notoriously bad for keeping race based diverse information. In the States, interestingly enough, they can tell you down to the nth decimal what percentage are Latino and first generation and all sorts of other kinds of divisions within there, we have never kept that. So, we will be looking at others that have been doing that. And then finally, I think we're probably going to have to look at getting some consultants to help us understand what it means to have diverse lenses through HR processes, and all that stuff. But we got really great people like, Pat, you've just seen the people who applied for this. This committee, we had just under 100 people from literally one side of the college to the other side, people who I've met people who I've never met, I consider myself pretty well known at the college, the amount of people that came out to volunteer on this committee, just phenomenal. And the stories are heart wrenching stories. People are really dedicated to both telling their own story and learning from each other. It's going to be awesome.

 

Pat Perdue  08:23

It sounds super exciting. It might be early days to even answer this question, but based on the folks who are participating in the committee, and maybe conversations that you've had so, far, do you have a sense of even the types of problems that you need to solve?  What will those problems look like?

 

Mark Solomon  08:46

Let me tell you a story. And it's actually a story that comes out of the Indigenous community. So, we have an absolutely wonderful, Indigenous student ambassador and we opened up this really short summer contract. We were looking to hire a number of Indigenous students, sorry, one Indigenous student, to hit a bunch of pow wows; set up a Seneca table and tell everybody about Seneca at the pow wows. So, she handed in her resume and I recommended her to be the student to have it. She had the time, she actually was pow wow dancer, it was totally great. Perfect. We got a note back from HR saying she doesn't qualify. And I'm like, what do you mean she doesn’t qualify?  She's Indigenous. She's a pow wow dancer. She's a graduate. And they're just like, well, it doesn't really talk about education or public speaking in her resume. Do me a favor, shoot me over that resume, because that kind of boggles my mind. When she's in our center she's very articulate. And her resume was less than a quarter of a page and it talked about her being a youth camp counselor, and that's all it said. So, we went to her I said, but you've done more than this. She told me about like leading at camps and talking to parents and handling off site risk. Yeah, that's all part of being a counselor. A part of Indigenous culture is about being humble. And so, she didn't tell that story. So, the resume was literally, a paragraph, direct line short and thick. And it didn't have the embellishment, it didn't have the positioning.

 

Pat Perdue  10:20

Exactly, exactly.

 

Mark Solomon  10:23

Now, So, if I take that through an EDI lens, I don't really, I look at that. But I also, look at the person, I look at the community that person comes from, I look at and visit with the person before and they feel a part of that. We sometimes don't remember is that, at least in hiring practices, it's supposed to be a two-way interview, right? So, employees should be interviewing us, if they want to come and work at our institution. So, making sure that they feel comfortable, we feel comfortable, everybody feels better. So, that's one very small example. I try and use that one because I think that it illuminates. You know, she's gone on to do amazing things. She worked for us and we've told her, before you hand that resume again, let us help you beef it up a bit. 

 

Pat Perdue  11:13

Nice. Nice. And what a great example of a blind spot. You know, who would have seen that coming in? You are aware of that as a member of the Indigenous community, you're gonna say, oh, I see what's going on. But if you weren't there to run interference, then it might have ended super differently.

 

Mark Solomon  11:33

Right? It's like when you talk to Peggy Pitawanakwat. She won't tell you that she's the first female Chief in her community and might be one of the first female Chiefs in all of Ontario. She doesn't tell that story. So, yeah. And former guest of Seneca Brown.

 

Pat Perdue  11:50

Yes. Such a great tour of Odeyto. It was so, so great to be there. It's such an honor to be there. 

Let's share with us a little bit about how the pandemic and how, the study from home and distance learning and all of that plays into the Equity, Diversity and Inclusion committee and that whole initiative, is there a crossover that you can benefit from?

 

Mark Solomon  12:15

I think, early in the pandemic, it became very clear that we understood that everybody's quarantine was different, that there was almost kind of quarantine privilege and quarantine, not privilege. So, one of the interesting things that we learned almost right off the bat was you and I are talking on a video conferencing. And both of us have, the privilege of sitting in a room by ourselves. Some of our students don't have that. Some of our students are sleeping three, four to a room or in impoverished settings. Some of our employees are as well. There's everything from domestic violence to all sorts of reasons why cameras shouldn't/can't be on at home. These were lessons. And then of course, internet quality depending on where you go in Canada. First Nations rural areas didn't have internet quality. We were seeing inequities all over when it should literally be as simple as open up your laptop sign on, and you might have some problems with your Zoom connection but we'll figure that out as we go. That didn't fuel the EDI committee. 

