2023 Recipients

Tka Pinnock is a PhD candidate in Politics at York University, and a graduate affiliate of the Centre for Feminist Research and the Centre for Research on Latin America and the Caribbean. Her research explores the ways in which the ‘life-work’ of craft workers in the Caribbean, predominantly women, is re/shaped by and in response to contemporary economic development processes. Her doctoral research and leadership have received several scholarships and awards, including the Joseph-Armand Bombardier Canada Graduate Scholarship and The Grace and David Taylor Graduate Scholarship in Caribbean Studies. 

An avid community volunteer, Tka contributes to both her academic and local communities. She currently serves as a Board member of the Lifelong Leadership Institute, a youth leadership and educational organization in the Greater Toronto Area and contributes to her alma mater, Queen’s University, in an ambassadorial and governance role. She believes that research and knowledge production can help transform the material conditions of people’s lives. To that end, she engages in community-based research and, in the future, hopes to be a public intellectual.  

Tka dedicates her PhD to her mother, whose love, labour and loss shape her as a woman and an academic. 

Casey Oliver is a second-year PhD student in the Clinical Psychology program at Lakehead University. She is from Cobourg, Ontario and holds a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Waterloo, a Master of Arts degree in counselling psychology from Western University, and a Master of Arts degree in clinical psychology from Lakehead University.

Her past thesis work has focused on facial processing (bachelor's), domestic homicide (MA counsel. psych.), and sexual harassment (MA clin. psych.). She has held funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), the Canadian Foundation of University Women, the Canadian Psychological Association, and the Ontario Graduate Scholarship (OGS). Her dissertation focuses on sexual violence that is perpetrated through technology to better understand gender-based violence in Canada. Along with her research, Casey integrates advocacy, volunteer work, and mentorship to achieve a personal goal of helping to empower women and girls globally.

For past and recent research outputs, please visit her ResearchGate profile:  https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Casey-Oliver-2

Alexandra is a PhD student in Community Health Sciences at the University of Calgary’s Cumming School of Medicine. Her research explores how Inuit and western knowledge systems can come together to collaboratively and ethically inform wildlife health and food sovereignty in Arctic Canada. Prior to beginning her doctoral degree, Alexandra held many roles at the University of Calgary, including as an analyst specializing in Indigenous research ethics. As a proud KKΓ alumnae from McGill University, it is an honour for her to receive this award from the Kappa Kappa Gamma Foundation of Canada and to put the funds towards community-based research