Indigenous Insights: An Evaluation Podcast

Dr. Fiona Cram (Māori: Ngāti Pāhauwera) is the mother of one son and has a PhD from the University of Otago (Social and Developmental Psychology). She has over 20 years of Kaupapa Māori (by, with and for Māori) research and evaluation experience with Māori and Iwi/tribal organisations and communities, as well as with government agencies, district health boards, and philanthropic organisations. A large portion of this work involves the use of mixed methods in the pursuit of decolonisation, tribal sovereignty, and societal transformation. Fiona’s project work, publications and conference presentations on Kaupapa Māori have made significant contributions to indigenous research and evaluation both in Aotearoa New Zealand and within the international community. She is also Co-Chair of EvalIndigenous. 

 

Overview

In this episode, Gladys is joined by Dr. Fiona Cram, Māori researcher, evaluator, and co-chair of EvalIndigenous, for a thoughtful and inspiring conversation about the evolution of Indigenous evaluation and the responsibilities we carry in doing this work. Fiona reflects on more than two decades of Kaupapa Māori research and evaluation in Aotearoa New Zealand, sharing stories of learning alongside communities, challenging conventional research practices, and creating evaluation processes grounded in relationships, reciprocity, and love. Together, they explore what it means to leave more behind than we take, protect community intellectual property, and recognize the everyday expressions of care and cultural connection that are often overlooked in conventional measures of success.

 

The conversation moves into the possibilities and tensions shaping Indigenous evaluation today. Fiona challenges listeners to think beyond simply decolonizing evaluation and instead consider how evaluation, historically used as a colonial tool, might be fundamentally reimagined to support Indigenous decision-making, sovereignty, and community learning. Gladys and Fiona reflect on the growth of Indigenous evaluation globally, the importance of creating space for emerging evaluators, and the ongoing negotiations with funders, institutions, and systems that do not always recognize Indigenous ways of knowing and creating change. Throughout, Fiona reminds us that good evaluation is ultimately about being useful to communities, strengthening relationships, and contributing to good decisions and that there is much joy, generosity, and possibility in doing this work together.

 

Resources 

EvalIndigenous: International network supporting Indigenous evaluation practice, knowledge sharing, and community building. Fiona serves as co-chair.

Insights For Indigenous Evaluation Book (Open access and free online!) https://pressbooks.pub/indigenousinsightscollective/ 

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Cheyenne Seneca is a descendent of the Seneca Nation of Indians. She comes from a lineage of social workers, teachers, and lawyers who have dedicated their life’s work to supporting communities in Indian Country. 

She grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area and her calling to serve Native people through science and storytelling was nurtured by the urban Indian community. 

She has worked with urban Indian organizations, partnered with Tribal research councils, and carried out Indigenous evaluation for almost ten years. 

Today, she works as an Indigenous evaluator at the Urban Indian Health Institute, a Tribal Epidemiology Center that serves urban American Indians and Alaska Natives nationally. She is committed to its mission to decolonize data for Indigenous people, by Indigenous people and has made contributions through her expertise in providing training and technical assistance in public health research and evaluation. 

She is passionate about reclaiming evaluation as an Indigenous value and practice, and improving the evaluation capacity of urban Indian organizations and young people.

She especially loves mentoring interns participating in the Urban Indian Health Institute’s Public Health Training Program and supporting their journeys to becoming leaders for their communities.

Overview

In this episode, Gladys is joined by Cheyenne Seneca, an Indigenous evaluator at the Urban Indian Health Institute, for a beautiful conversation about identity, belonging, public health, and evaluation as a practice of service to community. Cheyenne shares her journey of coming into confidence in her Indigenous identity, shaped by family stories, connection to Seneca heritage, urban Indigenous community, and formative experiences at the National Congress of American Indians, Intertribal Friendship House, Native American Health Center, and tribal research spaces. Through these relationships, she came to understand evaluation not as an extractive or judgment-based practice, but as a way of giving back, strengthening community, and carrying responsibility with care.

Cheyenne reflects on her work supporting the evaluation of the Urban Indian Health Institute’s Public Health Training Program, which supports Indigenous youth, interns, and fellows in exploring public health, research, evaluation, and service. They explore the opportunity of storytelling, art, oral presentations, and culturally grounded evaluation methods as powerful ways for young people to reflect on their learning and reclaim their place in science, public health, and community leadership. This episode is an invitation to invest in Indigenous youth, build spaces of belonging, and imagine Indigenous evaluation as a practice rooted in love, cultural connectedness, mentorship, and collective futures.

