CHANGEMAKERS NORTH OF THE BORDER
A symposium complementing the Ashoka U Exchange in Miami

Friday, March 3 (10:00am – 5:00pm)
DMZ – Ryerson University (10 Dundas Street East – 6th Floor)

12:30 – 2:00 PM  SESSION | INCLUSION: A LIFELINE TO INNOVATION
In collaboration with 6 Degrees and This Is Worldtown

A key to creating a culture of innovation is to recognize the notion that every person can be a source of potential ideas. Innovation requires the ability to see things differently and from unique viewpoints, and this is where inclusion is vital.

Despite the rise of populism in the West, where political leaders are increasingly being elected on platforms based on narratives of fear and disunity, a significant number of policy-makers, artists, entrepreneurs and community builders continue to see inclusion as a main driver of innovation and creativity.

What role does inclusion play in protecting innovation? What steps can leaders in the social innovation space take to ensure they are resilient when there are threats (political and social) to inclusion? How will the politics south of the border affect the innovation landscape in Canada?  What can we learn from the benefits of diversity in the Canadian start-up and social innovation space? How can we ensure inclusion rises to the top of the boardroom and political agenda?

FRAMERS

Huda Idrees, Founder & Chief Executive Officer, Dot Health
Huda is the Founder and CEO of Dot Health, a health technology platform that helps you understand your own health better. Most recently a partner and Chief Product Officer at Wealthsimple, Huda is a product designer, an engineer, and a writer. She previously jumpstarted the product design team at storytelling giant, Wattpad, and led the invoicing and accounting products at Wave.

Saadia Muzaffar, tech entrepreneur and Founder, TechGirls Canada
Saadia is a technology entrepreneur and founder of TechGirls Canada (TGC) – the hub for Canadian women in Science, Technology, Engineering, & Math – proudly supporting Women of Colour, LGBTTQ, variously-abled, & Indigenous trailblazers. She is a passionate and internationally prolific media advocate and speaker on diversity, inclusion, and equitable access to technology education and jobs for marginalized groups and has been featured on CNN Money, Financial Post, Canadian Business, VICE, Motherboard, and CBC RadioOne.

Claudia Hepburn, Chief Executive Officer, Immigrant Access Fund (IAF) and co-Founder, NEXT Canada
Claudia has a record of leadership studying, designing, building and leading innovative education programs. Ms. Hepburn is currently a Senior Resident in Entrepreneurship at Massey College at the University of Toronto. She was the Fraser Institute’s first Director of Education Policy, who opened and led their Ontario office for seven years, and founded Children First: School Choice Trust.

HOST  
Sana A. Malik, Creative Director and Founder, This is Worldtown
Sana is the Founder and Creative Director of This is Worldtown, a platform dedicated to repositioning depictions of the lived migrant and refugee experience from the lens of Women of Colour storytellers. Sana’s background is at the intersection of humanitarian aid, media, technology and culture. She is a journalist with credits in the Guardian, i-D, BuzzFeed and the Toronto Star. She has worked in strategic communications, and gender-based international development everywhere from the UK, Toronto and Tanzania, to Burkina Faso and Lebanon.

ORGANIZERS

6 DEGREES  An initiative of the Institute for Canadian Citizenship (ICC), 6 Degrees is the global platform on citizenship and inclusion in the 21st century. Our work involves the brightest minds and the boldest methods. It brings thinkers, doers, business executives, artists, politicians, and civil society leaders together in order to get them talking about what is really happening in the world.

6 Degrees debuted over three days in Toronto in September 2016. It will be repeated there each autumn, and will also be featured in other cities and countries throughout the year. For spring 2017, we are doing 6 Degrees Vancouver and 6 Degrees Den Haag in The Hague, Netherlands.

THIS IS WORLDTOWN  This is Worldtown is a digital hub for first person expression by women of color, globally, across all storytelling mediums. We are a redemptive, living and breathing platform that brings new perspectives to issues of politics, race and culture. We tell stories behind the crisis, directly from those who are building, making art, sharing their pain and their truth.

Register Here