Cameron Crowchild was born on this side of Turtle Island, near the Elbow River, an area known today as Calgary. He was raised within the Tsuut’ina Nation, surrounded by the language, traditions, and teachings of his people.
Cameron‘s early learning was guided by the late hereditary Chief Peter O’Chiese of the Hinton Foothills Ojibway, whose teaching laid the foundation for his lifelong passive learning. He continues to expand his knowledge through the wisdom of the current Hereditary, Chief Jimmy O’Chiese of the Foothills Ojibway and his father, Tsuut’ina, Elder Alex Crowchild, along with many other respected elders across Turtle Island.

For more than 30 years, Cameron has dedicated his life to teaching about Inherent Rights, International Treaty Rights and Traditional Cultural Knowledge. He has walked the ceremonial path for decades, learning the sacred laws within the lodges. The ceremonies he teaches form the foundation of healthy, balanced and holistic life as Dina-tii, the real people of this land.

Throughout his life, Cameron has worked in many fields, as a Framer, Roofer, Greenskeeper, Log Home Builder, Bus Driver, Addiction Worker, Aftercare Worker, Aftercare Facilitator, and a Community Outreach Coordinator. Most recently he worked with the Tsuut’ina Education, Teaching Land Base Learning, and helping students reconnect with the land, their culture, and their identity.

Cameron is also a devoted husband and father. He has shared 34 wonderful years of marriage with his wife, Yolanda, and together they have raised four lovely children. Family is at the centre of Cameron‘s life and teachings, a living reflection, reflection of love, respect, and the passing of ancestral knowledge to future generations.

Cameron believes in the importance of using both sides of the mind: the western analytical way of thinking and the traditional way of understanding. By walking both paths, he believes that Dina-tii, the real people, will grow strong, wise, and balanced, following the two sacred ways that Nato Niskagagulaga gifted to the Dina-tii and Tsuut’ina people.

Mohammed Hashim is the Chief Executive Officer and Executive Director of the Canadian Race Relations Foundation, and has worked as a human rights advocate in Canada for the past two decades.

He has dedicated his career to supporting equity, inclusion, and community empowerment, and has contributed to various legislative and policy agendas to prevent and address racism and hate in Canada.

As CEO of the Canadian Race Relations Foundation, Mohammed leads the national Hate Crimes Taskforce with the RCMP to better understand the systemic challenges and gaps in addressing hate crimes and incidents in Canada, to support communities, and to equip policing services to prevent, investigate and support prosecutions related to hate crimes.

Dunia Nur is a woman of African descent residing in Edmonton, Alberta. She has a dual degree in social work and a Bachelor of Child and Youth Care and Executive Education Certificate in business and executive leadership. Dunia serves as the President & CEO of the African Canadian Civic Engagement Council (ACCEC), a nationally recognized organization celebrated for advancing human rights and delivering impactful, high-quality programs.

ACCEC's mandate is to protect and promote the dignity and human rights of all people of African descent, while also celebrating their contributions to our society and worldwide. Dunia has 15+ years of experience creating best-practice rehabilitation programs and working with diverse communities providing tools and knowledge to become agents of their own change, creating sustainable, community-owned solutions.

She is an avid community builder, policy analyst, and advisor. Dunia is a global thinker who creates thriving communities where everyone has equal opportunities to feel safe in contributing socially, culturally, and economically. Her areas of expertise include health promotion, gender equality, civic engagement, criminal justice, mental health, child migrants, and pre-migration trauma.

Dunia possesses a robust track record in assessing laws, policies, and programs towards providing equity-focused recommendations across
healthcare, education, justice, and housing to drive systemic change.

Dr. Amy Cardinal Christianson is Métis and grew up in Treaty 8 territory (northern Alberta, Canada). Her family was nîhithawîwin (Woodland Cree/ “N”) speaking. Her Métis relations are the Cardinal (Peeaysis Band) and Laboucane (Laboucane Settlement) families. She currently lives near Rocky Mountain House in Treaty 6 (central Alberta).

Christianson was formerly a Research Scientist with the Canadian Forest Service (Natural Resources Canada) and an Indigenous Fire Specialist in the National Fire Management Division of Parks Canada.

Christianson works with Indigenous Nations across Canada on fire stewardship practices like cultural burning and collaborates with Indigenous peoples from around the world on decolonising land management. She also studies wildfire evacuations and advocates for Indigenous wildland firefighters.

She is the co-author of the books, First Nations Wildfire Evacuations: A guide for communities and external agencies, Blazing the Trail: Celebrating Indigenous Fire Stewardship, and Creating a Cultural Burn Pathway.

Christianson also cohosts the Good Fire podcast, which looks at Indigenous fire use around the world.

She helped create the Thunderbird Collective and serves on the board of the International Association of Wildland Fire and the international research advisory panel with Natural Hazards Research Australia.

