Our Board & Advisors

Chair

John Valk has a Ph.D. in Religious Studies (University of Toronto) and is Professor of Worldview Studies at the University of New Brunswick (Canada). His teaching, research and writing focuses on worldviews.  He has presented academic papers at numerous national and international conferences, has published two books, and written book chapters as well as articles in various international academic journals.  He is also a Visiting Lecturer at the Protestant University Darmstadt (Germany), University of Heidelberg and the University of Zurich.  He is an International Advisory Board Member of the British Journal of Religious Education and of the Europäisches Institut für interculturelle und interreligiöse Forschung (Heidelberg, Germany).

Vice Chair

Rabbi Ellen Greenspan served as the Rabbi-Educator at Temple Emanu-El-Beth Sholom from August 2014 to June 2022. She moved to Montreal from New Jersey, and is excited to remain in Montreal to pursue various interests, including serving on the CCRL board, maintaining her involvement in interfaith activities, and studying French. Rabbi Greenspan is a Reform Rabbi, Judaism’s most liberal movement. She is passionate about helping people explore their spiritual and religious identities. She was ordained at the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR), in New York. She received two Masters Degrees from HUC-JIR in Los Angeles: a Masters of Hebrew Letters and a Masters in Jewish Education. She served as a rabbi and in other educational and community building capacities for many years in New Jersey.

Ehaab D. Abdou is Assistant Professor in the Department of Global Studies, Wilfrid Laurier University. His research aims at rendering K-12 school curricular representations and classroom practices more holistic and inclusive, especially of historically and systematically marginalized perspectives, historical narratives, wisdom traditions, and epistemologies. He explores how students’ interactions with curricular and extracurricular historical representations shape their historical consciousness and civic engagement, especially in Egypt and Canada.

Previously, Ehaab worked with the International Development Research Centre (Canada’s IDRC) in Cairo, the Brookings Institution, the World Bank Institute in Washington, DC., and was the co-founder of the Nahdet El Mahrousa NGO in Egypt.

Kunle Akingbola is Associate Professor of Human Resource Management & Organizational Behaviour in the Faculty of Business Administration at Lakehead University. He is interested in the complex interactions in the environment that influence strategic change and human resource management in nonprofit and healthcare organizations. He is the author of Change Management in Nonprofit Organizations: Theory and Practice and Managing Human Resources for Nonprofits. He is on the board of directors of Association for Nonprofit & Social Economy Research, and two community organizations, and established and facilitates the HR Nonprofit Network.

Akaash Maharaj is Ambassador-at-Large for the Global Organization of Parliamentarians Against Corruption (GOPAC), a Director of Nature Canada, and is a Supporter Class Member of the Canadian Olympic Committee. In the past, the United Nations Committee of Experts on Public Administration selected him to speak for the world’s legislators in the General Assembly Chamber on bringing kleptocrats to justice. He obtained his MA from Oxford University in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics, and was the first overseas student elected President of the student government in the history of the 900-year-old university. In Canada, contributes to various groups, including the Canadian Interfaith Conversation (CIC).

Patricia Bell is a retired journalist and journalism professor with a keen interest in people, their lives and beliefs. She graduated from the University of Western Ontario in 1963  and spent more than 35 years in the field  (including seven years in India and Southeast Asia) before moving to Saskatchewan in 1999 to teach at the University of Regina.   

She is an active member of Intercultural Grandmothers Uniting, founded in 1993 to build bridges of understanding and friendship between First Nations and non-First Nations women. The group has been practicing truth and reconciliation for decades and now provides a welcoming setting for new arrivals from other countries to learn about Canada’s native people and to share stories of their own.  

Cathy is grateful to respectfully acknowledge she lives on the traditional unceded, unrelinquished land of the kʷikʷəƛ̓əm (Kwikwetlem) First Nation, which is now known as Coquitlam, BC.  

Cathy has worked in the nonprofit sector her whole career and the community living field for over 40 years in Metro Vancouver.  She has worked at Kinsight for 32 years, in various roles, and for the last 8 years as the Community Engagement Coordinator. 

Her passion and life work is not only professional but also personal having lived experience as a parent of a son with disabilities.  She is also an avid volunteer, with experience on various Boards and initiatives that work to advance opportunities and rights for and with people with disabilities and their families.  She has a deep interest in inclusion, equity and intersectionality. Cathy recently worked with Alice and Margie on CCRL’s BC-based project about spirituality among adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities.  On a personal note, Cathy loves to be out in nature, gardening, and to travel and meet and learn from people from many different cultures.  

