"A passionate visionary, esteemed researcher and early child advocate, Clyde inspired every one of us."

Dr. Hertzman,  Founding Director of the Human Early Learning Partnership (HELP); former Canada Research Chair in Population Health and Human Development and Professor in the School of Population and Public Health at UBC.  Nationally, Dr. Hertzman was a Senior Fellow of the Experience-based Brain and Biological Development Programme and the Successful Societies Programs of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research (CIfAR). He was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences, and he held an honorary appointment at the Institute for Child Health, University College, London.

Dr. Hertzman played a central role in creating a framework that links population health to human development, emphasizing the special role of early childhood development as a determinant of health. His research contributed to international, national, provincial, and community initiatives for healthy child development.  He was the recipient of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) 2010 Canada’s Health Researcher of the Year and was made an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2013.

Dr. Thomas Boyce is the Sunny Hill Health Centre/BC Leadership Chair in Child Development in the Human Early Learning Partnership and the Centre for Community Child Health Research at the University of British Columbia. He is also Co-Director of CIFAR's Experience-Based Brain and Biological Development Program and a member of Harvard University's National Scientific Council on the Developing Child.

Joanne Schroeder studied social work at the University of British Columbia. She has played a foundational role as Community Development Manager in the translation of HELP's early child development research to communities. She is also the lead author of the Communities for Children: A Toolkit for Action recently published by the HELP and a contributor to a variety of other publications. Joanne is the National Lead Fellow for the Council for Early Child Development (CECD) and as part of that role manages the Pan-Canadian EDI initiative.

Dr. Jim Frankish is the director for the Centre for Population Health Promotion Research. He is also a professor for CFIS & School of Population & Public Health. Additionally, Dr. Frankish is a member of the PHIRNET research-training program, board member for Lookout Homeless Society and member of the National Collaborating Centre on Determinants of Health. His research interests include: Olympics & inner city communities, service use by homeless with mental illness, poverty & nutrition and health literacy in street youth.

Dr. Martin Guhn is an Assistant Professor at the Human Early Learning Partnership, School of Population and Public Health, UBC, and the National Research Lead of the Forum on Early Child Development Monitoring, which is supported by funding from the Lawson Foundation.

Dr. Guhn has a PhD in Human Development (UBC), and degrees in Psychology and Music. His interdisciplinary, applied research focuses on social, cultural, demographic, and socio-economic determinants of children's and adolescents’ developmental health, wellbeing, and educational trajectories, drawing from HELP’s EDI and MDI research projects. Further research interests include children's social and emotional development, bio-ecological theories of human development, validation of population-level assessment, measurement of change over time, educational reform, as well as school and community-based knowledge-to-action research.

Dr. Paul Kershaw is a farmer morning and night. By day, he is an academic, public speaker, media contributor and volunteer. In these latter roles, he is one of Canada's leading thinkers about family policy, receiving two national prizes from the Canadian Political Science Association for his research. 'Armed with a laptop and a raft of statistics,' The Province newspaper describes Kershaw as 'a one-man road show trying to change Canada one talk at a time.' Change is necessary, he argues, because Canada no longer works for all generations. At the University of British Columbia, in the College for Interdisciplinary Studies, Kershaw is the Human Early Learning Partnership (HELP) Scholar of Social Care, Citizenship and the Determinants of Health.

Dr. Brenda Poon leads HELP's Early Childhood Screening Research and Evaluation initiative. Dr. Poon completed her doctoral work in Special Education at UBC and postdoctoral fellowship with HELP through a joint award from the Canadian Health Services Research Foundation (CHSRF) and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR). Dr. Poon is interested in research and evaluation related to early identification and early intervention for children with special needs, family-centered services, integrated child health information systems, as well as social determinants of children's health and development over the lifecourse.

