She’s the director of community relations at the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network (APTN), and a proud member of Sandy Bay Ojibway First Nation.

But there was a time when Vera Houle kept her indigenous identity to herself.

Before graduating in 1991 from Red River College’s Aboriginal Journalism program, a Creative Communications spinoff funded by the province and Winnipeg Core Area Initiative, Houle faced discrimination from employers because of her background. She recalls traveling to Winnipeg for a job interview at a library.

“I thought (the interview) was really good but of course I put down my address as being on the reserve and during my interview I was informed I wouldn’t be competent due to drinking,” says Houle, 51.

Completely new to the city, Houle says she took “drinking” to mean water, pop or tea, inferring that there was some sort of danger of those liquids getting on the library books. That was until she returned to Sandy Bay and her grandfather set her straight.

“When he told me that I was really upset,” Houle says. “When I came back for another interview I did not admit I was Native. I did not say I was on the reserve, and when they asked me my nationality, I didn’t say anything. They said ‘Oh, Portuguese?’ and I’m like ‘yeah.’ I wound up getting a very good job at the Health Sciences Centre in payroll.”

“For many years I didn’t admit who I was. Then when I started working with ACFS (Anishinaabe Child and Family Services) and when this program (Aboriginal Journalism) came around, it was really easy to come forward and say, ‘Yes I am this, but here’s why I had to hide it – because society had labeled me before I had even opened my mouth.’” Read More →

Some might shy away from sewing their own wedding dress, especially if they’ve never made one before. Not Monica Jones.

“It was very stressful. I had actually never made a dress before – maybe that’s why I didn’t realize how hard it would be – so I just dove right in,” she says with a laugh. “It actually turned out pretty good but I needed a little help from my aunt who knows how to sew.”

It’s not that Jones had never sewn before – she’d been making purses for some time. It’s just that she’d never taken on such a large – and important – project.

Despite some initial hiccups, Jones – a saxophonist with a degree in jazz performance – quickly found she was hooked on sewing.

“I’ve always had an interest in the eye of design as well as auditory art, so I think it’s just that I’ve always been a bit of a multi-disciplinary artist,” she says.

Today, the Red River College Apparel Design grad has come a long way, recently launching a line of high-end leather handbags.

Called Barbara & Cecile (after Jones’ grandmothers), the line features high quality leather and hardware, and Jones even designs the printed textiles that line the purses. Read More →

Ever look at a major construction project and think, ‘I wonder who’s running the show?’ In the case of the new Health Sciences Centre Diagnostic Imaging complex, it’s Red River College grad Jorge Laba.

Laba is the HSC project’s Assistant Site Superintendent. He’s the guy that makes sure things are running smoothly, whether overseeing subcontractors, coordinating logistics, maintaining safety, recording payroll, documenting progress, or more. He enjoys being able to see a project’s many sides.

“My favourite part is having the freedom and flexibility to learn all the paperwork involved in a complex construction project, as well as the practical side by seeing what is on paper [being] built in real life,” he says. “It gives me the chance to leave the desk to walk around the job site and observe the subcontractors perform their associated works.”

Laba, 29, works for Bockstael Construction, the contractor for the $39-million Diagnostic Imaging project. When completed, the seven-storey building will house a full range of state-of-the-art imaging technology and include a rooftop helicopter landing pad.

He accepted the position with Bockstael even before graduating from RRC’s new Construction Management degree program earlier this year. The training ensured he was prepared for the job’s multifaceted nature.

“Training at RRC prepared me on a technical level – hard skills – and personal level – soft skills – both equally as important in a leadership role. I mastered blueprint reading and some of the complexity that comes with specific work of the trades on site.” Read More →

Five years into her nursing career, Stephanie Staples was burned out.

“I was trying to be everything for everybody and not asking for help. I had the superwoman cape on,” she says.

After graduating from the one-year Nursing program at Red River College in 1985, Staples worked as a geriatric nurse and opened her own in-home foot care business. As terrible as the burnout was, she made the best of it.

“It kind of became a catalyst because I changed my life and people started asking me what I was doing and how I was doing it.”

