Meet KPU: Valérie Vézina
The instructor was honoured with the Canadian Political Science Association Prize for Teaching Excellence
Valérie Vézina has been an instructor at KPU since 2018. (Submitted/James Timmins)
Valérie Vézina is a political science instructor at Kwantlen Polytechnic University. She is originally from Quebec and her areas of interest include nationalism as well as Canadian comparative and global politics.
She also has an interest in studying islands, which she developed while completing her master of arts at the Memorial University of Newfoundland. In addition to her master of arts, Vézina has a bachelor of arts from McGill University and a PhD from the University of Quebec in Montreal.
She has been involved in multiple scholarly works, including a book she authored titled Une île, une nation?: Le nationalisme insulaire à la lumière des cas de Terre-Neuve et Puerto Rico. Vézina has also edited the KPU pressbook Political Ideologies and Worldviews: An Introduction, written chapters for several books, and contributed to multiple articles and reviews.
Vézina was recently awarded the 2024 Canadian Political Science Association (CPSA) Prize for Teaching Excellence, which is presented annually to recognize political scientists who show excellence in teaching and student learning. She accepted the award in June during the 2024 CPSA conference at McGill University in Montreal.
Vézina wrote the following responses in an email statement to The Runner.
When did you join the KPU community and why?
I joined KPU in September 2018. After a recruitment and interview process, I was hired as a regular faculty. Prior to KPU, I was teaching at Memorial University in St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador. I was looking for an institution that had teaching at its heart. KPU is a teaching institution, with innovative practices and pedagogies. This was a plus. The fact that it is located in B.C. also helps as I love the outdoors, and we are close to the ocean!
What is your favorite story of your time at KPU?
In a POLI 4190 course (Selected Topics in Canadian Politics), students had to create political parties of an invented country I had created. They were given basic demographic, economic, and political facts about it and, in groups, they had to create a political platform and political advertisements. There was a leaders’ debate and the parties were exposed at the Surrey Library. We even had elections! It was my favourite course to teach, and students loved it!
What is something you would like to say to people new to KPU?
As a new faculty member, it is sometimes hard to meet people as you are really busy with teaching. However, get involved in some committees that interest you; it is the best way to meet people from various departments. This is how I have created long-lasting relationships and friendships!
What are you working on or doing right now?
I was just programme chair of the Canadian Political Science Association annual meeting, which took place in June. I was responsible for overseeing the organization of more than 300 events! It was a lot of work, but very rewarding. So now that this is over, I can focus on my first love which is islands. I study and research islands and have been asked to do some writings on Newfoundland and other places I love, so I can’t wait to get back into researching!
I research specifically island nationalism, and I am interested in islands that are attached to a state (for example Newfoundland being a province of Canada) and how it developed a different sense of identity.
One of the things I am the proudest from being programme chair was to organize three keynote events that were attended by over 60 people each. I had to negotiate with the keynote speaker on the expenses we will reimburse, who will introduce them, what topic they will talk about that was relevant with our theme (Approaches, Knowledges and Methods for the World of Tomorrow).
What is something you would like people to know about you?
I love teaching! I love it so much that in my spare time, I teach yoga! I am also an avid swimmer and enjoy doing laps at the outdoor pool. I have been a student of yoga for almost two decades. For many years I have wanted to do my teacher training, but it was never the right timing, or I did not have the money.
It all came together two years ago and since then I have been teaching at a small neighbourhood studio in Burnaby called Heights Yoga and Wellness. I teach once or twice a week mostly in the evening. As I often joke: without yoga, I would be a horrible person! In other words, without the grounding of yoga, I would be lost in the world of ideas.
I like how yoga takes me out of my head [and] into my body. The same happens when I swim, it is just me, the water, the strokes. In some ways, it makes me feel free.