Dr. Ziba Vaghri is a Research Associate leading the International Research and Initiatives Program at HELP. Her previous work as a health care professional in various countries has given her rich experience in working within multiethnic settings and appreciation for cultural diversity. Dr. Vaghri's current interests lie in population-based monitoring of Early Child Development (ECD) in diverse parts of the world. She ascribes to the view that this could inform new initiatives in the various countries and provide direction to them in the framing of future policy around ECD. In accordance with this view, for the last few years, she has been actively involved in the development of a tool to monitor fulfillment of the Convention of the Rights of the Child (Indicators of General Comment 7). She is a member of the multinational team of the Early Childhood Rights Indicators supported by the United Nations Child Right Committee ...

My interests center on the sociology of health and illness, particularly community and individual socioeconomic influences on physical and mental health. I also have related interests in social capital, social networks, theory-building in population health, social constructions of illness and risk, community action research, the measurement of community social environments, and the application of mixed methods to health research.

In addition to sociology, my training is rooted in public and population health.  Thus, my research activities are interdisciplinary, often involving collaboration with researchers from fields such as geography, anthropology, public health, nursing, and medicine.  I was a Robert Wood Johnson Health & Society Scholar at the University of Wisconsin from 2004-2006. Currently, I am a Faculty Affiliate of the Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies at UBC. 

I have been the recipient of two investigator awards.  In 2007, I was awarded a six year Career Scholar Award from the Michael Smith ...

Dr. Susan Dahinten is an Associate Professor at the UBC School of Nursing and Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research Scholar. Her research program focuses on the intersection of family and community factors that influence the health and development of children and youth, and the evaluation of public health interventions to support healthy childhood development. She currently teaches quantitative research methods at the University, and has expertise in the longitudinal analysis of large data sets, including the use of administrative data.

The focus of Dr. Grunau’s interdisciplinary research program is biobehavioural reactivity and infant neurodevelopment, broadly encompassing multiple aspects of infant arousal, self-regulation, attention and cognition in preterm and term born infants, including pain responses.

Dr. Tony Herdman’s research program focuses on understanding the brain dynamics that underlie many psychological phenomena involved in auditory and visual perceptions, attention, language and memory. He uses behavioural, eye-tracking, and electrophysiological (EEG & MEG) measures to study fundamental principles of these systems and how they develop. One main line of investigation is providing insights into how experience with visual objects (such as letters and words) alters brain dynamics and neural-network communications in typically-developing readers and dyslexics. Another research stream is looking at how auditory selective attention and visual novelty detection in children are affected by socioeconomic disparities. Dr. Herdman is also conducting research in the fields of cognition & memory and neuroimaging methodology. Dr. Herdman is particularly fascinated by how a brain functions and communicates across multiple dimensions (space, time, and frequency) and how such communication is altered by experience as a brain develops its abundant abilities.

Dr. Herdman is ...

Dr. Michael S. Kobor is an Associate Professor in the Department of Medical Genetics at UBC, and a Scientist at the Centre for Molecular Medicine and Therapeutics, a gene research centre under UBC’s Faculty of Medicine and located at the Child and Family Research Institute (CFRI). 

Dr. Kobor completed his PhD in Medical Genetics under Dr. Jack Greenblatt at the University of Toronto before undertaking postdoctoral training as a Human Frontier Science Program Fellow with Dr. Jasper Rine at the University of California, Berkeley. 

Research in Dr. Kobor’s laboratory is focused on the epigenetic regulation of gene expression and genome function. Particular emphasis is placed on understanding the mechanistic nature of these processes and their modulation by environmental exposures. Dr. Kobor’s research team utilizes an interdisciplinary approach, with investigations spanning the entire spectrum from model organisms to human populations.  Through a variety of research approaches, ongoing work ...

Dr. Oberlander a developmental pediatrician studying how early social experience (prenatal maternal mental illness and psychotropic medication exposure) influences biobehavioral development during childhood.

Dr. Kimberly Schonert-Reichl is the Principal Investigator of the Middle Years Development Instrument (MDI). An Applied Developmental Psychologist and Professor in the Department of Educational and Counseling Psychology and Special Education at UBC, she has been conducting research in the area of the child and adolescent social and emotional development for over 20 years. Specifically, her work has been to identify the processes and mechanisms that foster positive development in children, such as empathy, optimism, and altruism.