 

Resources 

Responsibility to All Relations: Indigenous Evaluation of an AIAN Public Health Workforce Development Program, Cheyenne Seneca, Benita McCarn, and Lenice Baker in the Canadian Journal of Program Evaluation. 

Insights For Indigenous Evaluation Book (Open access and free online!) https://pressbooks.pub/indigenousinsightscollective/ 

For more visit: https://www.gladysrowe.com/podcast (Scroll to the bottom to subscribe to the newsletter!)

If you are loving this podcast please leave a five star review on your favourite streaming service.

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Martell Hesketh, a member of Michel First Nation from Treaty 6 territory in Canada, is a program evaluator dedicated to advancing Indigenous ways of knowing through data and storytelling. After studying Human Biology at Stanford University and earning her MPH from the University of Washington, Martell worked with Urban Indian organizations at a tribal epidemiology center. Her work focuses on reclaiming narratives through evaluation grounded in Indigenous values and community priorities. She currently works at NDN Collective as the Impact & Learning Manager and lives on Coast Salish lands in Seattle, Washington.

 

Gillian Joseph is Ihaŋktoŋwaŋ and Mdewakaŋtoŋ Dakota and grew up as a guest on Waxhaw and Catawba lands. They have worked as a researcher, evaluator, and writer across diverse contexts, guided by their passion for Indigenous sovereignty and storytelling. Some of their previous experience includes serving as Research Manager at NDN Collective, developing and evaluating a curriculum about Indigenous Knowledge, producing social sciences textbooks, and utilizing decolonial methodologies to deepen understandings of health and well-being. They have a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology from George Washington University and a Master’s in Social and Cultural Psychology which was completed at ISCTE - University Institute of Lisbon, the University of Oslo, and the University of Limerick.

Overview

In this episode, Gladys is joined by Martell Hesketh and Gillian Joseph in a conversation about Indigenous evaluation, storytelling, and the ongoing work of redefining impact. Martell and Gillian share their journeys into evaluation through public health, psychology, community-based research, and Indigenous-led organizations, reflecting on how they came to understand evaluation as a practice of responsibility, relationship, and narrative reclamation.

 

Together, they explore their process of developing an impact framework within a movement organization, where work is constantly shifting in response to community needs. Rather than treating impact as a fixed or linear concept, Martell and Gillian describe it as contextual, relational, and intergenerational, something shaped by ancestors, present-day realities, and collective dreams for the future. They highlight the importance of strong and flexible evaluation questions, positive feedback loops, Indigenous definitions of sustainability, and the need to resist narrow metrics that flatten community stories.

 

A central thread of the episode is collective dreaming: the practice of coming together to imagine futures rooted in Indigenous worldviews, shared meaning, and community power. This episode invites listeners to consider how evaluation can hold space for dreams, uncertainty, accountability, and the many ways Indigenous communities already know how to measure what matters.

 

Resources 

Article: Reclaiming Data for Indigenous Dreaming & Self-Determination.

Insights For Indigenous Evaluation Book (Open access and free online!) https://pressbooks.pub/indigenousinsightscollective/ 

For more visit: https://www.gladysrowe.com/podcast (Scroll to the bottom to subscribe to the newsletter!)

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Dr. Lindsay Marie Brant  is the Director, Indigenous Initiatives at St. Lawrence College and is from Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory. In addition to her administrative role, Lindsay is an Adjunct Assistant Professor in the Master of Health Professions Education program at Queen’s, and Senior Advisor, Teaching, Innovation and Learning, advising on the curriculum design and redevelopment for this program.

Lindsay has received several awards in recognition of her contributions to education, including the Educational Leadership Award from the Educational Developers Caucus and an Ideas Worth Teaching Award from the Aspen Institute in 2021, the latter acknowledging her innovative work in the Commerce program at Smith School of Business at Queen’s University. Most recently, she was honoured with the Canadian Association for Medical Education’s Certificate of Merit Award (2024) for her impactful work in health education curriculum development. Lindsay was also the 2025 recipient of the Indigenous Women’s Movement Award from the Ontario Native Women’s Association, honouring her commitment to leading community-driven and values- based work both in community, and across educational institutions. Lindsay has also been honoured with several team awards from Queen’s University, including Principal’s Teaching & Learning Award for Indigenous Education (2 x recipient in 2023 and in 2026).

