Weaving Hope Through Our Education System

Derrique DeGagné (she/her) is a cis-gender, White, second generation settler with ancestors from England, Ukraine, and Poland. Holding an MEd (University of Calgary), a BEd (University of Alberta), and a Dip Theatre (Grant MacEwan University), Derrique is a life-long learner, educator, and artist. She serves as a Curriculum Consultant with Edmonton Public Schools after having worked as an Arts Curriculum Consultant with Alberta Education. Prior to that, Derrique was a theatre and humanities educator at Victoria School of the Arts. Additionally, she ran the KidsFringe at the Edmonton International Fringe Theatre Festival and InkPulse, a summer writing camp, for the Writer’s Guild of Alberta. As well as serving on the Citadel Theatre’s Board of Directors, Derrique is a committee member for the Greater Edmonton Teachers’ Convention and a former Theatre Alberta board member. Derrique’s proudest role, however, is parenting her creative and caring children alongside her amazing partner.

This soulful collection of teacher stories resonates with its fierceness, authenticity, and longing, indeed insistence, on ways we must move forward together in education. This diverse threaded collection, beautiful in its recognition of human imperfections and call for shared humanity, forms a collective blanket of sisterhood, solidarity, and inspiration in these times of hopeful awakening.

—Dr. Yvonne Poitras Pratt, Métis Nation of Alberta Citizen, Associate Professor, Werklund School of Education at the University of Calgary

This collection of powerful, poetic, and personal narratives epitomizes what it means to be hopeful. Anyone who cares about public education and building and creating hope will find inspiring words tucked into these pages. The fact that many of these stories were written during a once-in-a-lifetime global pandemic just adds to the power of how stories can be the transformative change towards a more hopeful and better world.

—Trisha Estabrooks, Chair, Edmonton Public School Board