Faculty Bios
Sandie Birkhead-Kirk
Sandie has dedicated over 35 years to the creation, expansion and improvement of training and development programs in Ontario. From 1986 to 2008, Sandie held executive positions in several Provincial ministries. Most recently, she served as Director of the Service Delivery Branch and Director of Apprenticeship. Her work with employer and union organizations, First Nations and sector groups has included the management of complex policy, program design, and development initiatives. Her responsibilities have included bilateral and pan-Canadian work with other provinces and the federal government and a brief exchange opportunity with the South African Government. A respected leader, Sandie has been recognized for her ability to bring together stakeholders, to clearly articulate direction, and to put ideas into action.
Sandie is an experienced facilitator. She has facilitated information gathering, problem resolution, strategic planning and program design sessions. Her work has included dealing with contentious and non- contentious issues in the public, broader public, private and not-for profit sectors. She has worked alone as a facilitator and as part of a team.
For the past four years, Sandie has been a partner in Sage-Advice Inc. Projects have included program design, development, and implementation strategies, as well as individual mentoring and working with the non-profit sector. In addition, she works as an associate with PMC Inc. and ARD Inc. consulting practices.
In addition to presenting the Facilitation Skills Workshop for OISEUT and her consulting work, Sandie teaches in two post-secondary certificate programs at Humber College: Global Business Management and Public Administration.
Sandie has a BA in English and Masters of Education from Lakehead University. She continues to be an active volunteer through the Toronto Sunrise Rotary Club where she has served as president and chair of numerous committees.
Michael Breen
Michael’s career encompasses 30 years in Financial Services and then a shift 6 years ago into “Knowledge Transfer”, as a professor, facilitator, trainer, mentor and coach.
In Finance his responsibilities included Relationship Management, Risk Analysis, Project Financing and Corporate training. He worked throughout corporate North America in a wide variety of industries and with all levels of Government. His clientele has included some of the world’s largest Corporations down to individual professional practices.
Michael has lived and worked in Toronto, New York, Montreal and San Francisco. His employers have included General Electric, Toronto Dominion, CIBC, Westpac, Royal Bank of Canada and Credit Suisse.
Since 2005 he has taught in Business Schools at the College level and has built a private portfolio of clients ranging from professional individuals to the Canadian Federal government. He has developed and delivered internet based courses as well as traditional classroom and one-on-one content for this clientele.
Michael’s formal education includes a Bachelors degree in Management Sciences from the University of Manchester, in Manchester, England, a Masters of Business Administration from Pepperdine University in Los Angeles, California and a Bachelors degree in Adult Education from Brock University in St. Catherine’s, Ontario. In addition he has numerous training and development certifications.
Rick Chambers
Rick Chambers is a former English teacher and department chair at several high schools in Ontario and with the Department of Defence Schools Overseas. He has been a program officer and manager in the Professional Affairs Department at the Ontario College of Teachers. He has also served as a coordinator of continuing education courses at OISE, and is a past chair of the Conference on English Leadership of the National Council of Teachers of English.
Rick is the Canadian consultant for the Stepping Out series of literacy resources for Pearson Education Canada. He has co-authored teaching materials for Pearson and delivered many presentations on teaching and learning in Canada and the United States.
Micki Clemens
Micki Clemens is a dedicated educator with more than 30 years experience. Currently she works as an independent education consultant and project manager and is assisting the Department of Continuing Education at OISE. Her previous leadership positions include school board coordinator; Education Officer for the Educational Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO); and Education Officer for the Ministry of Education in the Curriculum and Assessment Policy Branch.
Her leadership work with provincial and board teams, principals, and classroom teachers and community organizations has involved researching best practices in literacy, including boys’ literacy, curriculum, and assessment; assisting clients with the collection and analysis of data on student achievement; fostering collaborative networking initiatives; applying for grants and funding; and building administrator and teacher capacity in adolescent literacy focused on reducing the achievement gap for all students. She has authored a student text, The 10 Most Ingenious Fictional Detectives (2007), published by Scholastic and supports local community theatre as President of the Burl-Oak Theatre Group.
Natalie Currie
Natalie Currie is an Instructional Designer, Facilitator, Life and Corporate Coach at: The Way Finding Coach (Natalie Currie Enterprises Inc). Natalie harnesses her 21 years of broad-based experience in the corporate and entrepreneurial sectors. She collaborates with creative and learning professionals supporting them in strength-based leadership.
Natalie designs and facilitates engaging, customized corporate and public workshops using leading brain-based practices in the areas of: adult education, creativity, communication, teamwork and negotiation skills.
Valerie Dixon
Valerie Dixon, President of Learnware Design Inc., is a leading expert on creating highly effective learning solutions to maximize learning capacity and capability. She has over thirty-eight years’ experience in all aspects of performance needs analysis, learning strategy development and learning design for all types of media.
Her company, Learnware Design Inc., has been providing clients with creative, custom-designed, and technology-based learning solutions for over twenty-nine years. She and her team have the expertise to take complex facts, concepts, processes and procedures and make them easy for others to learn and expertly apply.
Valerie is the creator and designer of the Canadian Society for Training and Development’s (CSTD) Training Competency Architecture (TCA) and Toolkit, the foundation documents for CSTD’s Certified Training and Development Professional (CTP/CTDP) designations. She also facilitates certification study groups and coaches candidates on how to achieve their professional designation.
Clay Lafleur
Clay Lafleur is an established and highly respected educator, researcher and policy analyst. Currently working as an independent consultant, he specializes in program evaluation, organizational change, leadership and knowledge mobilization activities. Clay is also an Associate in the Graduate School, University of Toronto. He has taught in elementary and secondary schools as well as in a number of colleges and universities in Canada and Australia. Clay has also held senior leadership positions with The Learning Partnership, The Simcoe County District School Board, the Ontario Ministry of Education, the Educational Research Institute of British Columbia and the South Australian Education Department. He is past president of several education, research and evaluation associations and in 2008 he received the PDK-University of Toronto Chapter Outstanding Educator Award.
Clay has completed numerous projects, seminars and publications over his career. His current and recent projects include a national evaluation of program for elementary and secondary school students, a federally-funded literature review of gender differences in post secondary education academic achievement, an evaluation of a provincial program to increase the participation of women in science and engineering, a study of boys’ literacy, a Pan Canadian study of immigrant and aboriginal demographic changes and rural depopulation on public education, development of a leadership self-review tool for Ontario school boards, and a province-wide study on building research capacity in Ontario school boards.