Panelists: Edward Carson, Wilson Leung, Joanne Del Core, and Laura Pacheco
Edward Carson has served as president of several major publishing companies, including Penguin Group (Canada), Pearson Technology Group Canada, Distican (Simon and Schuster), HarperCollinsCanada, and, while Vice President of publishing, founded the successful indigenous publishing list of Random House of Canada. Over the last decade he was Chief Business Officer & Program Director at the University of Toronto School of Continuing Studies, and now heads BusinessPlanetSolutions, a Toronto-based business consultancy.
Wilson Leung teaches leadership at Ryerson University. He is the Chairman and Co-Founder of Thinking Forward, a registered Canadian charity, whose mission is to provide anti-bullying character education for children and youth of inner-city schools in Toronto through arts and leadership training. Wilson holds a doctorate specializing in leadership through which he designed Adaptive Courage, a field-tested model for supporting individuals in managing their leadership fears. He is the author of Everyday Leaders, a leadership facilitator to various organizations, a former director of ministries in church leadership, and a certified practitioner for Myers-Briggs Type Indicator.
Joanne Del Core is an Emotional Intelligence Strategist who works in many capacities with educators and children to create and sustain emotionally healthy environments for children. Her work with child and family facing organizations like Humber College City Wide Training Program, daycare centres and schools across the GTA, is meant to drive training and educational initiatives to equip educators and parents with tools and information about how to navigate and support the emotional landscape for children. These initiatives directly target anxiety, ADHD, depression, trauma, addiction, bullying, and mental health overall in the classroom and at home.
Laura Pacheco is the Vice President, Research at FEI Canada, Canada's leading association for 1,600 CFOs and other senior financial executives. She oversees FEI Canada’s research studies produced by the Canadian Financial Executives Research Foundation (CFERF), the research arm of FEI Canada, and manages the organization’s strategic partnerships. Laura earned her MBA from Dalhousie University, Bachelor of Education from Brock, and Honours BA in Economics & Political Science from the University of Toronto. She holds the CPA designation and certificates from the Burke Institute in Quantitative Analysis and Market Research Methodology.