Freda Diesing School of Northwest Coast Art

[1] In 2002, she received an National Aboriginal Achievement Award and honorary doctorate from the University of Northern British Columbia.

[2] The school was opened in the Fall of 2006 by one of Freda's students Dempsey Bob and two of his nephews, Ken McNeil and Stan Bevan.

Dempsey Bob received a Lifetime Achievement Award in Aboriginal Art in 2007 [5] The school frequently invites guest speakers for presentations.

[13] In 2013, Dempsey Bob was appointed Officer of the Order of Canada,[14] Ken McNeil was a recipient of a 2013 BC Creative Achievement Awards for First Nations' Art.

[17][18] In 2021 founding member Dempsey Bob won the Governor General's Award for Visual Media and Art,[14] instructor Stan Bevan was awarded the Fulmer Award in First Nations Art by the province of BC [19] and Jessica McCallum Miller was awarded the Lieutenant Governor's Medal for Inclusion, Democracy and Reconciliation [20] In 2024, the school reunited Kwakwaka'wakw artist Lou-ann Neel with a 100-year-old totem pole model carved by her grandmother Ellen Neel[21] In 2025, artists Stefanie Anderson, Ellen Neel, Arlene Ness and Veronica Waechter had their art featured, along with works of Freda Diesing at the "Curve!