It was then that Staples began considering a career as – and underwent training to become – a life coach.

“I started helping other people live their lives happier and better and healthier. I started doing one-on-one coaching and then I started doing group coaching and then someone asked me whether I’d do a seminar. And then one day the Mayo Clinic called!”

Today, Staples works as a professional speaker and life coach, which she’s been doing full-time for about nine years. You might not think nursing and motivational speaking have a lot in common, but you’d be mistaken. It was nursing that set the foundation for her current career, as Staples predominantly speaks to those working in the healthcare field.

“People think what I’m doing now is so different, but it’s not. I went into nursing to help people and that’s exactly what I’m doing now. And I think the way I’m doing it now can help more people than nursing one-on-one. It was a pretty cool evolution.” Read More →

As a kid riding his bike through Assiniboine Park’s “monkey trails” and doing tricks on “Devil’s Dip”, Kevin Hunter would never have guessed he’d one day be in charge of singing the park’s praises to the world.

“Assiniboine Park and Zoo were both a huge part of my childhood,” says Hunter, the Director of Marketing & Community Engagement for the Assiniboine Park Conservancy (APC), which oversees Winnipeg’s historic park, including its zoo. “My friends and I would spend entire days here during the summer and, now that I have a family of my own, it means a lot to be part of making this place something really special for them and so many other families. I really feel I have the best job in the world.”

When Hunter joined four years ago, the APC had already begun working on its 10-year, $200-million redevelopment plan, launched in 2009 to expand and improve the zoo and other public spaces. He’s charged with promoting the park and these new initiatives, including the Assiniboine Park Zoo’s brand-new Journey to Churchill northern species exhibit which just opened earlier this month, featuring animals including polar bears, seals, wolves and snowy owls.

“So much of our role here is to create new and exciting things, which is a big part of what makes what I do so much fun,” he says. “The whole redevelopment of the park and zoo is really unbelievable, and it naturally played a big part in what attracted me to this position.” Read More →

When cheerful and outgoing Juanita Fraser decided to switch careers to pursue information technology (IT), her friends were thrown a bit off guard.

“They were surprised, because IT is typically more introverted, you know ­– they put their heads down,” she says.

Fraser is anything but introverted. (Though it’s actually a common misconception that all IT staff prefer a quiet work environment.) She had spent a number of years as an elementary school teacher before realizing she was in the wrong career.

“One day I realized I didn’t have job satisfaction … it’s hard to realize that I spent six, seven, eight years of my life teaching, [and now I wanted] to want to make a career change,” she says. “I was lost. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do.”

A natural logician and problem solver, Fraser took a few aptitude tests to discover her options. The tests pointed her towards business analyst.

“It was funny because I was thinking back in Grade 9 or 10 you do [the aptitude tests], and I think business analyst came up, but no one knew what it meant so I never pursued it.”

She started researching programs, and when Red River College came up as the top result, she enrolled in the Computer Analyst program (now called Business Information Technology).

“I already had a degree and I spent four years doing that,” she says. “I didn’t want to take a Computer Science degree, so that was perfect.” Read More →

At 46, Barb Szpak decided it was time for a career change.

“I felt that things were getting too mundane, too monotonous. You need something just to challenge you, to keep your brain active and keep you wondering what’s out there.”

After spending 21 years working as a baker/cake decorator for the same company, deciding to give it all up wasn’t as difficult as you might think, especially since Szpak knew she’d be heading to Red River College.

“RRC was the only place that I wanted to attend, as I have always had great experiences in the past. I had been taking evening courses over many years, to challenge myself and keep my brain active.

“I decided to take some Accounting courses just to challenge myself because I hate math. So why not take the hardest thing, right?” she says with a laugh.

After deciding to head back to school full time, deciding what to take proved an easy choice.

“I went… looking through stuff and thought ‘[RRC’s] Administrative Assistant program has a bunch of different [courses] in there that I could use.’ And it was a shorter course so I knew that financially I wouldn’t be out of work for that long.”

She excitedly enrolled, but nonetheless started to doubt herself.

