I'm a feminist organizer, speaker and consultant focusing on the intersections of gender, culture and technology. As founder of Women in Toronto Politics, I produce events and create resources to promote a more gender-inclusive civic discourse. As a consultant I help organizations bring their gender lenses into focus so they can do a better job of engaging women as customers, staff and community members. My comments on politics, gender and technology have been featured on CBC's The Current and The National, the Toronto Star, the Globe & Mail, ET Canada, Global News and Chatelaine. Follow me on Twitter at @amirightfolks.
Freelance consultant, speaker, and author specializing in gender equity training, development of multimedia learning resources, workplace diversity strategies, social media, events, and stakeholder engagement for social good.
Clients/bookers: TVO, TEDx Toronto, the National Film Board, the Law Society of Upper Canada, Mozilla, CBC, the White Ribbon Campaign, ArtREACH, the Canadian Media Guild, Long & McQuade, Ottawa Coalition to End Violence Against Women, Amalgamated Transit Union, Academy of the Impossible.
Created this non-partisan grassroots group that amplifies women’s voices and promotes a more gender-inclusive civic discourse. -In the 2014 municipal election season, led development of the Position Primer, a user-friendly, crowd-funded online voter information tool that earned glowing reviews from users and extensive media coverage. -Collaborated with Farahway Global on #thecityiwant, a public awareness campaign to support and show solidarity with Muslim women candidates targeted by hate during the 2014 election. -Produced a panel mini-series featuring Toronto city councillors Shelley Carroll and Kristyn Wong-Tam and journalists Robyn Doolittle, Andrea Houston and Hamutal Dotan. -Coordinated a cohesive set of fall 2012 learning events, culminating in a series of 4 deputations on the 2013 city budget by Toronto women delivering their first-ever deputations.
Plans, executes, and evaluates outreach programs to change the way educators, students, and parents think about technology careers, including: -Guest speaker program in Toronto & Kitchener-Waterloo with 75 tech speakers and 30+ secondary schools. -Presentations, panels, and workshops for the Ontario education community. -Major events for up to 1500 high school students. -Resource packages to guide educators on using CareerMash.ca as a learning tool. -Monthly e-newsletter; launched and increased list subscribers by 20% within first quarter.
Managed relationships with partners in industry, academia, and the public school system to change the way high school students, parents and teachers think about technology careers. -Built a 60-volunteer guest speaker program from the ground up. -Key in the planning & execution of CareerMashup, a hybrid tech trade show and career fair at Roy Thomson Hall with 50+ booths, 1500 high school students, and a panel discussion with some of Toronto's most respected young tech leaders.
Initially engaged as writer & editor for this leading national career management firm. Client insight and writing skills resulted in promotion to lead writer in under a year. • Played a key role in screening, selection, and training of 5 new writers during a rapid growth period, and contributed to design and implementation of new training tools and processes.
Sourced and placed candidates for administrative, clerical, and technical roles with a variety of federal government departments. • Pursued and won a long-term, ongoing $MM contract with DND’s helpdesk directorate.
Recruited to join this government elections agency to optimize turnout at the 2004 federal election by authoring press releases and playing a frontline role in media relations.
In collaboration with TVO's The Agenda with Steve Paikin
– (1 month)
Co-produced an interactive live-streamed meet-up called "Trolling for Trouble: Online Actions, Offline Consequences" which exceeded attendance capacity, trended on Twitter (#AgendaTFT) and bolstered the case for a series of similar events in 2013.
Lead Organizer
Take Back the Block (#TBTB)
– Present (3 years 7 months)Civil Rights and Social Action
Spearheaded two block parties in neighbourhoods affected by a recent string of public sexual assaults in downtown Toronto. The parties had the vocal support of Take Back the Night organizers, received significant media coverage, and sparked a vigorous online discussion about sexual assault and harassment.
Joint M.A. with Ryerson University, Communication and Culture
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Thesis: Utilizing qualitative policy analysis to scrutinize the notions of “quality” held by curriculum developers and encoded in Ontario secondary schools’ Media Studies curriculum.
A preview of what LinkedIn members have to say about Stephanie:
I've had the pleasure of working with Stephanie on CCICT's CareerMash initiative. Stephanie exhbitted enthusiasm, dedication, hard work and exceptional inter personal skills while working with CCICT members and career mash role models in organizing the many different components involved in the development of CareerMash and the Career Mash up event. In my experiences with Stephanie, she has always offered her support in assisting role models in any way she can. Her personally, knowledge, and exception skill set have contributed significantly in making CareerMash and the CareerMashup event a huge success!
Stephanie helped organize an extremely successful presentation to students in grades 10 and 11 at my school with very little time. She single handedly found 3 business people to visit our school who a brief outline of their careers and answered students questions.
Her organizational skills are superb. The students had wonderful things to say and some have decided to look into different careers.
Thank you Stephanie!