Robert Jackson is Emeritus Professor in Religions and Education at the University of Warwick, UK, and a Visiting Professor at Stockholm University. He has contributed to the educational work of the Council of Europe since 2002 including writing Signposts (Council of Europe Publishing 2014) His book Religious Education for Plural Societies: The Selected Works of Robert Jackson, is about to be published by Routledge. In 2017, he was awarded honorary doctorates by NTNU, Trondheim and the Norwegian School of Theology, Oslo.

Uzma Majeed joins the CCRL with over 25 years of multi-faceted experience in administration, management and service acquired from working in various disciplines and environments within the public, private and academic sectors. She is currently a Research Administrator at McGill University’s Desautels Faculty of Management where she provides support to faculty members by facilitating and propelling the researchers’ funding through varying initiatives and enhancing the presence of faculty researchers  locally, nationally and internationally. Uzma is passionate about initiatives that aim to advance knowledge, understanding, and well-being. She is grateful to be able to support these initiatives through service in both her professional and personal life. Previously, she was the CCRL Board Secretary. She transitioned in the advisory role in 2023.

Previous CCRL Advisor (2018-2022)

Dr. Stonechild is a member of the Muscowpetung Saulteaux First Nation. He attended Qu’Appelle Indian Residential School and Campion Collegiate then went on to obtain his Bachelor’s degree from McGill, and Master’s and Doctorate degrees from University of Regina. In 1976 Blair joined the First Nations University of Canada as its first faculty member.  He has been Dean of Academics and Executive Director of Development responsible for construction of the university’s facility. Major publications include Loyal Till Death: Indians and the North-West Rebellion,(1997) a history book which won national attention; The New Buffalo: Aboriginal Post-secondary Policy in Canada (2006) a study of Canadian Indigenous higher education policy; and the biography Buffy Sainte-Marie: It’s My Way on the life of the internationally renowned singer which has received awards and his latest work The Knowledge Seeker: Embracing Indigenous Spirituality which relates the teachings of Indigenous Elders is published by the University of Regina Press in 2016. Blair resides in Regina with his wife and 3 adult children.

Previous Chair of the Board (2018-2023)

Shauna Van Praagh is a Professor of Law at McGill University, where she has taught and researched since 1993, and served as Associate Dean, Graduate Studies in Law, from 2007 to 2010. A graduate of University of Toronto (BSc 1986, LLB 1989) and Columbia University (LLM 1992, JSD 2000), she clerked for Chief Justice of Canada Brian Dickson in 1989-1990. Her areas of research and expertise include religion and law, children and law, and legal education. In 2017, she received the One World Award from Montreal’s Temple Emanu-El-Beth Sholom in recognition of her contributions to community and outreach.

Previous Interim Chair of the Board (2023), Board member (2018-2023)

Siebren Miedema is Emeritus Professor in Religious Education in the Faculty of Theology and Religion and Emeritus Professor in Educational Foundations in the Faculty of Behavioural and Movement Sciences at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, the Netherlands. He has published numerous books, chapters and articles both in academic and professional journals and newspaper articles and gave numerous lectures all over the globe. His main research topics are: personhood formation from an inter-worldview perspective; the interrelated positioning of worldview education in the public, the social and the private domain, and the concept of worldview citizenship education within liberal-democratic societies.

Previous Board member (2023)

Dwight Newman, KC (King’s Counsel) is Professor of Law and Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Rights in Constitutional and International Law at the University of Saskatchewan (2013-2023), where he has been on faculty since 2005 and has previously served a three-year term as Associate Dean. He holds a BA in Economics (Regina 1996), JD (Saskatchewan 1999), MSc in Finance and Financial Law (SOAS/London 2021), and BCL, MPhil, and DPhil in Philosophy of Law (Oxford 2002/03/05), and he recently completed an MATS in History of Christianity (Regent College 2022). He writes on areas that include constitutional law, domestic and international Indigenous rights law, and law and religion.

Arlene Hache, C.M. MA, is a grassroots activist leader, published author, and researcher with a focus on personal empowerment and community development. Informed by her experience with homelessness and traumatic impacts of childhood violence, she founded and led the Centre for Northern Families, an urban-based family resource centre that provided support to marginalized women and their families, the majority of which were Indigenous. Because of her leadership in that capacity for over three decades, and other community engagements, she is well-known across Canada’s Arctic as an advocate for social change. In recognition of her work, she was awarded the Order of Canada in 2009 and then the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal in 2012. Of equal importance, Arlene was honoured with a Star Blanket ceremony guided by Wisdom Keepers and hosted by Keepers of the Circle, an Indigenous Hub in Northeastern Ontario. She currently sits as the Co-Chair of the Women’s National Housing and Homelessness Network.