Women at KPU: Why International Women's Day is more than just a celebration

International Women’s Day was on March 8 — a day to commemorate the social, cultural, and political achievements of women around the world. The day also serves as a time to reflect on the progress made and inequalities yet to be answered.

At Kwantlen Polytechnic University, women make up 59 per cent of the overall workforce. However, average hourly wages are 14 per cent less than men, according to KPU’s November 2025 pay transparency report.

Women play an important part in shaping the campus community — and this year, The Runner spoke with five women who’ve made an impact on the school community. 

Lyndsay Passmore

Lyndsay Passmore began her journey at KPU around the age of 20 as a non-traditional student. Before then, she had already been working full time for five years. While teaching in Russia in 2008, Passmore saw a part-time job posting at KPU and decided to apply. 

Getting to know people personally and the small class sizes appealed to Passmore, so she decided to stick around. She has been a faculty instructor at the Melville School of Business for about 18 years now.  

Passmore also served as the chair of the KPU senate standing committee on teaching and learning until 2023. She’s currently serving as a faculty board member on KPU’s board of governors. 

“I love strategy, and I think probably what motivated me was I had been in so many positions on the senate side.”

Outside of KPU, Passmore works for the Global Emerging Leadership Programs, which involves teaching in universities around the world. The program works to establish leadership capabilities in young people through community. 

Being a woman has shaped what Passmore can pursue in terms of opportunities, she says. 

“The older I get, the more I realize how much it’s shaped [my life] in positive and probably more negative ways … even as a white woman, really recognizing the impact of that intersectionality and what I’ve experienced is going to be so different than others.”

Passore adds that she has been in many spaces where she hasn’t been taken seriously because of the assumptions that come with being a woman.  

“I think it definitely has even impacted who listens to your voice and when,” she says, adding that there is a lot of work that needs to be done to address gender parity. 

She takes inspiration from a quote by author Charlie Mackesy that says, “I wish there was a school of unlearning.”

“I feel like the older I get, the more unlearning and relearning I do. It’s just been a collection of experiences.”

Passmore says her biggest accomplishment has been raising her kids. For other people, she says, it might be her going to university, getting a master’s, and receiving a doctorate. As a non-traditional student, Passmore dropped out from high school after Grade 8 and worked full time. 

For her, International Women’s Day is a time of reflection, looking back at women’s accomplishments, and taking account of the present. At KPU, she says, this includes looking at whose voices are missing from decision-making and breaking down systemic barriers to reach gender parity. 

“Oftentimes, we avoid hard discussions that really need to be had — and I think we need to have more of those.”

She emphasizes more solidarity instead of the spotlight and looking at the bigger picture in terms of how far we have to go. 

“I have been affected really positively over the course of me being an instructor,” Passmore says. “What I love about the School of Business … is how many faculty have really advanced equity and pushing the envelope on making sure there’s equity and inclusion built into the classroom.”

Seanna Takacs

Seanna Takacs, a learning specialist and practice lead with KPU Accessibility Services, started at the institution in spring 2018. Takacs has also worked on universal design for learning initiatives at the university’s Teaching and Learning Commons.

Working in accessibility circles before she joined KPU, Takacs wanted to work at the institution because of the available student support such as its Learning Centres, which help support accessibility work. 

As a woman and eldest daughter, Takacs says she is aware of the expectations of emotional labour and the responsibility of being a mother. Takacs also understands the importance of supporting young women navigating these expectations created by gender roles. 

“As a woman navigating some really bewildering expectations at times, I’ve learned how important it is that we encourage each other,” she says. “The world works in progress, and if we get stuck or lost, we can always sit together.”

Takacs advises young women to question what access and inclusion means to them in the context of the community spaces they are a part of. She adds that a lot of work within accessibility is also value-driven, which is why it’s important to be aware of accessibility and inclusion.

“It’s not just about whether you can read or whether you can enter a classroom. It really has to do with finding your place and having people who welcome you and are also finding a place together with you.”

Takacs says winning the 2025 Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI) Award offered her an opportunity to stand with her community and it was the pinnacle of her career. 

“But also, a student recently told me I was cool, another laughed because I sounded like a teenager sometimes, and a colleague said he likes that he doesn’t have a mask around me. That’s a huge, huge compliment.”

She says that having interesting children, enjoying her family and work commitments, and how they weave together is also an accomplishment to her. 

Takacs says that International Women’s Day has always been a day of historical excavation for her. From questioning the untold stories of women contributing to science, art, culture, and community to realizing what it means to be a woman herself, Takacs has let go of some of the expectations she associated with the role.

