2025 Alberta Healthy Communities Symposium

Celebrate 20 Years of ChooseWell!

We are so excited to invite you, our passionate Champions, to participate in our 20th anniversary celebrations! To mark this milestone, we have launched Trivia Tuesdays – a fun and engaging way to test your knowledge on the history of Communities ChooseWell and how we have supported HEAL Champions across Alberta over the past 20 years (all in good fun of course).

Event Details

• March 26 – March 28, 2025
• Vivo for Healthier Generations, Calgary, AB
• Cost:
  • $40 (ARPA members)
  • $45 (non-ARPA members)

Accommodations

If you’re in need of accommodation, we have a room block reserved at the Executive Residency by Best Western.

To book a room under this block, please contact the hotel front desk at 403-984-6999 Extension 0 and provide the group name “Alberta Recreation & Parks Association’ and dates to secure your reservation.

Imagine walking through a night market where the currency is Connection and the goods are Community Stories?

We are thrilled to bring back the Community Stories Market where various Albertan communities/organizations will have a booth set up showcasing the amazing work happening in their community. This will be a fun and exciting opportunity for Champions to showcase the amazing work happening in their community.

Join us on March 26th from 3-6pm!

• If you are interested in having your community included in this showcase please select yes on your registration form.

Taylor McPherson | Sports Program Coordinator (Indigenous Sport Council of Alberta)

Taylor is a driven and accomplished individual who takes great pride in her Miawpukek First Nations heritage. She has recently successfully completed her Masters of Science in Kinesiology at the University of Alberta. Taylor’s passion for sports stems from her experience as an Alumni of Pandas Wrestling, where she excelled as a wrestler at both the Varsity and National Team level. With her love for sports, she aims to inspire and empower those around her and develop more inclusive spaces for Indigenous people and girls within sports programming. In addition to her academic pursuits, Taylor serves as a Sports Programs Coordinator with the Indigenous Sport Council of Alberta (ISCA). In this role, she is responsible for developing and implementing culturally appropriate sports programming for Indigenous girls and women in Alberta. Through her work, Taylor aims to create safe and inclusive spaces that promote physical activity, healthy lifestyles, and community engagement amongst women and Indigenous populations.

Cynthia Watson | Chief Evolution Officer (Vivo for Healthier Generations Society)

Cynthia is Chief Evolution Officer of the charity Vivo for Healthier Generations Society. She loves to tinker, test and prototype in the realms of social innovation, service design and social economics to co-create transformation at a systems level.  She brings perspectives from the spectrum of healthcare, health promotion and chronic disease prevention, grassroots to Olympian-level sport, and community wellbeing, recreation and active living.  She is dedicated to championing diverse communities of belonging to have their voices in leadership roles. In her parallel universe, she has Co-chaired ActiveCITY Collective, multi-sector leaders driving a sustained, collaborative commitment to Calgary’s emerging active economy sector. She is currently a board member of Parks Foundation Calgary and a senator for the University of Calgary.  She is a graduate of the Royal Roads University Master of Arts in Leadership.

We All Belong in Nature: Ecojustice in the Outdoors

Nature supports physical and mental health and wellness in so many ways – exercise, food, spirituality, and so much more. But not everyone has equitable access to nature. Mainstream outdoor recreation is inaccessible, exclusive, and expensive. It perpetuates systemic racism, ableism, classism, heterosexism, sexism, cissexism, and sizeism. Many community members feel ignored, unwelcome, and unprepared in the outdoors. 

Join Hira Shah, conservation biologist, educator, and ecojustice advocate,  and Jaclyn Angotti, Education Director from the Southern Alberta Chapter of the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society as we explore how we can help make the outdoors inclusive for all as we explore how we can help make the outdoors inclusive for all. Learn how you can provide inclusive nature connection opportunities that support the wellbeing of your community members. This indoor-outdoor session includes games, crafts, and creative thinking! It will help guide your role in responding to inequities in our communities, specifically in accessing nature, while ensuring opportunities for physical and mental health and wellness. We will demonstrate how to apply cross-cultural guidelines to your activities and programs to make nature connection more accessible for all! 

If you would like to dive further into the topic before or after the session, please check out our webinar “Fostering Diverse Parks for Healthy Communities”, which shares recommendations on increasing inclusion and accessibility in parks based on research and a diversity of lived experiences.

*Please Note:

We invite you to please bring one small item (that you are okay parting with) from your home, local community park, or nearby natural space that you think represents you or your community. This item will be used in one of the activities during the session. If you are taking something from nature, please do so respectfully by only taking items that are already on the ground; avoid picking live plants or disturbing wildlife habitats. Finally, please come prepared to be outdoors for all or part of the session (weather dependent).