Katelyn Lucas is a Métis woman with roots to the Red River Settlement who has been working within the Indigenous Community over the past 28 years. Katelyn has engaged on many levels from front-line, to leadership. At present she is the Executive Director of the Elizabeth Fry Society of Calgary, and Chair of the Aboriginal Standing Committee on Housing and Homelessness (ASCHH). She sits on the boards of Miskanawah and the Indigenous Justice Centre.

Katelyn’s body of work has been primarily focused on homeless Indigenous populations, restorative justice and addressing the gaps and issues that are barriers to urban and rural First Nation communities. Through the development of positive relationships with government partners, Indigenous partnering agencies, neighboring First Nations, Katelyn has participated in many funding panels, projects, community consultations, and think tanks to help identify culturally appropriate options for Indigenous peoples. Katelyn was one of 7 professionals who participated as a member of the Downtown Safety Leadership Table in 2023-2024 to provide 28 recommendations to the Mayor's office to support initiatives to increasing safety in downtown Calgary.

Dr. Gideon Christian is an Associate Professor and University Research Chair in AI and Law at the University of Calgary. His research focuses on artificial intelligence and law, legal impacts of new and emerging technologies. Dr. Christian’s research seeks to identify elements of racial bias in laws, policies and in emerging technologies. His current research seeks to develop the concept of algorithmic racism which is defined as race-based bias arising from the use of AI-powered tools in the analysis of data in decision making resulting in unfair outcomes to individuals from a particular segment of the society characterized by race.

A leading Canadian scholar at the intersection of AI, race and law, he has appeared before the Canadian House of Commons Parliamentary Committee as an expert on racial bias in AI tools used in immigration. His recently published work “The New Jim Crow: Unmasking Racial Bias in AI Facial Recognition Technology within the Canadian Immigration System” (McGill Law Journal), is the first scholarly publications in Canada to address the issue of racial bias in AI facial recognition technology. In 2024, he was named one of the Top 20 Compelling Calgarians by the Calgary Herald.

Dr. Pallavi Banerjee is a Full Professor in the Department of Sociology and University of Calgary, Research Excellence Chair. Her research is situated at the intersections of migration, anti-racism, gender, families, labour studies, intersectionality, transnationalism. She is the author of the award-winning book entitled, The Opportunity Trap: High-Skilled Workers, Indian Families and the Failures of Dependent-Visa Policy published by New York University Press. Her other award-winning research has been published in many peer-reviewed journals including the American Behavioral Scientist, Gender & Society, Contexts, Canadian Ethnic Studies, Sociological Forum, Gender, Work and Organization, among others. She has also written opinion-pieces in venues such as The Globe and Mail, The Conversations and Ms Magazine and her research has been cited widely in the media in the U.S., Canada and India. She directs the Critical Gender, Intersectionality and Migration Research Group at the University of Calgary, and the lead researcher in the Youth and Anti-Racist Integration (YARI) Collective. Her research is supported by Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), Canada and Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC).

Dr. Emily Laidlaw is a Canada Research Chair in cybersecurity law and Associate Professor in the Faculty of Law at the University of Calgary. She is also a senior fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation, an Associate Member of the University of Ottawa’s Centre for Law, Technology and Society and a Fellow of the Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies. She is currently serving as the Rovinescu Visiting Scholar on anti-hate speech at the University of Ottawa. Beyond academia, Dr. Laidlaw contributes her expertise on the boards of the National Cybersecurity Consortium and the Canadian Internet Society.

Her research centres on technology regulation, cybersecurity, and human rights, with particular emphasis on platform regulation, privacy, online harms, freedom of expression, and corporate governance. Dr. Laidlaw is the author of Regulating Speech in Cyberspace: Gatekeepers, Human Rights and Corporate Responsibility(Cambridge University Press, 2015) and co-editor, with Florian Martin-Bariteau, of the forthcoming book Security of Self: A Human-Centric Approach to Cybersecurity (Ottawa University Press, 2025).

Dr. Laidlaw’s academic journey began in the United Kingdom, where she earned her LLM and PhD from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and held her first professorship at the University of East Anglia Law School. She initially practised as a litigator and has since returned to legal practice, now operating her own law firm. In 2014, she joined the University of Calgary.

For over 20 years, Francis has worked with communities, institutions, governments, and service providers on issues of equitable social and economic integration of racialized communities. Francis’ current role as Executive Director of ActionDignity and previous roles as VP, Strategy at the Centre for Newcomers and former co-chair of the Calgary Anti-Racism Action Committee attest to his commitment to contributing to building an equitable Calgary community. He is a sessional instructor at the faculty of social work, university of Calgary, adjunct professor at the Cumming School of Medicine and currently a Board member of Canada’s first Black Foundation-Foundation for Black Communities (FFBC).

