I’ve been offline more often than online these days, trying to do less scrolling of digital pages and more reading of physical ones.
I did, however, break my self-imposed social media hiatus and limited email checking to read an Invest Ottawa newsletter a few weeks ago, which led me to discover the 6th cohort of Impact Academy’s City Maker Edition was welcoming applications to their upcoming 2018 program.
I applied with details of the parent and child-friendly professional development pilot I’ve been working on, as I felt it is in line with Ottawa City Council’s priority area of Healthy & Caring Communities.
Great news! 📬 This week I found out I am one of the 15 projects and founders selected to participate in the three-month program organized by Synapcity and Impact Hub Ottawa.
As part of the program, I will participate in an immersive and experiential learning program for creative and entrepreneurial changemakers who are dedicated to making communities more sustainable, inclusive, and equitable.
I will have access to training, advisors, mentors, networking – and most importantly – a community of like-minded peers dedicated to making Ottawa an even better city to live, work and play in.
Over the past year, since relocating with my young, international family from London, England back to my home city of Ottawa, Canada, I cannot describe how welcome we’ve been made to feel.
Not only have our friendly neighbours introduced themselves to our family – perfect strangers have openly listened to my ideas, offering introductions to their network, feedback on my concept and continued support – as we settle in.
I am proud to have a slowly expanding network in this city, which complements the connections we’ve made abroad over the years. I’m still thinking global but getting ready to execute at a more local level and am happy to say, this time it will be in Ottawa.
I’m dedicated to creating a positive community for women who would like to invest in themselves. At the moment, I am focusing on primary caregivers – because I believe parenthood and professional development don’t have to be mutually exclusive.
The concept I’ve pitched to Impact Academy will provide parents with an opportunity to participate in a safe, accessible and inspiring space where they can:
📈 Learn from experts (in a judgement-free zone, without having to leave the room to breastfeed)
🙋♀️ Ask questions (in between answering their child’s 100th question of the morning)
📆 Work on their goals (safe in the knowledge there are diapers, wipes and a change table nearby)
👭 Meet other like-minded parents (while your children play amongst themselves)
🙌 Get out of the house (without having to worry about packing a day’s worth of snacks)
If you or anyone else in your network from Ottawa and surrounding areas are interested in attending child-friendly business sessions with other local parents and their pre-school age children (newborn to four-years-old), please like, comment and/or share this post!
Looking forward to sharing my progress as the program unfolds this fall/winter 2018!
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About Impact Academy:
Since 2012, Impact Academy has supported over 150 social changemakers in their entrepreneurial journey. The 6th cohort in this special CityMaker Edition is the latest program of Impact Hub Ottawa to contribute creative and entrepreneurial solutions towards the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): 17 calls to action to transform our world for the better by 2030.
Notes From Another Land 