Eleven years after receiving her high school diploma at Prince George secondary school, Cherisse Seaton can finally say she's finished school.
Seaton just completed her doctoral studies in psychology and this afternoon at UNBC's Charles Jago Northern Sport Centre, she will receive her PhD with top honors as winner of the Governor-General's gold medal.
Best of all, for Seaton, she did it all without having to leave her hometown.
"The university is an amazing place, I really enjoyed my experiences at UNBC," said the 30-year-old Seaton. "We had only five graduate students in our cohort and that small size made for a lot of opportunities to engage in research, a lot of people willing to supervise you doing extra projects. Because of the small size you get to know all the profs and there are opportunities for everything a student could want to do."
The Governor-General's gold medal goes to the student with the highest academic standing in a graduate program. Seaton's grade point average throughout her doctoral studies was 4.16 out of a possible 4.33. Bachelor of commerce graduate Colin Castley of Prince George will receive the Governor-General's silver medal for having the highest academic standing in a UNBC undergraduate program.
"I'm so excited about the Governor-General's award, I knew I had been nominated in the psychology department, because my supervisor [Dr. Sherry Beaumont] put my name forward with an application package," said Seaton.
Seaton, the youngest daughter of Ron and Brenda Edgar of Prince George, attended O'Grady Catholic high school in Prince George until 2001, the year it closed, when she transferred to PGSS to get courses not offered at O'Grady. She was originally interested in pharmacology when she began two years of study at the College of New Caledonia, but that would have required her to move away from Prince George, away from her husband and their families, and she didn't want to do that.
Scholarships have taken much of the financial burden of 11 years of university off Seaton. She was selected in 2008 for the Joseph-Armand Bombardier scholarship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRCC), which was worth $105,000 over three years. At the time, it was the most valuable scholarship ever awarded to a UNBC student. In 2006-07, her masters studies were funded by the Canada Graduate scholarship, a $17,500 award, also funded by SSHRCC.
Seaton's dissertation defence in February, entitled The Role of Positive Emotions and Ego-Resilience in Personal Strivings, philosophically probed how momentary positive emotions in people contribute to lasting happiness by promoting goals to encourage personal growth and well-being. She found that when people maintain positive thoughts, their thinking broadens and they become more resilient and open to ideas, which in turn brings more satisfaction in their lives.
"We know positive emotions feel good when we're experiencing them, and my research is all about how positive emotions serve a purpose beyond that," Seaton said. "We have negative emotions for a reason, like if you see a bear in the forest you feel fear, and that's going to be helpful for your survival. Positive emotions, over the longer term, make us more creative and over a longer time build social resources that can support us in hard times later on."
Seaton has taught introductory courses in psychology at UNBC since 2008. She's applied to become an adjunct professor and hopes to continue working with students, who have indicated they like her teaching style.
In January, Seaton was hired as a research co-ordinator by UBC and is now based at the Prince George Centre for Healthy Living working on two cancer-prevention projects. In partnership with Northern Health, the Canadian Cancer Society and the B.C. Cancer Agency, one of the programs encourages people to stop smoking before surgery, while the other promotes healthy eating and active living for men.
"I just really enjoy working with people and and I picked an area that I could contribute and give back to the community," said Seaton.