More information about Dr. Schonert-Reichl: http://educ.ubc.ca/research/ksr/schonert-reichl.html.

Dr. Joanne Weinberg is a Professor and Distinguished University Scholar in the Department of Cellular & Physiological Sciences at UBC. She is a member of the Brain Research Center, and an Associate Member of the Department of Psychology and the Child and Family Research Institute. Dr. Weinberg has served as President of the International Society for Developmental Psychobiology and the Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders Study Group, on the Board of Directors of the Research Society on Alcoholism, and on the Editorial Advisory Boards of Alcohol,  Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research, Neurotoxicology and Teratology, and Physiology and Behavior. She is currently a member of the Advisory Panel of the Intervention Network Action Team, Canada Northwest FASD Research Network and is co-leader of the FASD Project of NeuroDevNet, Networks of Centers of Excellence. The research in Dr. Weinberg’s laboratory utilizes rat models to examine how early life experiences, in particular, prenatal alcohol exposure ...

Department of Educational & Counselling Psychology & Special Education, University of British Columbia RESEARCH INTERESTS: Statistical theory and practice, including the analysis of large scale survey data arising from tests, scales, and questionnaires, as well as data from observational (quasi-experimental) and experimental studies.

Connie Deane is Metis and Coordinator of the Infant and Early Childhood Development Center in Vernon. Connie began working with families in 1985 after receiving a Diploma in Early Childhood Education. Her passion for children and families has led her to pursue many additional training and educational programs, including earning a Diploma in Infant Development from UBC. Connie also works with families as the Interior Region Advisor for Aboriginal Infant Development Programs of BC.

Diana Elliott is a Coast Salish, Cowichan Tribes member with equal roots from the Nuu Chalth Nuth Tribal Territory. Diana has accumulated over 15 years experience in the field of Aboriginal Infant Development with an early career in Licensed Practical Nursing. She also has over a decade of experience in planning, implementing, delivering, and evaluating programs and services for children and youth aged newborn to 19 year and their parents. Most specifically, Diana works in Infant Development with an interest in community health and wellness.

Joan Gignac hails from the Sagamok Anishnawbek, Ojibway Nation in Northern Ontario and has been living in BC since 1990. Joan works as the Executive Director of the Aboriginal Head Start Association of British Columbia. She is an Early Childhood Educator and has worked in a wide variety of child care settings. In the past, Joan was the Child Care Manager for Nutsumaat Lelum: the Chemainus First Nation Child Care Centre.

Duane Jackson is from the Gitanmaax of the Gitxsan Nation. He is a certified early childhood educator completing the Early Childhood Education Program at the First Nations Training and Development Centre in Prince Rupert. Duane has been working with young people as a basketball coach for the past twenty-seven years and his passion for developing well rounded individuals both on and off the court was acknowledged when he was the recipient of the 2006 Aboriginal Coach of the Year by the Aboriginal Sports and Recreation Association of B.C. Duane has worked with Success By 6 and Children First as ...

Jessie Nyberg is a Shuswap Elder registered to the Creek Band. Her Shuswap name, Busy Ant, was given to her by her grandmother when she was just one year old because she did not like to stay still and kept very busy. Jessie is a wife, mother of two, grandmother of three and a retired registered nurse after practicing for forty-five years. She is an RN, holds a Bachelor of Science Degree and is close to completing earning an MHA. In addition to her role as the ASCs Elder, Jessie is involved with the Vernon First Nations Friendship Centre, School ...

Sue Sterling originates from the Nlakapamux Nation in Merritt and currently sits with the Dumdehmyoo (Bear) Clan with the Nadleh Whuten Indian Band from the Carrier Sekani Nation. Her traditional name is Gwanawar, meaning Black Swan. Sue is an Aboriginal Early Childhood Development Consultant for the Interior Region of BC. She participates on the Board of Directors for the British Columbia Aboriginal Child Care Society (BCACCS) and is the Western Canada National Representative for the World Forum on Early Childhood Foundation.

