“You deserve to take up space…. You are worth it and you are important in these places. You deserve it. You are smart and you’re intelligent and you can be an Indigenous person in a Western institution and you can make that experience your own.” These inspiring words come from Cameron Anderson, a Mohawk woman from Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory who currently resides in Kingston, Ontario where she is finishing her undergraduate degree at Queens University. She loves reading, swimming, beading and quillwork in her free time.

After she finishes her thesis on viruses and graduates, she hopes to teach STEM in the community, through Connected North and promoting curiosity around science among Indigenous youth. She’s planning on taking a year off before returning to complete a Master’s of Science. During that year she’s hoping to travel and move to Montreal.

Anderson’s advice for students considering science in post-secondary is to try not to compare themselves to others. She also says, “just because you don't understand what they want you to know for this specific question or course or exam doesn't mean that you aren't meant to be there, and doesn't mean that you shouldn't still take up space, and it definitely doesn't mean that you're not still incredibly intelligent and smart.” Some of the smartest people she knows didn’t excel at first-year calculus. She recommends reminding yourself that you worked hard and deserve to be there, and that bumps in the road don’t reflect on your self worth or how smart you are.

When it comes to obstacles she faced in schooling, Anderson is in a competitive program and many of her peers are eager to attend medical school. She found herself comparing herself to others and she had to learn that everyone is on their own journey and nobody is good at everything. She began to recognize and remind herself of her own strengths. She also had to find community at her school, something she was able to do through the Indigenous student centre at her school and given the large Indigenous population there. She encourages incoming students that they will find their people as long as they are open to the opportunity to meet people.

Anderson especially recommends Queens for its supportive Indigenous center. She even got to participate in an all-Indigenous rocket team. She suggests emailing the Indigenous advisor at whatever school students are considering to see what support and opportunities are available.

If she could share a message with her younger self it would be, “you don’t have to have everything figured out.” As a fourth year student, she’s been asking others about their post-graduation plans. “I realized a lot of people don’t know what they’re doing and most people go through their life winging it and you don’t need to know all the answers all the time,” she confided. That realization was one that she wished she came to earlier, as it would have saved her so much stress, she feels, in retrospect. “You don’t need to know all the answers. You don’t need to know all of your goals and stuff for the future. I mean, if you do, that’s amazing, but I don’t think that’s as common as you think. I think a lot of people are guessing their way through life,” she continues.

Looking back, she wishes she was less stressed when she was younger and she was more open to opportunities that didn’t 100% align with what she thought she would do. She would tell her younger self, “Take the opportunity if it’s given to you because you might learn something and you might experience something that is amazing and wonderful.”. She believes every opportunity is a growth opportunity even if it’s not something you are going to do the rest of your life because at least you will learn more about yourself. She sees university as a great chance to do that.

To balance her mental health, Anderson looks to find work-life balance, though she works three jobs and goes to school and is working on her thesis. She tries to laugh a lot and not take things too seriously. She dances more, too. She shares, “I think once you kind of get over this idea that people care what you're doing all the time, you can just have so much more fun. Life is so much less stressful when you care a bit less what people think.” Finding more joy has helped her reduce stress.

As far as inspiration goes, Anderson has always been inspired by her older sister and lately she’s found inspiration in how her younger sister lives. She’s also inspired by the Northern kids she works with and how they are less pressured by time and work constraints. “I take a lot of inspiration from the younger generation and I think it keeps me young fully,” she beams.

Pursuing her dreams of studying and teaching science, Cameron Anderson is working hard in her jobs and on her thesis. She didn’t just find educational opportunities like an all-Indigenous rocket team and an Indigenous STEM program, she also found a community. She might be in a competitive program, but she’s learned to run her own race and stop the comparisons to find her joy.

Thanks to Alison Tedford Seaweed for authoring this article.