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Lyn Davis created this award to honour Dr. Charlotte Loppie's teaching and service to many Indigenous communities, and to enact reconciliation. Lyn is excruciatingly aware of the tenible irony of enacting reconciliation by offering assistance to Indigenous students who wish to engage in a colonial educational institution. And yet she believes in the power of education and in the right intentions of the faculty, staff and students in the School of Public Health and Social Policy to create a new and just society.

Lyn began teaching in the Faculty of Human and Social Development in 2002, and had the great fortune to teach in the School of Public Health and Social Policy from 2012 to 2017. In PHSP, her main focus was on the undergraduate program. In these five years, Lyn has said she learned much more than she taught.

Lyn came to Canada in 1998 from the American South and discovered a different way of life here: one where we can talk about our differences and work together to resolve them. And one where Lyn, a butch lesbian, is accepted and provided full human rights.

Lyn's wish for the award recipients is that they feel seen, accepted and part of the School of Public Health and Social Policy. May they enjoy their colleagues and studies, and emerge from their studies with new tools and confidence. Lyn raises her hands to these students and holds them in her heart.