Kathy Waddell is Metis and works as the Director of Human Services for the Huu-ay-aht First Nations on Vancouver Island. Kathy has been working with families since 1999.  She has earned a Diploma in Early Childhood Education and a certificate in Aboriginal Health and Community Administration.  She is presently working on her Bachelor Degree.  Kathy is an advocate for all Aboriginal people and especially enjoys working with preschoolers and elders and has been learning the Nuu-chah-nulth language with the Paawats Learning Centre since 2006.  Kathy is the Aboriginal Early Child Development Steering Committee Chair in Port Alberni.

Dr. Alisa Almas joined HELP as a Research Associate in 2012. She completed her doctoral work at the University of Toronto where she studied the development of social behavior in children and adolescents. Subsequently, she spent two years as a Post-doctoral fellow in the Child Development Lab at the University of Maryland where she expanded her examination of social development to children in atypical populations, including those at risk for developing anxiety disorders and children who experienced severe psychosocial deprivation early in life. At HELP, Dr. Almas continues to explore the nature of children’s social skills and behaviors, with ...

Dr. Barry Forer is a research methodologist and statistician specializing in early childhood development and child care. At HELP, his research topics have included child care quality and stability, neighbourhood effects on child development, and the psychometric properties of the EDI. His Ph.D. was completed in the Measurement, Evaluation, and Research Methodology program at the UBC Faculty of Education.

Dr. Anne Gadermann is a Post-Doctoral Fellow to the HELP Team.  In addition to her current Post-Doc appointment in Population Health at the Centre for Health Evaluation & Outcome Sciences at St Paul’s Hospital, Anne is also a member of the MDI research team on a part-time basis.  She is studying the patterns of children’s development in the middle years and developmental trajectories, linking MDI data to the EDI.

Dr. Jennifer Lloyd is a Research Associate and Djavad Mowafaghian Foundation Junior Scholar at the Human Early Learning Partnership (HELP) at the University of British Columbia. She is also an Associate Member of UBC's School of Population & Public Health. Dr. Lloyd earned her B.Sc. in Psychology and her M.A. in Educational Psychology from the University of Victoria. Following a year working in the Department of Experimental Psychology at the University of Oxford, she pursued her Ph.D. in psychometrics from UBC's Department of Educational and Counselling Psychology and Special Education. Under the supervision of Prof. Bruno ...

Dr. Constance Milbrath is a developmental psychologist who joined HELP as a Senior Researcher in 2006, moving north from University of California San Francisco (UCSF) where her focus was on developing and applying methodologies that blend qualitative and quantitative analyses in complementary frameworks. Her interests at HELP are in the ethno-cultural determinants of early child outcomes for immigrant and aboriginal populations. She has published widely in the fields of clinical and developmental psychology.

Dr. Jayne Pivik is a community/environmental psychologist who examines community/neighbourhood impacts on child and youth well-being, community asset mapping, human-environment interactions, and collaborative and participatory research processes involving children and youth. Dr. Pivik has studied the impact of traumatic brain injuries, stress and coping with disabilities, promoting inclusion and disability awareness for children with disabilities, university-community collaborations and involving community voices in health care decision-making.

Jeremy works to produce GIS maps and cartographic support for the provincial ECD mapping unit. He graduated in May 2008 with a BA in Human and Physical Geography from the University of British Columbia. His main projects while working at HELP have been work on Aboriginal mapping, Dental Survey Mapping and work with EDI and SES Index mapping projects. Jeremy's research interests include aboriginal mapping to appropriately contextualize Aboriginal data and information design.

Lynell Anderson is a leading authority on family policy in Canada, especially with respect to the finances of child care services. As a Certified General Accountant (CGA) with extensive experience in the private, voluntary and public sectors, Lynell brings leadership to the role of Senior Family Policy Researcher with UBC's Human Early Learning Partnership. Lynell has also taught Public Sector Financial Management for the CGA Associations of BC and Canada. Lynell uses financial information to inform, engage and empower. In 2010 Lynell received the United Way of the Lower Mainland Excellence in Action Early Childhood Development Award for her ...