The pandemic was one crisis that we had since March. But we've had a massive choice A awakening. George Floyd was the beginning of it. There are countless examples in Canada, countless examples in Toronto, Ottawa, of police brutality, racism that exists both as systemic and direct. So, we we’re taking this time to learn. So, as we are rethinking how we are delivering classes, let's rethink what we're delivering as well. Lots of great opportunity that is coming out. The pandemic brought on the Au Large project, and then we were able to tack on the need for an EDI committee.

 

Pat Perdue  14:13

And some of the, some of the whispers some of the talk is that these days are different. You know, maybe it's because of everything that's been happening in the United States shining a light on things that are happening here in Canada. But they're thinking, it's easy to say we've been down this road before, but it feels different in some way. Is that an opinion that you would share?

 

Mark Solomon  14:42

You know, Pat I really certainly hope so. And George Floyd was not the first black man to be killed by police and sadly has not been the last. Since his murder it's happened here in Canada. It's happened everywhere. Canadians have often said they saw this as a US problem, then all of a sudden, we have seen this at fisheries, we've seen police brutality amongst our forces north of here in Canada, we are seeing it kind of everywhere. And I think there's a heightened ability to it, I was actually talking to one of our committee members, Kurt Muller, Dean, Kurt Muller. And he was talking that he felt this is a time, right around in South Africa, where there was a time of awakening in that community where apartheid ended. I really hope it has the same outcome, where we dance in the streets, and we celebrate each other.

 

Pat Perdue  15:40

That would be great. And, you know, you mentioned that often the Canadian response to what happens in the United States, typically, the Canadian response is, oh, that's over there. It's different here. Right? Do you find that we're a little bit more receptive?  That Canadians overall are more receptive to the conversation that says, “no, it's here to”?

 

Mark Solomon  16:04

I don't know, I love to say, yes, but I don't think so. I think sometimes we're a little bit more pompous. And we say, that's an American problem, right? And, you know, we all support, for example, we all support Indigenous rights as long as they fish within the season and do this and do this and do this. You know, the Mic Mac Fisher's had a Supreme Court of Canada ruling. They had RCMP sit around and watch a Chief be punched in the face. And we all said, well, you know, there's a reason for the season. And that's horrible, right? These kind of things, it's not all Canadians, obviously. but we in Canada, CBC has shut down their comment sections on news stories that report specifically on race and Indigenous issues. It's an issue here. And we've become emboldened. The far right has become emboldened and racist thought has, for some reason, really come out of the closet recently. So, it's here. And we want to make sure that our students understand the full story, make sure that they are prepared to not necessarily battle but debate and engage,

 

Pat Perdue  17:21

Which is why your committee is so, important and so timely, I think. And you mentioned, we were talking a little bit about the pandemic and how, in the privilege that we have, we're sitting alone in a room, the room is, is warm, we're by ourselves, we have good internet to have this conversation. And all of that is privileged. Are there some lessons that you anticipate that may have been gleaned during this time of pandemic that can be carried forward into a post pandemic Seneca College that does demonstrate more equity, diversity and inclusivity?

 

Mark Solomon  18:04

Yeah, I think there's we've learned, you know, Seneca is a very big complex organization with multiple campuses. There's been many great successes in student services, where we've just literally been able to turn on a camera, and do everything from online yoga to cooking shows, Peggy did a cooking show about Bannock, I think, and Pride events. We've actually seen more community come to the online events. Now, instead of doing the event four times on all of our campuses, or five times. Now I think we're starting to learn how to deliver programming. We're also, learning wonderful ways of being able to connect with the community. So, one of the events, we had a drag queen actually doing her makeup before one of our Pride events, and then she performed later in the hour for the Pride event. And it was absolutely fascinating. It's like a glimpse into someone else's life. Like how often have you seen, you know, a drag queen put on makeup? Probably never, I haven't. And we had an absolutely candid conversation with one of our managers, from student services. I think we've learned things like that.

