Maurice Switzer is a citizen of the Mississaugas of Alderville First Nation and a member of the Sons of Jacob congregation in North Bay. He is the principal of Nimkii Communications, specializing in presentations on the Treaty relationship to school boards across Ontario. The first Indigenous student to attend Trent University, he has served on the faculties of the University of Sudbury, Huntington University, Canadore College, First Nations Technical Institute, and the Banff Aboriginal School of Leadership and Management. During a lengthy career in the newspaper industry, he became the first Indigenous publisher of a Canadian daily, and later served as director of communications for the Assembly of First Nations and the Union of Ontario Indians. His articles regularly appear in the Anishinabek News and North Bay Nugget. Currently a board member of the White Water Gallery, North Bay’s Coordinating Body for Arts, Culture, and Heritage (CBACH), and the Aanmitaagzi art collective, he previously served on the boards of the Winnipeg Art Gallery, the Laurentian University Museum and Arts Centre in Sudbury, and the W.P. Kennedy Gallery in North Bay. He produces freelance articles on the North Bay arts and culture scene for the daily North Bay Nugget. He is the author of “We are all Treaty People“ — a graphic novel that has sold over 8,000 copies — and “Bruno Cavallo: a Conversation”, about a Sudbury artist who studied and painted with five members of the Group of Seven. Maurice was the recipient of an Anishinabek Nation Lifetime Achievement Award and inducted into the Nipissing District Human Rights Hall of Fame.
