Compassionate Systems Leadership in BC
There has been a growing interest in working differently together in BC over a number of years. It has been clear for a long time that the traditional approaches to children and families have not been working. On almost all outcome and wellbeing measures, children’s wellbeing has been decreasing.
Across several sectors, people are coming together to support and lean into this work in different ways and through a variety of initiatives. This website and the resources in it have been developed to support all of this work - from education and early years to health and child welfare. The authors of the website are two people who hope to be catalysts and leaders in the CSL space. Over the last seven years +, they have helped to emerge CSL tools and practices in BC. They have been inspired by many, both here in this Province and also internationally. The material on these web pages draws from all of this.
Joanne Schroeder
Joanne is a settler on the traditional territories of the K’omoks People on Vancouver Island.
She is a mother and grandmother.
Joanne recently “retired” from her role as Executive Director at the Comox Valley Child Development Association and has returned to the Human Early Learning Partnership as Director of External Partnerships.
Joanne’s exploration of Compassionate Systems Leadership is a natural extension of her passion for and career long commitment to building better systems and policies for children and youth, through leveraging innovative practice, community leadership and research.
She sees in the Compassionate Systems framework a rich opportunity to join with colleagues in B.C. who are building a more compassionate approach within the child serving systems and to contribute to the emergence of a provincial network for transformative change.
Pippa Rowcliffe
Pippa is an uninvited settler on the traditional territories of the W̱SÁNEĆ People on Vancouver Island. She is a mother of three boys.
Pippa has been learning and practising CSL since 2015. Her long time employment at the Human Early Learning Partnership, University of British Columbia, where data consistently suggest worsening child development outcomes in BC over 20 years, brought her a sense of urgency to develop new and innovative approaches to supporting all children and families to thrive.
Along with Joanne, Pippa designed and guided three pilot communities in Compassionate Systems Leadership training in 2018/19.
Pippa has a particular interest and has trained in Compassion Cultivation (Stanford/ Compassion Institute) as a necessary foundation for a Compassionate Systems Leadership approach.
In her current position at the Office of the Representative for Children and Youth of BC, Pippa continues to develop and apply compassionate systems leadership approaches to provincial policy and program change.