Jacqui is a Statistical Analyst, knowledgeable in advanced, complex modeling methods and technologies, and ecological based psychometrics for individual, nested, and aggregated data. She is particularly interested in applied social science, education, and policy research related to quality of life.

Anna-Marie is the part-time administrative assistant to Joanne Schroeder.

Lisa Chen is responsible with database 'scrubbing' and data management issues. She will do EDI analysis and provide school reports. Lisa Chen has an MS in Applied Statistics from University of Georgia and has been working at UBC as a statistical analyst for 14 years.

With a background in strategic planning and project management, Gillian's role at HELP is to ensure smooth implementation of the Early Development Instrument (EDI) and Middle Years Development Instrument (MDI) in public and independent schools across British Columbia. Gillian holds an MA in Human Geography from McGill University and has focused her career on interdisciplinary cooperation around the well-being of children and families.

Jay provides GIS, Cartographic and web based interactive mapping to the Early Childhood Development Mapping Project. In 2004 Jay earned a BA in Human Geography from the University of British Columbia. Jay's research interests include visualization of complex data, web based cartography and spatial statistics.

Matthew is the key systems administrator at HELP.

Tanya provides overall coordination support for the various research and administrative activities of Dr. Thomas Boyce.

Catherine is the Project Coordinator, International Research and Initiatives Program. She is an experienced researcher and writer and has worked as a consultant to government and other clients on social justice and cultural issues. Catherine holds an MA in Anthropology, and BA and MA degrees in English Literature, and is currently pursuing studies in the Post-Graduate Laws Programme, University of London. Her interests include public international law and philosophy of law.

Jennifer is responsible for coordinating HELP’s knowledge translation activities (maternity leave position). She provides support for both internal communications and external publication materials. She also assists with HELP events and public and media relations. Jennifer holds a Master’s degree in International Educational Development from Boston University and has worked both as a public school teacher and in the non-profit sector.

Brianne is the EDI Coordinator at HELP. With an MA in Children's Literature, she has focused her career and volunteer work on fostering stronger local communities to support child and youth development.

Diane is a Research Coordinator with the Centre for Population Health Promotion Research (CPHPR).

A keen cyclist, Jennifer has been active in her community since she her training wheels came off.  She works to support academic, community, and government audiences to interpret and use HELP's research.  As monitoring and evaluation lead, Jennifer brings learnings from these relationships back to HELP to support innovation internally and externally. She works with HELP's Knowledge Translation Team, Aboriginal Steering Committee, and EDI Implementation Team to support collaboration with district and community EDI trainers, local coalitions, health authorities, school boards, government and community organizations.  Jennifer has a M.A. in Geography from the University of Victoria and ...

Ruth coordinates the linked and longitudinal database development for HELP. She works closely with HELP Affiliates, and with government, hospitals and community organizations. She will be working to create longitudinal trajectories of health and development for defined populations of BC children, and will provide leadership in augmenting current databases and facilitating maximum data development and linkage.

Rita is responsible for grant applications and research/service agreement processing, including evaluation of budgets.  She also  facilitates faculty and researchers in finding appropriate funding sources.  Rita holds a BA in English Language (UBC) and comes to HELP with experience in coordinating health and social science research applications at the Child & Family Research Institute and the UBC Faculty of Education.

Elsie is a member of Yale First Nation, a small community located at the southern end of the Fraser Canyon. Elsie graduated with a BA in Communications (Journalism and Public Relations) in 1999 and has spent the past decade working at the community level engaging various populations to make positive social change. Elsie works with the Aboriginal Steering Committee and the EDI Implementation Team.

Christine is the coordinator for the pan-Canadian Forum of Early Child Development Monitoring (ECDM). She holds an MEd in Human Development, Learning and Culture from UBC, a BA in Communications with a focus on culture and children’s journalism, and certificates in ESL Teaching and in Development and Innovation in the Teaching Practice.

Christine also has over twelve years of working experience in the field of education, mostly in Mexico but also in China and Canada. She is an English-Spanish translator and interpreter, and has experience supporting research projects in Social-Emotional Learning and International Development. As a graduate student, she ...

