Alumni Profiles
Alumni in their own words - Kelly Hearne (CMBC '95)
Where has your life taken you since you left CMU?
I graduated from CMBC in 1995, which feels like a lifetime ago and yet only last week. There is this dual reality in my head where I feel like I'm still the same person I was back in the 1990s and my core personality is exactly as it was when I was sitting in the lounge in what is now Poettcker Hall, (but was back then, just 'the res'). That said, I also know that the emotional and mental growth I've gone through in the intervening years has almost transformed me into someone else. How can I be the same, and yet, completely different? I have spent a lot of time thinking about this.
Alumni in Their Own Words - Wyatt Anders (2010-12)
Where has your life taken you since you left CMU?
After CMU, I was offered a full scholarship at the University of Manitoba. I completed two degrees and played professional basketball. I am now juggling the life of coaching, playing (traveling the world through basketball), refereeing, and teaching in the Winnipeg School Division. CMU was the start of my academic and playing career—I would not have had these opportunities without CMU.
Meet Music Therapist Lacey Friesen: She doesn’t sing ALL day
I guess you could say that music runs in Lacey Friesen's blood. Her role as a Music Therapist at HSC Children's Hospital could not be better suited to her interests, personality, or way of life.
"I grew up in a very musical family, with a mother who taught private music lessons, a father who plays drums and sings, and two musical sisters. We grew up singing in church together," said Lacey. "There was just so much music around me."
Alumni in Their Own Words - Nicole Richard Williams
Nicole Richard graduated from CMU in 2013 with a Bachelor of Music Therapy.
Where has your life taken you since you left CMU?
After finishing my Bachelor of Music Therapy at CMU, I worked as a music therapist in Winnipeg for about three years. During this time, I started working with many clients on the autism spectrum and noticed that doing rhythmic and drumming interventions with these folks really seemed to help them reach some of their therapeutic goals. I wanted to deepen my understanding of how exactly music therapy could help autistic children. Going to grad school had always been a dream of mine, and so I decided to take some time off working to do a Master's in Music and Health Science at the University of Toronto. During that degree, I decided I wanted to continue on and do a PhD and was accepted again at the Music and Health Science Research Collaboratory (the lab out of which the master's and PhD are based) at the University of Toronto.
Ten stories of CMU alumni (audio)
As an extension of the A Time of Reckoning symposium that took place at CMU in October 2023, this student-led media project is one way of reflecting CMU's story from 2000 to 2023. Every now and then, it's good to consider what we say we're doing, what we think we're doing, and what is actually going on.