Sandi L Boucher, Red Thunderbolt of the Loon clan, accepted the Aboriginal Leadership Award in 2017 and shared a core teaching: with a gift comes responsibility. She uses her platform to inspire Northern Indigenous communities by speaking openly about poverty, violence, and cultural practices like the jingle dress, urging mainstream organizations to create opportunities that break stereotypes.
Chapters
Bonjour, Mishko pogganong kwei nadishnikas mang dodem. Hi, everybody. It's Sandi Boucher once again. I'm Red Thunderbolt, woman of the Loon clan, a proud member of Seine River First Nation in Treaty 3 Territory in Northern Ontario. And I'm actually not here. Okay, so I'm never really here when you're watching the videos. Actually, I'm probably here, but never mind. What I meant is right now I'm actually on winter break. My team and I have worked really hard over 2023, so we're taking a much needed break. But there was no way I was gonna forget about you, especially all of those new people that found me in 2023, those people that love to comment. I am not taking you for granted. So what I've done is taking clips from keynotes, seminars, live workshops that I did throughout the years. Probably things you haven't seen before. But I've just taken clips from them, focused in on a key point or a teaching that I thought you might appreciate. For example, in today's video. Well, this is. No, this is not professionally done. I will apologize for the wobbly, but this was a speech I gave. I think it's. In 2017 when I won one of the influential, Influential Women Awards. I wanted to focus in on the teaching that I live every single day. I hope you appreciate it.
Here it is.
Here she's built a career as a motivational speaker, helping empower Indigenous women and youth in communities right across northwestern Ontario. Her message to Indigenous audiences is not about joining the mainstream, but learning to live within it while maintaining personal and traditional values. I think I can add here, her message to mainstream people is the same thing. There's no going back to change the last 150 years, but we can learn from it and focus on the next 150 years. The winner of the 2017 Aboriginal Leadership Award is my friend, Sandy Boucher.
Thank you.
I didn't think it was going to be so challenging to keep my makeup on, Sherry Ann. Like, oh, my God. And then that introduction. I have to say thank you to opg, to influential women, to Northern Ontario business, and to so many amazing people. Woman who believed in me long before I did.
Roz.
Proud. Carol, woman here. Eight years ago, I walked in with a one page document that I thought was a darn good business plan. And thankfully, Meryl was there to help me expand on that and to expand on my dreams. But I stand here today and receiving this award, I was reminded of one very important teaching. As an Ojibwe woman, I was taught that with a gift comes responsibility. This award is a gift. And I take the responsibility very seriously. Because what OPG may not realize or influence which women may not realize is. But I take these awards into the Northern communities, and I talk to them about the poverty and the violence I survived. I talked to them about my mom, who inspired me with her stories but didn't want me to go to school because she was scared she wouldn't be able to protect me or that I would leave her behind. And I showed them the awards and I about talked to them about my jingle dress. And I tell them about all the amazing people I get to work with, non indigenous people who have never asked me to give up who I am. I show them that I have succeeded to a level that I didn't think possible, that I know they don't think possible. So every single time, I just want you to reason, realize all these business owners and executives and the fellow winners in this room, every single time you give an indigenous person a chance, you're destroying a stereotype. You're showing them that what they were told is wrong. But we have to acknowledge we have a long way to go. We have built some bridges, but you can't pick up a newspaper without reading, realizing there are still issues. But I am so proud to say that the issues are not in this room. I thoroughly believe the answers are in this room. Because you set the culture for your businesses. You decide what is acceptable for your staff and how you treat your customers. And I know how loyal indigenous people can be. I drive across the city to the bank that welcomes me past three other branches of the same bank because I have a relationship with them. And there are so many amazing, powerful men and women in this room that I have relationships with. And I just look forward to expanding on that and seeing where we're going next. Thank you, Miigwech.
