Gerry Oleman is a member of the St’at’imc Nation from British Columbia, which is located in the Coast Mountains between Whistler, the Fraser River, and the interior of BC. Gerry is an Elder, traditional knowledge keeper, mentor, storyteller, healer, and educator. He is a former Chief, Band Councillor, Tribal Director, and counsellor.
Biography
Over his long career, Gerry has been a trailblazer. He was one of the first Indigenous addictions counsellors trained in British Columbia. In the mid 1990s, Gerry was hired by British Columbia Institute for Technology (BCIT) as the first Indigenous Cultural Advisor, helping to bring traditional counselling and healing practices to the BCIT community. Similarly, Gerry was hired as the first Traditional Practitioner permitted to practice traditional healing methods within the BC health care system at BC Women’s and Children’s Hospitals. Gerry has continued to work with various health care authorities to develop provincial and regional programs and policies to improve the health outcomes of Indigenous peoples.
Gerry has worked extensively with a variety of post-secondary institutions as an Elder, guest lecturer, sweat lodge keeper, curriculum consultant, and advisor. He has several academic appointments as Adjunct Professor at the University of British Columbia (UBC), including in the School of Family Medicine and the School of Community and Regional Planning. He has lectured on diverse topics such as cultural and spiritual care in public health care settings, traditional healing and grieving practices, traditional medicines, ethnomusicology, forestry and traditional land use, traditional forms of justice and peacekeeping, historical impacts of colonization and residential schools, and Indigenous student success.
Gerry is a consulting Elder for Cuystwi, a youth health promotion and suicide prevention online training program, which replicates the traditional teaching relationship between Elders and youth. For several years, he has been an Elder in Residence at UBC’s Summer Science program, an initiative to encourage Indigenous youth to pursue careers in science and health. Gerry is also a popular motivational speaker at youth and wellness conferences.
In 2016, Gerry was awarded the R. Paul Kerston Award by UBC Health Sciences, established to honour outstanding community educators who have made a difference to student learning at UBC. He received this award in part due to his generosity and impact on students and UBC faculty members in medicine, dentistry, nursing, social work, physiotherapy, occupational therapy, and pharmacy for over 15 years.
A survivor of Kamloops Indian Residential School, Gerry facilitated UBC’s Truth and Reconciliation process at the UBC Longhouse. Gerry works with San'yas Indigenous Cultural Safety Training Program and the Provincial Health Services Authority in BC.
He is the host of Teachings In The Air, an Indigenous health and wellness podcast, and he currently resides in Manitoba.
