St. Pierre's Annie Martel is one of 20 people from across Canada to receive the RBC Indigenous Youth Scholarship.
Nearly 800 Indigenous youth were considered for the annual scholarship. Recipients are awarded $10,000 a year for up to four years.
Martel will use the funds to help her complete her master's degree in Environmental Studies at the University of Winnipeg. She notes she wants to lean into her Métis roots and battle the effects of climate change in southern Manitoba.
"We're facing droughts and more extreme flooding and this is not just my community but a lot of communities across the province and, unfortunately, climate change is amongst us. I am really interested in ways to use traditional knowledge and indigenous knowledge to combat climate change and create adaptation tools and mechanisms and risk assessment on how indigenous communities in Manitoba can deal with this ongoing crisis.”
Receiving the RCB Indigenous Youth Scholarship is a tremendous honour and Martel outlines what she believes made the winning entries stand out.
“I think one thing that was quite remarkable was the connection to community that a lot of us have and so I think having that connection to community and wanting to come back to our community and do work for our own communities is something that is quite important.”
Martel says her appreciation for St. Pierre has only grown over the last few years.
“I grew up in St. Pierre but I did my undergrad degree in New Brunswick and I think it was leaving home and leaving the community that made me realize how important my community and my home are to me. It is one of those things where you never realize what you have until you leave it and that is the feeling I had.”