Human Rights Advocate and Gender Expert, Dr. Glenda Simms, Remembered

By Neil Armstrong

Photo credit: Ewart Walters  Left to right: Michelle Simms (daughter), Glenda Simms, Merle Walters (her speechwriter), and Daisy Gordon (a friend)

 

The late well-known feminist Dr. Glenda Simms, a distinguished educator, cross-cultural psychologist and advocate for gender and racial equality, is being remembered as a trailblazer in Canada and Jamaica.

 

Just days before she passed away in Ottawa on December 31, 2021, Simms

was celebrated for her advocacy for women at a Kwanzaa event in Toronto. 

 

At “Kujichagulia – Ring Your Bell For bell hooks – A Tribute to bell hooks,” organized by a Different Booklist Cultural Centre: The People’s Residence on December 27, Jean Augustine – the first African-Canadian woman to be elected to the Canada’s House of Commons as a Member of Parliament – spoke of Simms’s daughter, Michelle, informing her of the educator’s illness. Simms, 82, was reportedly ailing with Lou Gehrig's disease and dementia.

 

Akua Benjamin, a retired professor, former director of the School of Social Work at Ryerson, activist and former president of the Congress of Black Women (Toronto Chapter), said Simms was among the vanguard of Black women advocating for social justice in Canada and should be commemorated in the future. 

 

These accolades were shared at the virtual event held to celebrate bell hooks, African American author, professor, feminist and social activist who passed away on December 15 in Berea, Kentucky, in the United States.

 

Simms was appointed the president of the Canadian Advisory Council on the Status of Women by Prime Minister Brian Mulroney in 1990 and served until 1996. 

 

Upon her return to Jamaica, she became the executive director of the Jamaican Bureau of Women’s Affairs from 1996 - 2005. This resulted from her attendance at the Beijing Conference on the Status of Women where she was part of the Canadian delegation and made contact with the Jamaican delegation led by Cabinet minister Portia Simpson Miller whose portfolio included women’s affairs. She was also the CEO of Simms Consulting in Jamaica.

 

Before her trailblazing work in Jamaica, Simms broke new ground in the fight for gender equality and social justice in Canada.

 

“As a former national president of the CBW [Congress of Black Women], I mourn the passing of our sister Glenda Simms. As a past national president, she showed leadership which guided the formation of the CBW as a truly national organization. She was an energetic and formidable advocate for the issues affecting Black women and their families,” says Augustine.

 

She says nationally, Black women cheered Simms’s leadership to the Status of Women Canada.

 

Augustine says she witnessed Simms’s advocacy as she pushed to ensure that the voices of women from non-governmental organizations were included at the tables of the 1985 UN Conference on the Status of Women in Nairobi, Kenya.

 

“Glenda’s work and advocacy for and on behalf of women would be long remembered. May she rest in peace,” says the former minister of state (multiculturalism and status of women).

 

“Dr. Glenda Simms was a formidable presence in Canada and Jamaica. I remember hearing her speak on many occasions, including a conference hosted by the National Council of Jamaicans and was blown away by her passion, boldness and commitment to giving voice to Black women and so many others,” says Adaoma Patterson, president of the Jamaican Canadian Association.

 

“She inspired me and other young Black people to own our space, not be afraid to speak out against injustice and work together to make things better for our community. I remember her telling many of us she hoped one day we would become prime minister. Dr. Simms has left a remarkable legacy that must not be forgotten and needs to be shared with current and future activists. The Jamaican Canadian Association extends our sincere condolences to her family.”

 

 

Simms emigrated to Canada in 1966 to take up a teaching job in Fort Chipewyan, northern Alberta, an isolated area where children had never seen a Black person and did not speak English. She knew very little about the culture of the country’s Indigenous peoples but as someone who grew up in Malvern, St. Elizabeth, she could relate to their economic circumstances.

 

A graduate of Bethlehem Teachers College, Dr. Simms became an associate professor in the Faculty of Education at Nippising University College of North Bay, Ontario. In 1972, she received her Bachelor of Education and in 1976, her Master of Education from the University of Alberta. Between 1977 and 1980 she was assistant professor at the University of Lethbridge, teaching educational psychology and native education. For five years, she was head of the Indian Education Department at the Saskatchewan Indian Federated College of the University of Regina.

 

From 1982 to 1987 she was the president of the Congress of Black Women. A founding member of the Afro-Caribbean Association, she was also a member of the Women’s Advisory Committee on Affirmative Action to the Treasury Board of Canada, a member of Phi Delta Kappa, a board member of the National Organization of Immigrants and Visible Minority Women and a member of the Psychologists Association of Alberta, among others.

 

Dr. Simms was the recipient of several awards, including the Black Achievement Award for contributions to public policy, and was the holder of honorary doctorates from the University of Alberta, Queen’s University and the University of Manitoba.

 

In 2014, she received the Order of Distinction from the Government of Jamaica for outstanding work in gender development.

“Dr. Simms was a champion for women’s rights and she worked tirelessly to end all forms of gender based violence and discrimination,” wrote former prime minister, Portia Simpson Miller in a Facebook post on January 1.

She noted that Simms “travelled to every parish to educate men and women about improving gender relations and ending gender based violence. She was strong in her conviction that the way to end gender based violence was to create a better understanding between women and men.”

In a Facebook post, Olivia “Babsy” Grange, Jamaica’s Minister of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport, says Dr. Simms was “a trailblazing figure in the fight for women’s rights.”

Grange noted that during her time at the Bureau from 1996 to 2005, Simms started the consultations toward the development of the National Policy on Gender Equality, revitalized Parish Advisory Committees, established the National Gender Advisory Committee and developed public education initiatives on gender-based violence.

“Dr. Simms never stopped advocating for women’s rights and for the removal of barriers that prevent women and girls from achieving their full potential. She gave dedicated and passionate leadership to her cause and has been a trailblazing figure in the fight for women’s rights. She will be missed,” says Minister Grange in the January 3, 2022 post. 

Photo credit: Sonia Godding Togobo   Sacred Women International's Sacred Women Training participants commune with members of the St. Elizabeth Women Ltd., founded by Glenda Simms, in Jamaica

After leaving the corporate sector, Dr. Simms became a farmer in Malvern at what she called her “shamba,” an East African word for a cultivated plot of land; a farm or plantation. 

She founded the organization, St. Elizabeth Women Ltd, in 2008, which grew into a total of seven groups operating in communities such as Santa Cruz, Malvern, Southfield and Stanmore.

"We are promoting sustainable development in our communities by helping these women to develop the economy at the grass-roots level through farming horticulture and craft," Simms told the Gleaner in a news report in 2011. 

The group had a membership of more than 250 and was involved in empowerment workshops geared towards the personal development of its members. The St. Elizabeth Women Ltd had started the process of community renewal and impacted the lives of girls and women through a process of education and empowerment. 

 

In 2017, Sacred Women International (SWI), founded by Aina-Nia Ayo’dele, held the culmination of its Sacred Leader Training with the women of SEW in St. Elizabeth. She has reposted a video on her Facebook page of that gathering “in honour of warrior woman Glenda Simms.”

 

SWI is an organization that inspires individuals to realize their highest vision, live with purpose, and influence change in their families, communities and throughout the world.

 

Dr. Simms is survived by her three children -- Michelle, Emil and Shaun – and grandchildren.