Egale Canada Board of Directors

The Board of Directors for Egale Canada is comprised of 14 directors, two people of different genders from each of six regions in Canada and two trans members at large.  Electoral terms are two years long, and each year half of the positions on the Board are open for election.  By-election terms are held to complete terms of directors who were elected in 2009, but have left and are for one year long. The following candidates were acclaimed recently and will join the Board for its first meeting in June.  Their biographies are below.

Biographies

Benjie Nycum lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He co-founded Young Gay America, a project that involved travelling North America with two friends and interviewing more than 1,500 queer teens about their experiences of coming out and coping in high school. Out of that project, he published the book Young Gay America: LGBT Youth and Their Allies and a film, Jim in Bold, about a gay youth’s suicide. Benjie is extremely knowledgeable about the challenges queer youth are currently facing in Canada.  

Hilary Cook – (Ontario Region Excluding the National Capital - Non-male)

Hilary Cook is a labour lawyer. She has been involved in queer activism since the mid 1990s. She has been Chair of Egale's legal issues committee since 2000 and on the board of Egale since 2004. She was elected Chair of the Board in 2009.  She lives in Toronto with her delightful children, fat cats, and gorgeous partner.

Jeffrey David Kushner – (Quebec Excluding National Capital - Non-female)

Jeffrey lives in Montreal, Quebec, where he sits as an administrative judge on the Workers’ Compensation Appeal Board. He speaks English, French, Hebrew and Hindi-Urdu fluently. Jeffrey has been a member of Egale’s Legal Issues Committee since 2000. He has a wide knowledge of the non-profit sector, having served in the past as Executive Director of Alliance Quebec and the Canadian Jewish Congress (Quebec Region) and on the boards of numerous community organizations including Chinese Family Services of Greater Montreal, the Canadian Council of Christians and Jews and Muslim-Jewish Dialogue. 

Mickey Wilson – (Prairies Region – Non-female)

Mickey Wilson lives in Lethbridge, Alberta. For more than twenty years, he has been active in the trans and queer communities. He founded and facilitates a trans support group, provides peer education and develops educational materials. In addition, he is the minister of a church in the queer community, providing pastoral ministry to people living in the inner city, including people living with HIV/AIDS.  

Emily Coates – (Prairies Region – Non-male)

Emily is working towards a Bachelor of Social Work at the University of Regina where she is starting her fourth year in the fall.  She is working for the Government of Saskatchewan as a Facility Youth Worker in a youth correctional facility as well as co-chairing the Provost’s Advisory Committee on Gender and Sexual Diversity.  Emily is a former Board member of Avenue Community Centre where she coordinated the Out and Proud youth group.  She is a former member of the Saskatoon Police Advisory Committee on Diversity where she helped to develop programming for queer youth at the Sexual Health Centre.

Terre Flower – (Pacific Region BC, YK - Non-male)

Terre is the Diversity Coordinator for the Central Vancouver Island Multicultural Society where she has worked for 8 years.  She is also a diversity consultant and trainer.  A native of New Brunswick, with a PhD from the University of Toronto, Terre lives on Gabriola Island.  As a feminist, trainer and educator Terre has extensive experience in creating innovative strategies and programs to involve people and institutions in diversity initiatives.

Gerald Walton – (Pacific Region BC, YK – Non-female)

Gerald Walton is the Assistant Professor, Faculty of Education, Lakehead University, Thunder Bay where he has worked for two years.  He is also an LGBT policy consultant for the British Columbia School District 71 (Comox Valley).  Gerald developed anti-homophobia lesson plans for the Report Homophobic Violence, Period campaign of the Toronto Police Service.  Lesson plans, based on Ma Vie en Rose and The Sissy Duckling are included in training of Community School Liaison Officers and School Resource Officers.  Gerald has a PhD from Queen’s University.

Jesse Invik -   (Member at large - Trans)

Jesse has been an activist for queer rights for more than a decade successfully petitioning municipal politicians to proclaim Pride week in Saskatoon in 1997.  He was a member of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Saskatchewan’s Executive Committee as well as a member of their National Pink Triangle committee.  He is a published author focusing mostly on the difficulties of transitioning at work.  Jesse currently resides in Calgary.

Egale Canada ©2011

Canada's LGBT human rights organization: advancing equality, diversity, education, and justice.