Chris Beaudry
“The Heroes and Dragons of Mental Health”
Chris Beaudry was born in Edmonton, Alberta and raised in Calgary, Alberta and St. Front, Saskatchewan. He’s a father of 3 young girls, husband to his wife Richelle, and a 4th generation farmer. Chris was an assistant coach with the 2017/18 Humboldt Broncos, who were tragically involved in the bus crash that killed 16 players and staff. Since then, Chris has been heavily involved in the field of mental health and healing. He has trained under Dr. Gabor Mate, Don Miguel Ruiz, Lama Sonia Potie, and many others.
Dr. Jan DeFehr
“Mending Psychiatric Divisions, Crafting a Liberatory Ethic of Care“
Dr. Jan DeFehr is an associate professor in the faculty of education at the University of Winnipeg. A strong supporter of anti-oppressive, peer-led, care-based communities, Dr. DeFehr has worked as a publicly funded social worker/counsellor for twenty years in settings ranging from “youth corrections,” community health centre programs, hospital, and university student counselling services. She is an associate of The Taos Institute and has regularly written and presented with colleagues at the Kanankil Institute (Mérida, México) since 2004.
Dr. DeFehr’s teaching and research forges generative connections between professional ethics standards, anticolonial liberation movements, and critical scholarship in the field of mental health. Promoting informed choice rather than implied consent practices and policies, her work aims to build public access to the extensive body of peer-reviewed critical mental health scholarship that is omitted from mental health promotion campaigns and curricula. Dr. DeFehr holds an MSW from the University of Manitoba and PhD in Social and Behavioural Sciences from Tilburg University, the Netherlands.
Sera Davidow
“Mental Health through a Harm Reduction Lens”
Sera Davidow is a filmmaker, author, activist and mother of two. As a survivor of physical, sexual, and emotional abuse, she has faced many challenges throughout her own healing process. At present, she spends much of her time serving as Director of the Wildflower Alliance, a peer-to-peer support and training organization. Wildflower has received international recognition including in 2021 by the World Health Organization for providing exemplary, rights-based crisis alternatives. Learn more about Sera and her work in the 2018 Sun Magazine article, ‘An Open Mind’: https://tinyurl.com/OpenMindSD