Anna comes to HELP most recently from Population Data BC where she had the opportunity to work with the BC Linked Health Database. She made significant contributions to documenting linkage practices and data processing methodologies. Anna works on screening-related projects and EDI-related projects.

Zin provides administration assistance and coordination at HELP.

Brenda works with Diane Gray and Dr. Jim Frankish as a Research Coordinator with the Centre for Population Health Promotion Research (CPHPR).

Adrienne provides financial coordination to almost all members of the HELP staff. She is key in the smooth administration of HELP's day-to-day financial and administrative tasks.

On maternity leave until 2013.

Bryan is the Senior Finance Manager at HELP.

As the Communications Officer, Amy provides support in the knowledge dissemination and knowledge transfer activities within HELP. Her responsibilities include coordinating the creation and production of both internal and external communications materials. She also assists with HELP events and public and media relations. Amy has a degree in Communication from Simon Fraser University and has worked in both the public and not-for-profit sectors.

Anita is responsible for the coordination of HELP conferences, meetings, webinars and workshops.

Currently on leave.

Neda is pursuing her PhD in Epidemiology at the School of Population and Public Health under Dr. Clyde Herzman’s supervision. She has received her Master of Public Health from UBC and for the past seven years has dedicated her career and research to the field of child health and development. Her current research focuses on the impact of having a parent with chronic illness, such as Multiple Sclerosis, on early developmental well-being.

Jasmyn provides administration assistance and coordination at HELP.

On maternity leave until July 2013.

Pippa's role is to increase the visibility of HELP and its research (provincially, nationally and internationally). As the Knowledge Translation Director, she oversees the creation and implementation of a communications strategy to effectively describe and promote HELP and to disseminate research findings.

Cheryl is the Human Resources and Administration Manager at HELP and her responsibilities include providing and planning for all aspects of Human Resources for HELP. She has over 25 years of experience working with government, non-profit and legal organizations. She is born and raised in Vancouver and her favourite free-time activities include spending time with family and friends, exploring the great outdoors and traveling the globe.

Michele A. Sam is Ktunaxa, a cultural and linguistic isolate group to the world. She is the Senior Aboriginal Researcher and Liaison for HELP's Early Childhood Development Mapping Unit. Her role is to provide leadership within HELP to ensure that the research needs of Aboriginal nations and communities are met. She works extensively with the Aboriginal Steering Committee, the HELP-EDI management team and the HELP Leadership Team.

Agata provides support for research and administrative activities to the director, deputy director and researchers of HELP. Agata earned a double BA in Economics and International Relations with a focus on International Organizations at the University of Calgary.  Agata's research interests include health equity, gender relations and community health.

Kim is the project coordinator for the Middle Years Development Instrument (MDI). Kim has an MA in Human Development, Learning, and Culture and wrote her thesis on protective factors during middle childhood and their relation to social and emotional health.

As the Finance Assistant (maternity leave position until 2013), Olga provides financial coordination to almost all members of the HELP staff.

Ryan works as a Cartographer for the ECD mapping unit. Ryan graduated from the University of British Columbia in 2011 with a BA in Geography specialized in Environment & Sustainability, and has a professional background in outdoor education, environmental advocacy and human rights development work. Ryan's interests include the creation of resilient, socially and environmentally sustainable developments and communities, and the integration of global perspectives into local planning and policy.

Emilia provides GIS, cartographic and graphic support to the ECD Mapping Unit. In 2006 Emilia earned a BA in Geography from the University of British Columbia. Emilia's research interests include data visualization, cartographic history and urban geography.

On maternity leave until 2013.

Michele is the Privacy Officer at HELP and also a Senior Manager, Knowledge Management within the Knowledge Translation team at HELP.

As an Information Specialist, she maintains HELP’s data sharing agreements, privacy policies, document archives and databases, and library collection of items related to child development and health. Michele has two Master's degrees, one in Geography and another in Library, Archival and Information Studies. She also teaches and provides information specialist services in environmental health.