Updates - Returning to a New Normal

The 2020-2021 academic year was both challenging and exciting as it provided incredible opportunity for skill development and reassessing my future. Coming of a year of great personal and professional transformation I re-engaged with students, colleagues, alumni, and industry partners to explore the ways that the pandemic was impacting on lives of Canadians and the leisure industry. As we move towards another academic year, I am making plans to return to Nanaimo's VIU Campus and am embarking on a new phase of my career that includes a greater focus on research and consultancy here in Canada. I continue to work from home over the summer and can be reached at Aggie.Weighill@viu.ca. 

​Who Am I?

As a professor in the Department of Recreation and Tourism Management at Vancouver Island University, I am fortunate enough to live a life of learning, adventure, and exploration. I am also honoured to live, work, and play on the unceeded territory of the Snuneymuxw First Nation. 

My educational journey took me from Vancouver Island, BC to Nova Scotia, Ontario, and Alberta. Since returning to the Island and VIU, I have led field schools to Central America (Mexico, Belize, Guatemala), Ghana, Kenya, and Tanzania, participated in funded international development projects, taught hundreds of students. 

Prior to graduating from the University of Alberta (PhD, 2009) my research focused on Women's Leisure, Community Development, and Sport Tourism. After travelling to Ghana for the first time in 2009, my research program has focused on Community-based Tourism Development, Destination Narratives, and Sustainable Livelihoods for Women.

More recently I have had the opportunity to teach in two different Indigenous training programs at VIU - Indigenous Ecotourism Training Program and the Stewardship Technician Training Program. Working with these program and connecting with Indigenous Tourism Operators has convinced me that doing field work in BC and Canada is the next evolution of my research and consultancy.  
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Physically Distant Leisure - Climbing Mount Benson, Nanaimo
Not all those who wander are lost - JRR Tolkien