After Facing Racism at MRU, I’m Demanding an Honorary Degree — and Public Accountability
When I enrolled at Mount Royal University, I expected to be judged by my work — not by my identity. I’m a neurodivergent Indigenous student who came in with ambition, skill, and a deep desire to build something real. What I didn’t expect was to be humiliated, discredited, and ultimately gaslit by staff and administration who were more interested in protecting each other than upholding any standard of education or equity.
My Experiences:
Yasaman Amannejad, one of my instructors, deliberately withheld class information from me. This sabotage felt personal, not professional. I asked for clarity — she gave silence.
👉 https://g.co/kgs/PtzeQXPMahsa, another instructor, refused to acknowledge my abilities until I “proved” them — forcing me to demonstrate a custom Eclipse library I had written just to be taken seriously. This wasn’t education. It was humiliation.
I brought both situations to Brady Killough, department faculty. Rather than investigate, he ignored everything.
👉 https://www.mtroyal.ca/ProgramsCourses/FacultiesSchoolsCentres/ScienceTechnology/Departments/MathematicsComputing/Faculty/MPE_BIO_BKILLOUGH.htmI turned to the Iniskim Centre, believing their message: stand tall like Clarence Wolfleg, and challenge systemic racism. But under Tori McMillan’s leadership, that message meant nothing. No action. No support.
Melody Xing’s actions directly affected my GPA, and despite documentation, the university protected her.
Steve Kootenay-Jobin (now at SAIT) and Noah Arney were both in positions to help — and did nothing.
This Isn’t Just Mismanagement — It’s Systemic Racism
This isn’t about a bad semester or a few isolated incidents. This is about how institutions:
- Protect racism when it’s convenient
- Ignore Indigenous students when it’s uncomfortable
- Reward silence while punishing truth-telling
I’ve Published the Full Documentation
To ensure the truth is preserved and publicly available, I’ve created a full breakdown of what happened — names, dates, evidence:
👉 https://formant.ca/MRU-staff-in-trouble
My Demand: A Public Honorary Degree
MRU has awarded honorary degrees to survivors of institutional racism like Clarence Wolfleg. I endured similar racism, academic sabotage, and systemic discrimination — and I built an independent body of work anyway.
If MRU truly believes in reconciliation and Indigenous empowerment, then I deserve an honorary degree — not as charity, but as recognition of what I overcame despite their actions.
Take Action — Demand Accountability
📣 Contact MRU directly. Ask why they continue to protect this behavior instead of confronting it.
- 📄 Staff Directory: https://www.mtroyal.ca/directory/r/
- 🏛️ Executive Team: https://www.mtroyal.ca/AboutMountRoyal/OfficesGovernance/executive_team.htm
- 🧑🏫 Brady Killough Bio: https://www.mtroyal.ca/ProgramsCourses/FacultiesSchoolsCentres/ScienceTechnology/Departments/MathematicsComputing/Faculty/MPE_BIO_BKILLOUGH.htm
- 👩🏫 Yasaman Amannejad (Instructor): https://g.co/kgs/PtzeQXP
To Students, Journalists, and Advocates:
I was taught to speak out — and I am. This isn’t revenge. It’s documentation. It’s truth. And it’s long overdue.
Please read the report. Share it. And help Indigenous and neurodivergent students avoid what I went through.
I will be publishing on here, and every related tech journal and educational literature I can, until MRU responds to me and gives me what I deserve.
This is supposed to be an educational institution that is hyper focused on reconciliation efforts to fix their image, and with me they have taken every possible effort to, abuse me.
When there are these many blatant human rights issues happening at an institution like MRU and they decide to cover it up instead of acknowledging me, this is where I need some, outside eyes to help see better.
Top comments (6)
It takes real guts to call out these issues so openly - thanks for sharing your story. What’s been the most helpful source of support for you so far, if any?
myself, cloudflare, google, firebase. You'd probably say that's weird but they're pretty happy with the work I do.
With the school stuff, the only support I've ever received, was from my reservation, Sagkeeng First Nation.
Currently I'm working with them on, what the next steps would be in this current situation. I believe the Ian guy below doesn't really understand the gravity of the whole ordeal.
Once I hear back from my funders about what's going on we'll see what to do next, but in the mean time, I'm going back to school still. Thankfully it's all good seeing as how much of a struggle MRU had made it for me in the first place.
Academic sabotage isn't really, something to support like these guys are doing implicitly but, they'll all see with time that this whole thing MRU did to me, was wrong.
Obviously it's a topic of interest if people are always willing to make an account just to say something lol.
Hello, I noticed your post on LinkedIn and have noticed some patterns that I’ve struggled with myself during the course of my career. I fully expect this to fall on deaf ears, as you feel that you have it all figured out already, but I’m going to give it a try.
You won’t get along with people in life by calling them out publicly every time you feel you’ve been wronged. People are just going to tune out (as they largely already have). It tells other people that you’re someone that is very hard to work with. Once you burn bridges it’s almost impossible to rebuild. Ask me how I know.
You also heavily overestimate your own abilities. I looked into your Spotify (you have five monthly listeners). You don’t have any games that have been released commercially, even in an indie capacity. The only organization that has employed you is 7-11. Your chatGPT usage is noticeable.
Here’s a hard truth about life. People don’t really care about “your truth” or how you were supposedly wronged, they aren’t invested at all really. If you want recognition you must go out and get it through your own volition. No one is coming to award you an honorary degree. It seems like you’ve gotten into a new program. Now is the time to get serious and get that degree. You post about how supremely talented you are, surely you can prove it this time?
Your comment perfectly illustrates why systemic abuse persists, especially toward Indigenous people in Canada. When someone speaks up, you call it burning bridges. When we share evidence, you call it whining. You’re not offering advice, you’re tone-policing to protect your own comfort. I don’t need approval from someone who thinks silence equals professionalism.
Instead of trying to take shots at my Spotify stats, maybe acknowledge the broader reach and positive response I get on platforms like YouTube and beyond. It’s more than you’re willing to admit, and clearly more than you’re comfortable with.
It’s also pretty weird you’re trying to insult me personally. I’ve never claimed to be ‘supremely talented’, that’s your projection. If that’s what you’re reading into my work, that says more about your own insecurities than mine. You’re not here to help, you’re here to dismiss someone speaking out about things you’d rather ignore.
Quite frankly I’ve had very little interaction with indigenous people and don’t live in Canada. The main capacity I’ve interacted with indigenous people in America where I live was volunteering for the Seneca nation. I also don’t know what tone policing is and I don’t really know you.
I do know however you’re in for a rough ride if you don’t give a little. Remember, your competition was able to get through degree programs, many of them subject to their own struggles while they were doing it. Ability only gets you so far in this world. If you want to play you have to get along, whether you like that or not. Be well.
Your demand for an Honorary Degree changes your whole article into an emotional rant. You can get a refund, you can even file a lawsuit. But if you want a degree, go earn one.