“Nicole is a phenomenal professor. Not only does she know the material, but she makes it relevant with real world examples. She brings in examples from her own days in the field and also cutting-edge archeological research and techniques. She is engaging and professional, but cares for all her students. She makes extra effort for those of us that are registered with CAL. She deserves this award because she exemplifies the best in teaching and caring.”
Nicole, a recipient of a Teacher Recognition Award last spring, has been a faculty member at Camosun College for 22 years. When she started, she had no formal teaching experience, but after 22 years she still loves what she does and says it continues to be challenging, interesting, and rewarding.
Nicole started out as a field archeologist. “I completed my undergrad at the University of British Columbia, then did three field seasons in Belize, living in a tent in the middle of the jungle. While I was in graduate school at the University of Colorado, I did consultant archaeology for a large company that sent me all over Arizona, New Mexico, parts of Southern Utah, to get dirt under my fingernails” which is where her love for applied learning was born. And Nicole loves that applied learning has become a focus at Camosun. “My experience with students over the years confirms for me how valuable applied learning is because while some students are not as strong in traditional academia, if you give them an opportunity to apply what they’re learning, more students will become engaged in their learning. It’s a lot more work to teach that way, but it’s also a lot of fun to see students proud of what they’re able to do, and what a great opportunity for them to feel pride in their work and to share it with family and friends and the public.”
Nicole teaches all the archaeology courses within the Anthropology department at Camosun, including an applied field program that she had just wrapped up ten days before we spoke. “I also I teach Introduction to Anthropology which for many, many years has been part of the Indigenous Studies program. I’ve been proud to have been able to Indigenize that content and to Indigenize the way I approach teaching in general because of all the amazing guidance I’ve received from my Indigenous colleagues and from our Elders.” She also teaches a food anthropology course. “I don’t have an academic background in food anthropology, but because that topic was starting to take over more and more of my existing classes, in 2012, I launched its own course.” The food anthropology course allows students to examine history, identity, sustainability, and globalization, but opened the door for Nicole to integrate applied learning. “I created opportunities for students to eat edible insects, for example, and to come face to face with how cultures determine what we think is ‘food’ and what we think is ‘gross.’” Then in 2018, Nicole started teaching an anthropology of death class. “This has been a profound professional and personal experience for me, as I have an opportunity to walk along with people at different stages of their lives – from 18-year-olds to retirees; most people in our culture are both interested in and terrified of death and we tend to live in death avoidance, but in the end we’re all mortal. This course has been an amazing experience for me to learn alongside my students, and while it’s very academic, it’s also profoundly personal.” The Anthropology of Death course partners with the Royal BC Museum, which Nicole says is an excellent opportunity to celebrate being a community college and part of our community. “Bringing what we do out of the classroom and having students teach is a really great way for them to cement their learning.”
What Nicole has discovered in the Anthropology of Death course is that “the more time you spend talking about death, the more time you are actually talking about life. Many of the students are just starting to think about mortality, and I’ve had some amazing experiences where students will tell me about how they were able to use the skills they learned in my class to help a loved one have a good death. To have somebody want to share that with me is very special.” But they also do some fun things in that class. “We did a mock Egyptian funeral in 2018 when the Egypt exhibit was at the Royal BC Museum, renting a coffin from the Victoria Operatic Society and everything. It was a ton of work, and it was crazy fun. We can’t do that if I’m just having students read something or watch a video.” This year, Nicole says the museum has already reached out to her for a partnership in conjunction with their Stonehenge exhibit. “It’s great exposure for the college and promotes what the College says we’re all about in terms of applied learning and being engaged with our community.”
I then turned to Nicole’s field work program, knowing how passionate she is about it. “The program has been offered since 2008, and this year we ran it over an intensive ten-day period which captured a different group of students. The program is designed to build an applied skill set you don’t normally get from traditional academic archeology field schools.” For some background, Nicole told me that 90% of archaeology is consultant-based here in North America, meaning that the work is done in the context of development to uphold heritage legislation. “Creating a safe place to learn is really what this applied program is all about, giving students a chance to build applied skills that will make them more desirable in a field setting. I developed this program in partnership with the Archaeology Branch of the BC provincial government, so students receive both a credential from the college and a certificate through the Archaeology Branch.” In addition, half of the program time is dedicated towards an applied project in partnership with an Indigenous community. “Students are not just learning how to take field notes or use a compass. They are also learning about cultural protocols and building respectful relationships.”