Ian Bailey is a reporter with The Globe and Mail’s Ottawa Bureau. This is his latest assignment in a journalism career that has taken him across Canada, from a posting as the St. John’s correspondent for The Canadian Press, through CP assignment’s in Toronto and Vancouver. Also in Vancouver, he reported for The National Post and the Province, where he covered federal and provincial politics.

Ian joined The Globe and Mail in 2007, covering politics, crime, the B.C. film and TV production sector, and a range of other stories while based in the Vancouver Bureau. His West Coast reporting included the Surrey Six murders, the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, and the 2011 Stanley Cup Riot.

Born in the U.K. and raised in the Toronto area, Ian graduated from York University and Toronto Metropolitan University.

Willow reports and writes stories related to Indigenous Affairs for the Globe and Mail, where she has been a staff reporter since May 2020. She is based in Northwestern Ontario, where she was born and raised.

Willow is a former videojournalist for APTN National News in Thunder Bay and a three-time finalist for the Canadian Association of Journalists awards and the recipient of the 2017 Emerging Indigenous Journalist award. She has covered stories of national and global interest including an assignment in Rome, Italy in 2022 when Pope Francis first offered an apology to residential school survivors from Canada.

Willow is Anisininew from Sandy Lake First Nation in Treaty No. 5 and a proud Kokum (grandmother) of four beautiful grandchildren.

Zilla Jones is an African-Canadian lawyer, writer and educator of Afro-Caribbean, Chinese and European descent living and working in Treaty 1 territory (Winnipeg). She received her Bachelor of Musical Arts degree from Canadian Mennonite University and her law degree from the University of Manitoba in 2011, where she won many academic and service awards and graduated with fourth highest standing in the class. She practices criminal defence and human rights law with Jones Law Office in Winnipeg, and has appeared at all levels of court in Manitoba and the Supreme Court of Canada. She teaches at the Faculty of Law at the University of Manitoba.

Zilla is the co-author and member of the Steering Group for Canada’s Black Justice Strategy, an initiative of the federal Minister of Justice, which made 114 recommendations to the Minister to eliminate anti-Black racism in Canada’s justice system. She currently sits on the Implementation Group for the Strategy. Zilla is also the Past Chair of the Board of Directors of the John Howard Society of Manitoba and a member of the Board of the John Howard Society of Canada.

As a public speaker and anti-racism educator, Zilla has presented to groups across the country, including the University of Manitoba, Dalhousie University, University of Toronto, Law Society of Manitoba, Canadian Association of Black Lawyers, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Black Opportunity Fund, Commonwealth Bar Association, and many more. She has twice represented Canada at the United Nations Permanent Forum for People of African Descent.

Zilla is also an acclaimed published fiction writer who has won the Journey Prize and the Writers Trust Rising Star award, amongst other accolades. Her debut novel, The World So Wide, was published this past spring and a collection of short stories will follow in 2027.

Anne-Marie Pham is a nationally recognized leader in diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility (DEIA), with over 25 years of experience working with diverse communities and workplaces across Canada. Based in Calgary, she currently serves as the Vice-President of Engagement at the Canadian Centre for Diversity and Inclusion (CCDI), where she mobilizes research, education, and strategic partnerships to drive systemic change.

Anne-Marie holds a Master’s in Public Administration (MPA) and a BA in Sociology, along with senior HR certification from the Society for Human Resource Management. She is a certified administrator of the Intercultural Development Inventory and has led many equity and anti-racism initiatives for organizations such as Spectra Energy, the City of Calgary, and the Government of Canada.

A first-generation immigrant and passionate community builder, Anne-Marie co-founded the Calgary Vietnamese Youth Association, the Asian Professional Network of Calgary, and most recently the National Council of Asian Canadians. She has served on the City of Calgary’s Anti-Racism Action Committee, is a current board director of the Canadian Race Relations Foundation as well as a member of the Government of Alberta’s Anti-Racism Advisory Council.

Her community contributions have been recognized with the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Medal and the Alberta Centennial Medal. Anne-Marie is a sought-after speaker on inclusive leadership, allyship, and anti-racism, and continues to mentor DEIA professionals and youth across sectors.

Darrin Spence is from Marten Falls First Nation. Darrin grew up between Constance Lake First Nation and Marten Falls First Nation. Darrin began his professional career with the RCMP, served 17yrs. Later moving on to working in policy and operational development with Nishnawbe Aski Nation in Community wellness response. This is where Darrin was introduced to the ISC Emergency Management Assistance Program with providing operational guidance to evacuated communities. Darrin became an advocate to redefining emergencies to include Social Emergencies to response models. Darrin was successful as the Ontario Provincial government funded 11 positions, later growing that funding to 20 positions. Darrin created the ontario First nation Emergency Response Association. FNERA had representation from all territories of the province. Darrin was recently elected to Council at Marten Falls First Nation.