About Hira Shah

Hira Shah (she/her) is a conservation biologist and an educator who engages diverse communities in environmental conservation. She holds a Masters of Conservation Biology from the University of Queensland and has over 10 years of experience as a science communicator and environmental educator. Hira currently works with the City of Calgary to engage Calgarians in climate and environment topics. Hira is presenting today not as City staff, but as a passionate and interested Calgarian. Through her work with the Multicultural Trail Network, Hira aims to increase diverse representation in the outdoors through her work with the Multicultural Trail Network.

About Jaclyn Angotti

Jaclyn Angotti (she/her), CPAWS Southern Alberta Education Director, works to increase inclusion, accessibility, and belonging in environmental education and conservation. She has 15 years of experience leading science and environmental education programs. She has a Bachelor of Science in Biology with a Business minor from the University of Alberta and Master of Education from the University of Calgary. Her interdisciplinary Master of Education included studies in Education for the Environment and Poo’miikapii: Niitsítapi Approaches to Wellness.

About Laura Harrisson

Laura Harrisson | Director of Programming, Brown Bagging for Calgary’s Kids
Laura is an experienced professional in the nonprofit sector and has lead program management and design across a range of areas: food insecurity; youth unemployment and gender-based violence prevention. At BB4CK, Laura plays a pivotal role in developing and overseeing programs that provide lunches to children in schools and community settings, as well as programs that support families experiencing food insecurity, and leading BB4CK’s advocacy work. Outside of work, you’ll often find Laura on a pair of cross-country skis, climbing, hiking, trail running or working on a crafty project!

About Wanda Laurin

Wanda Laurin | Board Chair, Alberta Food Matters I am a retired teacher from Peace River, and have been very active in environmental initiatives in the Peace Region for decades. I am passionate about sustainability and healthy living, and I wish to pass along that passion and knowledge to the next generation. I joined Alberta Food Matters (AFM) in 2016, just as the Board was preparing a conference “Cultivating Connections”, that brought together people who are passionate about gardening, healthy soils, aquaponics, farming, and transformational food security initiatives. Under the leadership of Susan Roberts, AFM became a founding member of the Coalition for Healthy School Food. In 2020, AFM began the work of connecting with school food providers and government school food people to establish a provincial network. We have grown the network to include a wide variety of people and organizations, and that work continues today! Since retirement, I have been able to devote my time and energy to my passions, including gardening, composting, reading, biking and the environment. This amazing and mysterious money gets deposited in my bank every month to support my habits, and with juggling all these various balls in the air, I couldn’t hold down a job even if I wanted to! Life is wonderful!

About Jenn Mireau

Jenn Mireau | Health and Wellness Consultant, Ever Active Schools
Since joining Ever Active Schools in 2022, I’ve been passionate about creating vibrant, healthy school communities where students can learn, grow and thrive. I focus on empowering student leaders, promoting active school travel, and inspiring a lifelong love of movement and well-being—all through the lens of Comprehensive School Health. When I’m not working with schools, you can usually find me outdoors—whether I’m hiking through the backcountry, fishing by the lake, or walking with my dog, Sterling, in the community. I’m happiest when I’m active and connected to nature!

Beyond Lunch: A Collaborative Conversation about
the Future of Healthy School Food in Alberta

Healthy school food is about more than just what’s on the plate. This session dives into the current landscape of school food programming in Alberta and explores how communities can best leverage upcoming funding opportunities provided by Canada’s new national school food program.

Join Laura Harrisson (Brown Bagging 4 Calgary’s Kids), Wanda Laurin (Alberta Food Matters), and Jenn Mireau (Ever Active Schools) as they share insights, successes, and strategies for healthy school food programs. Discover opportunities for collaboration between schools, recreation providers, and community organizations, and explore how intersectoral partnerships can drive meaningful change.

This interactive masterclass will aim to address challenges in delivering equitable and sustainable school food initiatives, with tools and inspiration for action in your community. Whether you’re a policymaker, educator, community leader, or advocate, this session is a chance to connect, reflect, and contribute to the growing movement for healthy school food in Alberta. Let’s go beyond lunch and work together to reimagine what’s possible for school food environments!

You want me to ride my bike where?

Join the Youth en Route team as we ride bikes to two schools in the area around VIVO. You’ll understand the barriers to Active Travel how you can improve the experience for all people in your communities.

Our short adventure will take us across roads, on pathways and we’ll experience porkchops, beg buttons and car-first urban design. It will be fun and exhilarating – and probably a bit frustrating – just like most rides to school for Calgary’s youth. The ride will be followed up with an indepth look at how Youth en Route’s multifaceted approach to empowering youth is changing minds and modes of travel across Calgary.

Youth en Route’s professional team will guide the group, providing bikes and helmets for everyone. Feel free to bring your own bike if you’d like, as well as a water bottle.

Pre-registration is required for this Masterclass.