Sheena Dela Torre 

Sheena Dela Torre has always balanced multiple hats. She was accepted to KPU while completing her executive master’s of business administration at the Asian Institute of Management.

While being a post-baccalaureate human resources management student, Dela Torre was elected as a 2025-26 student senator, founded the KPU Pinoy Club, and has made a name for herself in the university community. 

“I would describe my KPU journey as something like, ‘OK, you need to jump, even if there’s no safety net when you are looking at the bottom of the bridge,’” she says. “Trust that safety net and bridge will appear eventually.”

Dela Torre moved to Canada in 2024, leaving behind her extended family and a decade-long stable career in finance and customer service. Her last role was as a director of finance operations at a fintech startup.

Moving to Canada was not Dela Torre’s first decision — it was her husband’s to help support his younger sister who was moving to Toronto.

“It was an act of faith that I would rebuild my new life here in Canada, rebuild my career, and start from scratch — a new identity in a new country and in a new world,” Dela Torre says.

While she has a positive mentality about moving, the transition was not easy.

“There were days where I would have to attend … six hours of classes, rush home because I need to also watch my kids, help them with their homework because they’re also managing themselves [with] entering into a new school,” Dela Torre says. “Then, I have to stay up a little bit at night so I can study.”

But that challenge quickly became an opportunity for growth.

At KPU, Dela Torre immersed herself in student life. She volunteered with the Career Development Centre, took on being a student ambassador with KPU Academic Integrity, mentored high-school students preparing for job interviews, and became involved in multiple campus activities.

“KPU became my training ground for courage,” she says.

Being a woman, Dela Torre says, has shaped every aspect of her journey — not as a limitation, but as a perspective.

“To me, being a woman became a lens through which I make every decision and sacrifice,” she says.

Balancing multiple roles — student, senator, volunteer, leader, and mother — sometimes felt like living up to the stereotype of a “superwoman.” While the label can be empowering, Dela Torre says it also comes with pressure.

Despite all she has accomplished at KPU, Dela Torre does not view her biggest accomplishment as others do, such as securing internships and job opportunities in their related field of work. Some peers point to her ability to secure internships and professional opportunities related to her studies — something many international students struggle to obtain. 

“That’s not how I value my biggest accomplishment. My biggest accomplishment, so far, is me putting my feet here in Canada,” Dela Torre says.

“I turned 180 degrees from being an operational leader to reinventing my life as a new immigrant here in Canada — a new country as a woman, a mom, a wife, and without losing my own identity in the process.”

For Dela Torre, International Women’s Day is a megaphone and serves as a reminder of the sacrifices and trade-offs women make, including herself.

The day also serves as a tribute to the women who shaped her early life, including her grandmother, who taught her independence and resilience by forcing her to sell oysters at the local market alone from a young age.

“It reminds me that my story also matters, and the stories of other women also deserve to be heard.”

Tracy Sherlock

Tracy Sherlock’s journey at KPU has come full circle — from student to instructor and now chair of the journalism department.

Sherlock first arrived at KPU having already completed a bachelor of arts in international relations from the University of British Columbia and a journalism diploma from Langara College.

She was working an office job, writing newsletters and grant proposals, while doing freelance journalism for local publications including the Richmond Review and The Marpole Review before returning to school. 

“I saw an ad in the paper, ironically, that KPU had created a new journalism bachelor’s degree and it included a practicum,” Sherlock says.

The decision paid off. She completed her practicum at the Delta Optimist, which gave way to her first journalism job at the newspaper around 2004. By 2007, Sherlock joined the Vancouver Sun, where she worked as a reporter and editor for a decade.

“I had many different jobs there, but the most significant one, for the longest time, was that I was the education reporter. I covered K-to-12 and post-secondary [education] in British Columbia,” she says.

While reporting had remained central to her career, Sherlock had long envisioned herself in other roles, too.

“Throughout my life, my career goals were pretty much to be a writer, teacher, or lawyer.”

So she returned to KPU — this time at the head of the classroom.

When she was offered the teaching job, the Vancouver Sun was doing mass layoffs and buyouts — cutting 10 per cent of its staff. Sherlock took the buyout because “it was a pretty dire time there.”

Her first class was in social issues journalism. She was only supposed to teach one class her first semester, but she finished the semester with a full course load after stepping in to cover additional courses.

Today, Sherlock continues to teach while serving as chair of the journalism department, a role she began in September 2025. She continues to do freelance work with The Tyee, The New York Times, and Canada’s National Observer, among other publications. She also writes a social issues and education column for the Richmond News. 