In 2024, for the ten-day version of the program, Nicole co-facilitated with Tommy Happynook, a hereditary leader from the Huu-ay-aht Nation located out of Bamfield who has his PhD in anthropology and is a faculty member at UVic. “It was a three-way partnership between me (Camosun,) Tommy (UVic), and the Huu-ay-aht Nation who hosted us. We first had three intensive days here in town, then we spent five nights camping out in Huu-ay-aht territory just outside of Bamfield. The Nation rolled out the red carpet for us and our students interacted with some of the people working in the Huu-ay-aht Nation’s Lands department. We were able to teach not just from a Western archaeology perspective, but also from a Nuu-chah-nulth perspective with Tommy providing his cultural lens. The Nation had asked us to work with them to help inform their visioning process to build thoughtful economic development. So, the students felt like they were doing something valuable, and they were able to learn by doing in a space where they could make mistakes and learn from them. We had two full field days crashing through the bushes experiencing things that can’t be replicated in a classroom. It was really intensive, and it was a lot of fun.” Nicole notes that when students work in community, the bar is set higher for them. “They put in a lot more work, and then are glowing because they are so incredibly proud of what they’ve been able to do.” Experiences like this make Nicole proud to be working at a community college. “We have opportunities to do exceptional things, we contribute to our community, and experts from our community teach us all kinds of things through our partnerships with them.” And including students in those relationships is something Nicole loves. “When we think about what we want students to take away from post-secondary learning, I’m not just teaching anthropology. I’m teaching students how to work together and build community.” So, Nicole says, we need to continue to integrate opportunities that take more time, take more resourcing, cost more money, because those things, for our students, are transformative.
Knowing how much Nicole enjoys being with her students in person, I wondered how moving online during COVID affected her teaching. “For my own sake, I needed to think about the opportunities that were presented, rather than all the things that we couldn’t do. For example, I use edible teaching aids in my food anthropology course, bringing in something for the students to eat every single class. During COVID, I put together teaching kits in mason jars with everything labeled for the weeks. One week we did a chocolate tasting, so I included three different chocolates. We did an olive oil tasting, so I included vials of olive oil. Then, after learning how to make sourdough started over the holidays I made a video teaching students how to make their own sourdough starter and about two thirds of the way through the course we had a bread night. I taught them about social, political, and economic complexity through the lens of wheat, and we discussed the domestication of wheat and the importance of bread. And at the same time, I taught them how to make dough and cook their bread. Then everybody shared pictures of their bread. That was really cool, and I still have bread night even though we are back in person.”
Nicole also finds opportunities to engage with other departments at the college. After we returned to in-person learning, “Chef David Lang helped us with bread night, inviting us to the Culinary Arts space so we could use their big ovens. I connected with my colleagues in Visual Arts who gave me clay for the students to make their own bread stamps inspired by Roman period stamps. Last year, in my Introduction to Anthropology course, we learned about acorns from a Knowledge Keeper who shared teachings about collecting acorns. We gathered acorns here on Campus, we weighed them, we learned what makes a good acorn and why, and we learned how to process them and how much work that is. Then we tried making a few different foods from the acorn flour, and ate it at the Pit Cook, which was great fun”.
Nicole had already shared so many amazing memories, but I could not resist asking if she had any others that stood out to her over her years of teaching. “When we did the Egypt the Mock Egyptian funeral at the Museum, I was interviewed by CFAX someone who listened to my interview was upset enough by what I had said to email me. This person said they took offense to me using the words death and fun in the same sentence because death is not fun, it is morbid.” The next day in class, while students were excitedly preparing for the mock funeral, Nicole asked them for their opinion about the email. “It was such an interesting conversation because they said the class was both fun and a safe way to think about something scary. Then the person who sent the email came to the event and peppered the students with questions. Later they told me how they tried to educate her about death literacy, and I thought, my work here is done. Seeing students engaged in their own learning is a real honour.”
And as always, my final question for Nicole was about what advice she might have for new instructors at Camosun. “Don’t be afraid to say, ‘I don’t know’ and to circle back when you do. Students appreciate knowing that we are humans. Also, bring your own expertise into the class – students love hearing stories. And don’t be afraid to ask for help, from colleagues, from CETL, from guest lecturers. It’s a learning process, and can be overwhelming but lean into your strengths, have fun learning, ask lots of questions, and above all, build community with your students.”