Our Team

As a storyteller, social entrepreneur and compassionate communicator, Kim has spent 15 years in the USA working with a diverse group of nonprofits leading social change initiatives. She has worked with urban, rural, inner-city and First Nations communities and has presented at numerous conferences.

She has facilitated innovative, arts- and adventure-based programs throughout the Pacific Northwest that focus on bullying prevention, community engagement & wellness, peace building, restorative practices, and using philanthropy to inspire social change.

The recipe for her program success is the implementation of Speaking Circles and inviting the disenfranchised to become part of the conversation. The results have proven that when youth and other minority groups are empowered and invited to the round table, they demonstrate their leadership ability, vision and capacity to become change makers. In 2010, Kim presented her story and the outcomes of her Speaking Circles at the World Conference on Restorative Practices in England.

Kim  is is the founder of Hope Rocks and Through the Lens, producing digital life stories for people and organizations.  She is also  the Program Manager and Digital Media Producer for National Education Consulting Inc. (NECI)

Dr. Robin June Hood is a cultural geographer, educator, filmmaker and activist/scholar. She worked for several years in Latin America supporting Mayan efforts to strengthen indigenous education and peace. During the past 30 years she has focused on supporting endangered peoples and landscapes, and creating strategies for educational renewal. Robin completed a post doctorate position at the University of Victoria on cultural keystone species research using digital storytelling. She was the co founder of the Global Village Store, Youth Speaks, the Gaia Project, Gumboot Productions and she was on the Rainforest Solutions team that crafted the globally significant, Great Bear Rainforest agreement. Her recent book, For the Love of Nature: Solutions for Biodiversity co authoured with Briony Penn was published in 2010.

I see Earth and Spirit as aligned with my lifelong interest in intercultural and intergenerational approaches to human and ecological well-being through the re-vitalization of indigenous worldviews. I am currently engaged in action research on cultural revitalization initiatives in Canada as well as regenerative and integral approaches to community development. I recently collaborated with Integral International on a Resilience Study on Climate Change in El Salvador and believe this community based work is part of what Joanna Macy calls “the great work” of our times. – Dr. Robin June Hood

A biography of life’s canoe journey 

Alice’s canoe journey of life began during lakeside explorations with her grandmother, and today, she follows in the footprints of her passionate, eco-minded parents. With a background in theoretical linguistics, Alice has canoed with First Nations communities engaged in celebratory language resurgence projects. This enthusiasm about Indigenous world views and educational styles has brought her to the west coast, as she learns how ancient, earth-healing wisdoms live on in local Coast Salish Elders. Alice is a doctoral candidate in the Language and Literacies Education program at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto.

Alice has a keen interest in land-based Indigenous language education strategies, and is honoured to join the CES team as they approach exciting interdisciplinary topics involving spirituality, experiential learning, and self-development related to (re)connecting with the natural world.

I have always been passionate and committed to social change, seeking ways to work that are holistic, integrated, and seek to understand root causes.  I have a background in holistic health and an interest in spiritual activism, reflective practices for practitioners and social change agents, and community-based mind / body / spirt wellness practices.

I have been working for several years on the coast supporting First Nations communities to assume their rights and responsibilities to determine what happens on their territories through Coastal Stewardship Network.  I am currently enrolled in the Community Health Promotion for Aboriginal Communities program at Vancouver Island University in an effort to integrate my holistic health studies in continued support of First Nations’ health and well-being.

Grant hails from England, Norway and Southern Bohemia. Most of his life he has been in office work, auditing and dealing with financial accounting matters. He has a deep interest in writing, journaling and exploring part-time work opportunities that pique his interest.

Grant was a member of the Well Foundation, which joined forces with Centre for Earth and Spirit, and is exploring, with others, how we can change and adapt our old world consciousness and ways of thinking into a new, higher awareness and mindfulness that is more relevant and more vital to the ‘New Story’ that is evolving.

Michael is a retired psychotherapist who lives in Sooke with his wife Beverley. He is strongly committed to finding ways to meet the challenges of a rapidly changing world in a positive and constructive way through his work as the Program Director for the Well Foundation, his role in the Sooke Transition Initiative, and his work as a facilitator with the Pachamama Alliance.

Michael sees that the issues of resilience and sustainability are key factors in shaping effective responses to current and future challenges facing our societies. At the same time, Michael senses that bringing together the cosmology offered by modern science with the ancient sources of wisdom is essential for the renewal of our civilization.

It’s true to say that Val has 31 years of teaching at the elementary and university levels in B.C. She is a wife of 36 years, the mother of one son, a happy resident of Cordova Bay, an avid reader and sometimes writer. Since retiring in 1996, she has honed a dedication to the Way of Council as a life practice and to developing intergenerational programs that have reciprocal mentorship at their heart. She is an early elder who strongly believes that the personal narrative speaks to universal truths about the human experience.

It is also true to say that Val was born to the giant cedars, ocean and mountains of Stanley Park and that she feels a kinship to all beings. Her passion for animals and their well-being is an enduring thread through her life journey. She is drawn to connect with new ideas that hide just below the surface of ordinary consciousness and to manifest visions that have not been seen before. She is a pathfinder who loves the elegance of language that gets right to the heart of the matter. Helping others see their own uniqueness gives her great joy. Retirement years have brought her in touch with her true essence, often rubbing elbows with instructive shadow beings in the process.

Daily, she listens for teachings of the Earth to speak through her intelligence, deepening her awareness, as Bill Plotkin says, “of being indigenous to Earth and thoroughly rooted in the land”.

Bev is a retired Administrative Assistant and Program Coordinator of the Faculty of Continuing Education, The University of Calgary. Over the last eight years of her career, before retirement, she worked closely with the Associate Dean in several areas including adult education programs, The Certificate in Adult and Continuing Education (CACE) and the Masters of Continuing Education.

Prior to working at The University of Calgary, Bev was employed by School District #18 Golden, BC and subsequently Strathcona-Tweedsmuir, a private school near Calgary.

Since moving to Sooke with her husband Michael she was involved with the Well Foundation, The Sooke Food CHI, Sooke Garden Club and was the Secretary for the Centre for Earth and Spirit Society.