{"id":62484,"date":"2019-12-03T15:26:21","date_gmt":"2019-12-03T20:26:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/?p=62484"},"modified":"2019-12-04T08:39:57","modified_gmt":"2019-12-04T13:39:57","slug":"accessibility-and-inclusion-recognition-award-recipient-named","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/2019\/12\/accessibility-and-inclusion-recognition-award-recipient-named\/","title":{"rendered":"Accessibility and Inclusion Recognition Award recipient named"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Being recognized for making significant contributions to creating a discrimination-free campus caused a tidal wave of emotions for <a href=\"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/human-rights\/accessibility\/inclusion-recognition-award\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Accessibility and Inclusion Recognition Award<\/a>\u00a0(AIRA) recipient Robyn Bourgeois.<\/p>\n<p>The award,\u00a0given annually at Brock University on Dec. 3 in alignment with International Day of Persons with Disabilities,\u00a0was created as a way of sparking dialogue to remove barriers that limit access to equality.<\/p>\n<p>Bourgeois, an Assistant Professor in the Department of Women\u2019s and Gender Studies, didn&#8217;t know she had been nominated for the award until she was told she won, which she calls &#8220;the highlight of my career at this point.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;When I got the news, I bawled,&#8221; says Bourgeois. &#8220;As someone who didn&#8217;t always feel like university was a place where I could be, to be recognized for my role in inclusion and accessibility means the world.\u00a0I decided that when I became a professor I would change that for people and find a way, whether it be little things in my class or in the community, to do everything I could to make everybody feel like this is a place for them.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Christopher Lytle, Accessibility and Inclusion Advisor for the Office of Human Rights and Equity Services, calls Bourgeois a &#8220;community activist&#8221; whose work has ensured that Indigenous peoples \u2014 particularly women \u2014 &#8220;have the same sort of footing as their peers, which was a very large component in our decision.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Robyn is doing a lot of work to ensure that the end of violence towards Indigenized women is a high priority,&#8221; says Lytle, adding that the AIRA is a great opportunity for Brock to lead the way in human rights and equity.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We want to have open discussions about how ableism is impacted by things like racism, sexism and misogyny,&#8221; he says. &#8220;Disabilities are intersectional. Why not have those conversations and why not start at Brock?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The event was co-sponsored by the\u00a0Ontario Secondary School Teachers&#8217; Federation and\u00a0Brock&#8217;s Student Accessibility Services.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Being recognized for making significant contributions to creating a discrimination-free campus caused a tidal wave of emotions for Accessibility and Inclusion Recognition Award\u00a0(AIRA) recipient Robyn Bourgeois.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":56,"featured_media":62499,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7,3319,6833,1,4,38],"tags":[96,4597,2981,6056,31,1426],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62484"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/56"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62484"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62484\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":62515,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62484\/revisions\/62515"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62499"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62484"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62484"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62484"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}