By Stacey Woods, 1st year MDP student
My name is Stacey Woods, I live and work within the traditional lands of Treaty 1 territory in Winnipeg, Manitoba. I grew up in a small community in the neighborhood of Windsor Park with my parents and older brother. My work throughout the MDP program has been aligned with exploring and gaining a greater understanding of policy analysis, and more specifically and accurately, Indigenous health policy development. Through my exploration of health policy and my related academic endeavors within the MDP program, my objective within my first-year field placement was to apply myself through an Indigenous lens in an organization outside of government.
Of note, I had previous experience in the Manitoba Government within the Indigenous Relations, Justice branch. I came across Waapihk Research from a mutual connection from my prior employment in government and became more interested in gaining perspective from the side of Indigenous health.
During my field placement at Waapihk Research I had the opportunity to dive into Indigenous health policy, or precisely, Indigenous self-governance and the operations, processes, and application of the Canadian federal health transfer policy for specific First Nations and Indigenous communities. I was tasked with completing deliverables such as a specialized report, progress report updates on a directed project, and a blog post on Waapihk’s website. I did this by conducting environmental scans and reading literature on self-government content from varying First Nation and Indigenous communities across Canada.
I
can say without hesitation that my time spent at Waapihk Research has been
overwhelmingly positive—the workspace environment, the relationships I have
walked away with, and the work I was involved in built up my confidence and has
set expectations for going into the workforce post-graduation. Especially
within a competitive field like policy analysis. 
Stacey at work in one of the Waapihk office spaces
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