COMMUNICATIONS Stories can capture your attention, strengthen, or challenge your perspective, and inspire you to take action. This past year, the Alumni Association had the privilege of sharing many powerful ones through our alumni features, which were published on the BCIT News blog and shared through our social media channels and website. In 2021/22, we shone a light on alumni who overcame enormous challenges on the road to success, are using technology to protect their communities, and are motivating future generations of BCIT graduates. Read all our alumni stories: bcit.ca/news
INDIGENOUS RED SEAL MACHINIST CHELSEA BARRON IS FORGING HER OWN PATH Chelsea Barron has an angel. Her name was Angelina. She hunted on horseback, and was a residential school survivor and fierce mother of nine children. Angelina was Chelsea’s grandmother and is a driving inspiration in her life. Like her grandmother before her, Chelsea is forging her own unique path. A member of the Tsilhqot’in (Chilcotin) Nation,
the BCIT alumna is now a Red Seal Machinist and one of few women working in a male-dominated trade. She says the leading-edge skills she learned as a student in the BCIT Machinist program helped prepare her to succeed: “You don’t often see many women in the machining industry. Being singled out as different, as a minority, a woman, an Indigenous person…it’s tough. You have to prove you belong.”
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