Among her professional highlights, Sherlock points to a six-part print feature called “In From Care to Where?” that examined the provincial policy that cuts off care to children in the foster care system at age 19. She won a Jack Webster Award for feature writing, B.C.’s top journalism prize, alongside fellow Vancouver Sun reporter Lori Culbert.

The piece also received a citation of merit for the Michener Award, which are administered in partnership with the Rideau Hall Foundation, from the office of the Governor General of Canada.

Sherlock continues her work on B.C.’s foster-care system today through Spotlight: Child Welfare, a collaborative journalism project hosted by The Tyee and aimed at improving reporting on the child “welfare” system.

However, what Sherlock sees as her biggest professional highlight is not often the case with others, who view a different milestone as her biggest achievement.

“When I talk about The New York Times, people get pretty impressed by that,” she says. “It’s not just the name, it’s also the reach. You have to remember that the world reads The New York Times.”

Being a woman has shaped Sherlock’s career, but the biggest barriers she experienced were often tied to motherhood.

“When you are a mother, you can’t really separate what is because you’re a mother and what is because you’re a woman,” she says. 

While raising her children, she didn’t want to work full time, but found that employers didn’t always offer the same respect to part-time workers.

International Women’s Day for Sherlock is both a reminder of battles won and a recognition of the inequities that remain today.

“I feel really fortunate that women in generations before me did the fighting necessary to make it possible for me to have this life that I have had with expectations that I could be a chair, a journalist, or whatever it is,” she says. “But the fight isn’t over.”

Laura McDonald

Laura McDonald never considered what being a woman in her career meant until she took over as the Faculty of Trades and Technology dean in 2022.

“I believe there was only one [female] dean in the position. It was typically held by men who had Red Seal trades training experiences. So it was one of the few times where I noticed that I was a woman leading predominantly men,” McDonald says.

For McDonald, her professional career path started at Douglas College after graduating from high school, when she started working at its registrar’s office. She later left and went to New Westminster Secondary School, where she worked as a registrar, too.

Though the position at the high school was cut due to budget changes, a new opportunity opened at KPU’s Office of the Registrar, where McDonald applied and was hired.

McDonald was first hired as the manager of records, registration, and scheduling. Later, she accepted a position as the divisional business manager for the Faculty of Trades and Technology.

“I thought that sounds really interesting, and it was a nice step away from the office of the registrar world, which I’ve been in my whole career.”

After moving into the associate dean position within the Faculty of Trades and Technology, she was mentored by the previous dean and later took over as dean herself.

Historically, roles in trades training have not been held by women, McDonald says. Seeing a woman in a leadership role shows others the pathways that are open to them and helps remove some of those historical stereotypes, she adds.

“I think students, when they see me, they don’t often right away think I’m the dean. It’s a good awareness moment — maybe we need to put aside some of those gender stereotypes and recognize that anybody can do any of these jobs,” McDonald says.

She says that sometimes such moments make it feel achievable and open a person’s mind to new possibilities.

Having an expectation of excellence is important for her, McDonald says, adding that respect is one of her key values.

“I often say to students [to] have respect for yourself, have respect for your faculty members because they are very accomplished in their fields, and then, in return, you can earn that respect.”

As dean, McDonald’s vision is to create a culture of excellence that everyone can support and contribute to in their own way in the faculty.

“I think that’s probably my greatest accomplishment,” she says.

The Faculty of Trades and Technology continue to be a sector where about seven per cent of workers are women, McDonald says.

“I would love to see that one day [the number] gets much higher than it is now. But there’s a lot of learning that has happened over the last few decades, where it’s a safer environment for women and it’s a more inclusive environment for women.”

She adds that she loves helping normalize a respectful culture and environment so that when women enter the workforce and work on trade sites, they can carry that culture forward, along with the men who were in the same classes.

“They see what’s acceptable, what’s not acceptable, and then when they get onto the trades training site, they feel comfortable in speaking up and making it safe and welcoming for women.”

For McDonald, International Women’s Day is a moment of celebration and awareness. With female skilled trades workers on campus, including foundation students and apprentices, it is also an opportunity to celebrate and acknowledge women working in male-dominated fields.

“It’s a moment of combined strength for all of us as women, stepping up and saying, ‘We’re here. The fight isn’t over, but we’re together, recognizing what we have done and how far we have come,’”

McDonald says she is proud of the work KPU has done to support women in leadership roles.

“I have felt nothing but support and respect since I’ve moved into KPU administration and I have no doubt that feeling is perpetuated throughout the institution.”