I think we've also, started to learn about caring for each other. One of the big things that have come out of the pandemic is that everybody is worried about mental health distress, over engagement under engagement, all of those things. I think we really, really earnestly we've always cared about each other. But I think, we're literally talking to each other in our homes, like you would come to my home and visit. I think that this is a new level of a relationship that we're building and I think this is something that I would like us to continue as we go forward.

 

Pat Perdue  19:57

I hope so, too. And I've often found that if we have to check in on somebody it's got to be a proactive check in to say, hey, how are you doing? And it's not something that we can just assume that somebody's fine, because and often this is an assumption, and we know what those are. But because we see them every day, maybe you know, at work at school, we assume that they're fine. But now if we don't check in on them, we can't make that assumption. So, we're kind of forced to say, hey, how are you doing?

 

Mark Solomon  20:26

Yeah, and care?  I'll be honest with you, the part that scared me was seeing how our black community at Seneca and a number of my black employees that work in my team, were handling the trauma as associated to the murder of George Floyd. I saw them feel like literally carrying the weight of the world; worrying about their children, we're sharing stories, their own stories, both at Seneca and in the community, their experiences, in all walks of their lives. And that hurt. That was hard. 

With the pandemic, I actually tried to have a team, coffee with them every couple of weeks. But seeing that, I don't know if they would have shared with me openly, because some people are working at Seneca in very open public places. Now we were able to go onto a zoom call and they were able to tell me some stories that were disheartening, disheartening their experiences, right.

 

Pat Perdue  21:37

So, yeah, but the opportunity on the other side of that coin, that there was a way that that conversation could be had.

 

Mark Solomon  21:47

Yeah, and it was so, special that they engaged, they did. I and tried to honor the experiences of what I learned and go forward. And that was before it was announced about the EDI committee and that I was going to lead it but trying to honor those experiences. 

 

Pat Perdue  22:06

And speaking of you, I'd love to know a little bit about you, Mark, apparently, you have this committee, and this is a committee that you're leading. And you're also, the Dean of Students and Indigenous Education. Can you can you tell us a little bit about that?

 

Mark Solomon  22:23

Yeah, So, I, I, again, I stand on the shoulders of many, formerly in this role was Christine Blake and, she moved into Academic and Learning Services, and I was her Associate Dean and was honored to be asked to fill very big shoes. And that role encompasses everything from Student Services, which is leadership orientation, First Peoples, our frontline services, International Student Services, visas and, and housing and health plans, our counseling and mental health and accessibility group. It's a massive department making sure students are well supported.  Student Conduct area, making sure students are not only following the rules, but they're taking care of themselves and each other. And then our recreation and varsity team, which if you looked at me, you know, I stare longingly at that treadmill every once in a while.

 

Pat Perdue  23:22

Oh, we all do. You're not alone, probably never going to happen.

 

Mark Solomon  23:26

You know, the poor, team, they're trying to drop off some uniforms, thinking, anything that fits that guy?  I'm also, responsible and the lead for the institution on all Indigenous education. So, it's a kind of a weird balance. I do services, and I also, do Indigenous education.

 

Pat Perdue  23:46

And that sounds like a lot.

 

Mark Solomon  23:48

Yeah, it fills a Tuesday, that's for sure. Yeah.

 

Pat Perdue  23:54

Feeling it might even spill over into the Wednesday.

 

Mark Solomon  23:56

It might it might a little bit not too much, though. We try and free up for a good weekend.

 

Pat Perdue  24:00

Good. Good. I'm glad to hear that. And one of the things that I'm always curious about when I get to speak with folks is, we all experience the pandemic in a different way. And sometimes it's driven by our culture. And sometimes it's driven just by how we're wired. So, if I may ask you, how is it going with the pandemic? And for me, I know that it's been, tricky because of the isolation and even out of that isolation. I've kind of discovered some things about myself, So, maybe I can ask that question to you. How has that been for you?

 

Mark Solomon  24:36

So, I'll be honest with you, the pandemic has been relatively fine and I I mean that in all sincerity, you know, there are things that I miss. I also, serve as the president of our professional association for student services and we canceled conferences and that's something that you miss because you get to visit and talk to people. I do miss visiting people, I miss walking around campus with a coffee and just talking to people. I miss the informal settings. I feel like now we schedule ourselves. In every half hour blocks are our blocks to talk to people we would normally see in the hallway on my way to the washroom or to a meeting or getting a coffee.  I miss those interactions. But I am very concerned for my team. Pandemic in the lockdown has been different for some people, I have some team members that are in very small condos in Toronto by themselves and that that worries me. I have team members like I said, I've had the varsity athletics team, they're worried about when are we ever going to play sports again.  I've seen people that are working 12–15-hour days just trying to do student programming and all sorts of stuff. People taking care of international students who are trying to fly and come to Canada to complete their education, but because of quarantine rules it is different. So, I'm really worried about my team, I'm really worried about students. So, I feel absolutely fine and fine and dandy. I'm more worried about the community. That's what kind of drives me to be better and do as much as I possibly can.