 

Dr. Brant was recently named an inaugural invited scholar and Pedagogy of Peace Nexus leader in the newly established Queen’s Institute for Educational Scholarship and Research (QIESR) at Queen’s University, which will allow for cross-institutional research, and global reach for advancing Indigenous knowledges/research/scholarship/educational praxis.

 

In addition to her academic and leadership roles, Lindsay is also an accomplished storyteller, writer, and poet, whose work is rooted in Indigenous knowledges, values, creativity, and community/ancestral connection and healing.

 

Overview

In this episode, Gladys is joined by Dr. Lindsay Brant. Rooted in her community of Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory and guided by the teachings embedded in her name, Lindsay shares a deeply personal journey of leadership, storytelling, and coming into her responsibilities as a knowledge carrier. Their conversation focuses on how her love of language, land, and water shaped her understanding of education as a relational practice and ultimately led to the development of her Pedagogy of Peace framework.

 

Lindsay reflects on creating the framework during the COVID-19 pandemic, drawing upon the teachings of the Great Law of Peace, Haudenosaunee values, and Anishinaabe understandings of relationality and balance. The episode explores how peace, strength, a good mind, and self-in-relation can guide educational practice, leadership, and evaluation. Lindsay offers reflections on the responsibilities that come with sharing Indigenous knowledge within institutional spaces, the importance of protecting community-rooted teachings, and the role of poetry and creative practice in imagining decolonial futures. The episode closes with Lindsay sharing her poem Fearless Futures, a powerful reflection on hope, world-building, and the possibilities that emerge when we choose peace, connection, and collective care.

 

Resources 

Queen’s University Centre for Teaching and Learning

Pedagogy of Peace Animation. Available through the Queen’s Centre for Teaching and Learning YouTube channel.

Book chapter - open access! Building a Pedagogy of Peace through Parallel Journeys. 

Insights For Indigenous Evaluation Book (Open access and free online!) https://pressbooks.pub/indigenousinsightscollective/ 

For more visit: https://www.gladysrowe.com/podcast (Scroll to the bottom to subscribe to the newsletter!)

If you are loving this podcast please leave a five star review on your favourite streaming service.

If you would like to offer support please visit: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/InsightsPod

Bio

Elliott Young is a Nehiyaw (Cree) scholar from Ermineskin Cree Nation with family ties to Louis Bull Tribe, Samson Cree Nation, and Tsuut’ina Nation. He lives in Edmonton with his wife and two children and is a PhD Candidate in the School of Public Health at the University of Alberta. His doctoral research, Indigenous Sovereignty through Health Economics Evaluation, examines how Nehiyaw worldviews can reshape how health systems define value and make decisions. Elliott has over a decade of experience in government, education, and the non-profit sector advancing Indigenous engagement, education, and evaluation. He is Vice Chair of the Maskwacis Education School Commission, an Associate Editor of the Roots and Relations section of the Canadian Journal of Program Evaluation, and sits on the Canadian Evaluation Society’s Working Group on Advancing Reconciliation and Indigenous Sovereignty in Evaluation. He is a SSHRC Doctoral Fellow and a 2020 Edify Magazine Top 40 Under 40 recipient. 

 

Overview

In this episode, Gladys sits down with Elliott Young, Nêhiyaw scholar, evaluator, and PhD candidate, to explore his journey into evaluation and the questions that continue to shape his work. Elliott reflects on his early experiences in Indigenous engagement and relationship-building that led him to ask deeper questions about impact, organizational change, and how institutions measure success. What began as a curiosity about evaluation has evolved into doctoral research examining the intersection of Indigenous sovereignty and health economics evaluation. 

 

Elliott asks important questions and offers observations about how health systems make decisions about funding, value, and resource allocation, and the ways Indigenous peoples are often excluded from those processes. Elliott shares how his research is investigating what it would mean to create space for Indigenous worldviews, leadership, and decision-making within health economics evaluation. The conversation expands into broader reflections on Indigenous evaluation, the challenges of defining the field, and the importance of grounding evaluation in Indigenous governance, community priorities, and sovereignty rather than simply adapting existing frameworks. 

 

Resources 

Maskwacîs Education Schools Commission (MESC)

Roots & Relations in the Canadian Journal of Program Evaluation 

 

Insights For Indigenous Evaluation Book (Open access and free online!) https://pressbooks.pub/indigenousinsightscollective/ 

For more visit: https://www.gladysrowe.com/podcast (Scroll to the bottom to subscribe to the newsletter!)

If you are loving this podcast please leave a five star review on your favourite streaming service.

If you would like to offer support please visit: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/InsightsPod