“I was nervous about making that change. I was nervous about my ability. Can I do it at my age? When you’re going into a classroom with a bunch of 20-year-olds – there might have been one 30-year-old in the whole class – and then me, the first day at orientation I was looking around the class thinking, ‘What did I get myself into?’”

But she soon formed great relationships with her classmates.

“They were wonderful. And they started looking to me for answers. It felt good that they were asking me for my opinion, asking me for help, even though I was learning just like they were. I became a mom figure for a few of them, I think,” she says with a laugh. Read More →

Learning the language is part of every profession, with every new job featuring its own distinct jargon that takes time to absorb and acquire.

That process presents an even bigger challenge when English isn’t your first language.

To obtain job-specific vocabulary, as well as boost their English proficiency in general, recent immigrants Lei Wang and Balwinder Kaur Loomba, from China and India respectively, both studied at Red River College’s Language Training Centre (LTC) in the English for Health Care Aides (now called Communication for Health Professions) program. Both women moved on to RRC’s Health Care Aide program, graduating in January.

In February, both Wang and Loomba found positions as health care aides at St. Boniface Hospital.

“I remember Mona (Abu-Ghoush, an LTC instructor) gave us lots of articles about the healthcare field,” says Wang (shown above, at right) of the English for Health Care Aides program.

“She gave us different vocabulary. She wants us to get familiar with the sound. A lot of healthcare language comes from Latin, and she found lots of difficult words for us. I like that. When I take my Health Care Aide program, it does help. When I see the thick book, I didn’t get scared.”

In addition to the standard textbook/whiteboard teaching method, English for Health Care Aides also includes guest speakers, workshops, field trips and volunteer work experience. Wang says that hands-on approach to learning English was beneficial.

“We did lots of presentations to better communicate,” says Wang, who came to Canada in 2011. “We have the knowledge, but it’s quite scary to talk to people and communicate with each other. Every week we had presentations and all those presentations were related to health. It’s quite useful.” Read More →

The creation of art is not enough for Danika Bock. What inspires her is crafting pieces that serve a greater purpose.

“Realizing I could create something that was not only fun to make, but also looked good and was useful was the ultimate accomplishment,” she says.

This love of attractive yet practical things led her to take the Graphic Design program at Red River College.

“Studying graphic design was a great way to explore this integration of usefulness, beauty and communication,” says the 2011 grad.

And although it may not be the most outwardly linear connection, this same pragmatism led her to open a stationery and gift shop.

Twenty-seven year old Bock, along with her printmaker husband Drex Serduletz, opened Tiny Feast in the Exchange District in October 2013. The store features high-end paper products and office supplies, housewares and art prints, amongst other things.

“My husband and I have always been drawn to well-made, thoughtfully-designed products. As creatives and homebodies, we think that products one uses on a daily basis should be both a pleasure to use and nice to look at.”

Hence the store’s name – Tiny Feast – which is a phrase the couple coined years ago. To them, it refers to items that “feel celebratory, lavish, almost extravagant – yet are intrinsically simple and useful, and therefore justifiably attainable on a personal, everyday level.”  Read More →

By Stacy Cardigan Smith (Creative Communications, 2006)

Fancy gadgets are integrated into every part of our lives, but how much do you know about how they function?

“It’s really fascinating – we’ve got all these things around us that are electronic and we really don’t know how they work,” says John Chihonik, who decided to study Electronic Engineering Technology at Red River College for just that reason.

“Coming to College and taking an electronics program, you really get to understand these things.”

Today Chihonik, 32, works for Lewis Instruments, a Winnipeg-based surveying and engineering equipment supplier. Part of his job involves learning, integrating and marketing innovative products like 3D laser scanners, GPS reference station networks and even autonomous drones.

“Any kind of new product that we take on, I’ll spearhead learning how to use it and how we’re going to sell it to our customers,” he explains.

Although he didn’t study these specific devices prior to graduating from RRC in 2004, understanding new technologies comes easily for Chihonik.

“The technical background I got from taking an electronics course [at RRC] allows me to understand these things and work with them a little easier then some of the other guys. It’s not that the course material itself is specifically dealing with laser scanners, but having a technical background definitely helps whenever you’re trying to learn a new technology.” Read More →