 

Pat Perdue  26:12

For sure, for sure. And there's a lot of the community that's listening to this conversation right now. And they're either seeing themselves probably both of this, they're seeing themselves and also, they're thinking, oh, yeah, you know, there are people that maybe I should check in on, or perhaps reach out to So, what advice might you have to folks who are listening to this, you know, faculty, staff and students who would like to become a little bit more, I guess, aware and maybe participate more in the conversation about equity, diversity and inclusion. Outside of joining the committee or participating directly in that initiative is there something that people could do on a day-to-day basis?

 

Mark Solomon  26:57

There's a tonne and it's everything from student services, and even the employee groups started book clubs. We've even started watching films together, you can hit NFB Hiner library, they have a great 15-minute thing. Stop watching YouTube, stop watching YouTube!

 

Pat Perdue  27:15

All the best cooking videos are on YouTube!

 

Mark Solomon 27:16

Watch good cooking videos. Don't watch whatever, watch something from CBC Gem, watch something with diverse actors on diverse subjects and talent. Tell yourself to get out outside of what you would normally watch. So, I'm Indigenous, I read a tonne of Indigenous literature watch a lot of Indigenous films. I've challenged myself to actually start reading from black authors, and about black subjects. And that to me has maybe been more fulfilling, I spent a year reading Canadian women lit. And that was really important for me understanding. So, find something that you'd like whatever that might be, and then look for a diverse community that you can support. So, if you're big into clothing lines, look for a diverse clothing line that you might be able to support. If you're big into podcasts other than the Seneca podcast, find some diverse podcasts that you can get into. There's so, many things that you can do. And we're all going out for walks these days, throw in and listen to an audio book by a racialized member. Listen to somebody who's a member of our Pride community that's talking about what's going on. I think there's just so, many things that we can do. And the crazy part is that all this information is free. And it's right at our fingertips. It's just right there for the taking. It's right there. And people said like, how do I start? I'm like, what do you mean? Where do you start because it's overwhelming, the resources that are available. Everything from the Seneca Library to the Toronto Library and community libraries, the interwebs there's so, much that is going on that you can do it. And like I said, free, just start, watch five videos and see what you learned. 

 

Pat Perdue  29:09

Right. Love it. Love it. I might trouble you for a playlist that I can leave in the show. Would that be okay? 

 

Mark Solomon  29:16

Yeah. We run an Indigenous faculty training called Suikoden. And they do a podcast recommendation. And let's find some, other things that are going on. Yeah, let's do that. 

 

Pat Perdue  29:33

That'd be great. Thank you.

 

Mark Solomon  29:35

And check out the liner notes.  None of your students will recognize what liner notes are. 

 

Pat Perdue  29:42

Yeah, you're going back to like 1990 or something, old school. Well, Mark, thanks so, much. You know, it's sad that our conversation has come to an end because I've genuinely enjoyed getting a chance to meet you and hear about the work that you and your teams are doing. It sounds like it's super timely and super important. So, thanks for joining the podcast.

 

Mark Solomon  30:04

Really, thanks for having me on. It's been absolutely awesome.

 

Pat Perdue  30:08

Likewise, thanks. Bye bye. 

And that was my conversation with the Dean of Students and Indigenous education, Mark Solomon. I've included his media playlist in the show notes. So, what was your biggest takeaway from that interview? For me, it was really the call to step out of my own cultural myopia and seek out media that tells stories from a different perspective. So, since that interview, I've had a chance to dive into Mark's suggestions. I really recommend you do the same. You'll find it super interesting, always entertaining, and always eye opening. 

Special thanks to our guest today, Mark Solomon, and a huge thanks to you for listening. This podcast was edited with the help of Mohit Ratatat. Until next time, I'm Pat Perdue. Stay proud Seneca!