Russ Evans

For the past two years I attended Brock University in St. Catharines, Ontario. While there I worked as a Teaching Assistant for three professors and as a Research Assistant for two others. Those experiences made me appreciate the work that professors do. Their potential impact on society is not limited to the classroom; they have a greater influence as researchers than I had previously thought.

Being of Aboriginal descent I feel it is my duty to bring my education, experience and expertise to the Native communities that need it the most. This will be accomplished through teaching and research. I will look for methods of managing band funds in a way that maximizes the returns for the communities they serve. I will educate Native leaders on governance issues concerning fiscal responsibility and cost management. I will look at whether a reserve could be run as a corporation. I will investigate whether Management Accounting principles such as control systems, compensatory incentives, costing systems, capital budgeting and financial performance measures could be applied to their operations. One case, in particular, sparked my interest in this area of research. The story of Membertou, a small reserve in Nova Scotia, was able to apply corporate principles such as International Organization for Standardization (ISO) Certification to band management. This led to unprecedented economic, social, cultural and symbolic success. Success stories such as Membertou are few and far between in the Native community.

My plan of study includes a PhD in Behavioural Accounting where I will conduct qualitative (ethnographic and field) and quantitative (archival analysis) research within Aboriginal communities in Canada. I seek to understand the social structures and internal practices of the community and managing administration, especially in areas where they have shown success. I will combine this information with quantitative analysis of external and internal performance to give a holistic view of the band’s operation. The reason for using triangulation is to increase validity of the research in order to increase the likelihood commonalities could be drawn from these success stories. These commonalities may then be externalized to other reserves in Canada. My hopes are that the crucial events that helped propel reserves into successful social and fiscal positions will be apparent and that general guidelines for action could be produced. If First Nations were able to be financially independent, it would be a great first step in helping us govern our own interests.

Michigan Softball Tournament September 24-25th

This ISA tournament was held in Potterville, Michigan (just outside of Lansing). I left Hamilton at 4 AM on Saturday the 25th and drove with a teammate in their van. We crossed the border in Sarnia and got to Potterville around 9:30. The trip took a while because we got lost and stopped for about an hour in Sarnia. When we arrived in Potterville my teammate's van broke down in the McDonald's parking lot. We left the van there and made our way to the diamonds. We proceeded to lose all 4 games with scores of 12-9, 30-9, 19-4, and 19-0. We got a t-shirt for showing up though. After getting back to the McDonald's we pushed the van over to some mechanics garage that was at his house. We bought some cheap beer and cigar's and played basketball in his driveway while he fixed the van. I bought an extra large MGD for $1.39 and a 24 case of Labatt's was about $16 US. After listening to country music and getting invited to a good old-fashioned bond fire in the woods we finally left for our hotel in Lansing - 4 hours later. The hotel was an Econolodge that was probably 1 star but not too bad for the price ($50 a night). We all went to dinner at Appleby's. I crashed right after at around 11:00 PM - I was dead tired. Some of the rest of the team stayed up and partied through the night. Sunday morning we all went for breakfast at Bob Evans where I tried to get a deal for name sakes but it didn't work. I got home around 5:30 PM on Sunday.

Hamilton Softball Tournament October 1-2nd

This SPN sanctioned tournament was held in Stoney Creek, Ontario as Eastdale Park. Our first game was at 9:00 AM on Saturday. I had gone out the night before to the Funky Monkey with some friends from work so it wasn't easy getting up that early. We played a team called True Blue. We got off to a rough start and got down 5-0. Our bats finally woke up in the third and fourth innings when we scored 12 runs so we ended up winning 19-7. In the second game at 12:45 we played the Vipers which is our hated rival that we beat in the championship of our league. We were up 9-5 going into the bottom of the seventh where they scored 5 runs and won 10-9. Our team was devastated. In the final game of the day we were beat by a sandbagger team by a score of 15-3. We finished the day 1-2. On Sunday we started the day at 10:45 and played True Blue again. We beat them again but this time by a score of 22-8. The next game we played at 1:15 against Creek's Finest and they beat us again eventhough we stayed with them through 4 innings. The final score was 22-9 for them. We finished the tournament 2-3 but we did win $25 and qualified for next years provincial qualifier tournament. All in all it was a good weekend and I was sore on Monday.

Volleyball - Tuesday, October 4th

We played in the top gym tonight and got started late. We ended having only 6 players which as bad in some ways but good that we didn't have to sit any games. The first match we were killed the first game (11-25) and then killed right back the second game (25-13). The second match we had big leads in both games but ended up losing both by close scores, it was a hard pill to swallow. The last match we lost the first game and won the second in a long game that ended 32-30. There was some controversy about calls so I will address it with the league. The issue is regarding exactly what a back row setter can and cannot do when playing at the net. We finished 2-4 and will be heading to the second gym (Collegiate) next week October 11th.

Crazy Test Night, October 6th

This is a direct result of having too many things going on at once and not being organized enough. On Wednesday, October 5th I went to my seminar for Motor Learning at 5 pm like I always do. There was no big deal about the class except for what people were talking about. Everyone was worried about this test that was coming up. I didn't remember there being a test so I assumed it was in one of their other classes. I decided to check my course calendar anyways. To my horror there was a mid-term scheduled for the next day and I didn't know about it or study for it. How could there be a major mid-term already. I decided to skip my last class of the day and head home to begin studying. As I was leaving a wretched thought crossed my mind....if there was a mid-term this early in one class....what about the other two? I frantically check through my binder for Human Phyiology and was relieved to find out that the mid-term wasn't until October 25th. I checked my Quantitative Analysis binder next and gasped when I saw the words "Term Test #1 - Oct 6". This meant that I had two major test the next night.....I knew the next 24 hours were going to be hell. I ended up studying from 8 pm until 2:30 AM on Wednesday, going in for a half day of work, and studying again from 1 pm to 4 pm. I have to say that I will not let this happen again, I'm vowing to stay organized from this day forward. The tests were hell and I don't know how I did yet.

Volleyball, October 18th

We played at Collegiate again (middle school) and had our work cut out for us from the get go. We only had five guys and were with out arguably our two best hitters for the entire evening. We played Bugsy's to start and we almost had them in the first game but ended up losing 25-27. The second game they pulled out to an early lead and held on for a 25-20 victory. We split with the next team and won both of our games against Moe's without too much trouble. We finished the night 3-3 and will be back at Collegiate next week again.