Monique Gray Smith is a mixed-heritage woman of Cree, Lakota and Scottish ancestry. Monique is an accomplished consultant, writer and international speaker. Her first novel,
Tilly: A Story of Hope and Resilience, won the 2014 Burt Award for First Nations, Métis and Inuit Literature. Her picture book
My Heart Fills with Happiness won the Christie Harris Illustrated Children's Literature Prize and was selected as the TD Grade One Giveaway Book for all first-grade students in Canada in 2019. Monique and her family are blessed to live on Lekwungen territory in Victoria, British Columbia.
Julie Flett studied fine arts at Concordia University in Montreal and Emily Carr University of Art + Design in Vancouver. She won the Governor General’s Award for Children’s Literature for her work on When We Were Alone by David Robertson, and her book Birdsong won the TD Canadian Children’s Literature Award and was shortlisted for the Governor General’s Award. She is the three-time recipient of the Christie Harris Illustrated Children’s Literature Award for Owls See Clearly at Night: A Michif Alphabet, Dolphin SOS and My Heart Fills With Happiness. Julie is Cree and Métis and lives in Vancouver.
Mary Cardinal Collins is a semi-retired teacher, fluent Cree speaker and translator.
The Cree Literacy Network was created in 2010 to promote Cree language and cultural literacy, in oral form and through literacy materials. Through the essential tool of standard spelling, the Cree Literacy Network supports the fundamental right of Cree speakers to understand and be understood.
