Annual Indigenous Graduate Student Symposium (IGSS)
Supporting Aboriginal Graduate Enhancement (SAGE) is a network started at UBC over 20 years ago, under the tutelage of Dr. Jo-ann Archibald. Every year the SAGE organizes an Indigenous Graduate Student Symposium (IGSS), a forum where interdisciplinary Indigenous MA and PhD students come together to share their work, exchange knowledge and to build academic networks. There are SAGE pods at universities in BC and across Canada. This is a student led event that is supported by faculty mentors from UBC Vancouver, UBC Okanagan and SFU and staff from all locations. The IGSS occurs in March of every year.
Current Indigenous graduate students from SFU and UBC are invited to participate on the annual IGSS Planning Committee please email gs_indigenous@sfu.ca to get involved!
Carrying Our Ancestors with Us: Knowledge, Responsibility and Collective Learning
The IGSS conference creates space for Indigenous graduate students to share ideas, hear multidisciplinary presentations, and build connections in a welcoming student community. The 2026 symposium invites students to reflect on how Indigenous knowledge guides their academic journeys.We invite Indigenous graduate students to submit proposals that consider the Symposium subthemes.
Symposium Subthemes:
- Carrying Knowledge: How Indigenous knowledges are held and mobilized across disciplines and contexts.
- Responsibility to Community, Land, and Relations: Accountability to community, land, ancestors, and future generations.
- Resurgent Methods: Indigenous methodologies that disrupt or work beyond dominant academic norms. This includes creative, land-based, story-based, quantitative, qualitative, and interdisciplinary approaches rooted in Indigenous worldviews.
- Building Futures: Exploring how disciplines are growing, shifting, or being re-imagined in response to contemporary challenges.
- Digital Basket: Exploring emerging technologies, application, ethics, and impact.
Call for Proposals
Submit your proposal by February 18, 2026 (11:59 PST)
Submit your proposal!
Presentations should be about 15 minutes long followed by an additional 15 minutes for supportive audience questions and feedback. You may choose to present in-person or virtually. We welcome applications for presentations delivered by individuals or teams.
Our intention is to host a space that celebrates the work of Indigenous students working in diverse disciplines at different stages of their programs. Your presentation could focus on your initial work developing your topic and methodology, stories about conducting your research and preliminary research results, and/or story-sharing about your journey leading to/engaging in graduate education.
Arts, STEM, Health, everything is welcome. If you are unsure of how your work fits within the theme and subthemes, please get in touch with the contacts below. We welcome all submissions.
Contact(s): Jessica, jessica.knott@ubc.ca (UBC-V) or Dana, grad.sage@ubc.ca (UBC-V)
Nicole Manson, SFU SAGE, nicole_manson@sfu.ca
Register by: coming soon!
Please visit UBC's SAGE blog for more information about previous IGSS and SAGE network events.