Advisory Board

Angela Absalom, RN

Angela Absalom practised nursing from 1969 to 2016, working in the United Kingdom as well as Ontario and British Columbia. For the last twenty years of her career, she worked at the BC Women’s Hospital in Vancouver.

She became a teacher of the Transcendental Meditation technique in 1976 and currently teaches TM in Vancouver. She recently participated in a Canadian Women’s Wellness Initiative project in Moncton, New Brunswick, where twenty-three nursing students and four nursing faculty learned TM as part of a research study.

Dr Catherine Aquino-Russell, RN, BScN, MN, PhD

Dr Catherine Aquino-Russell received her BScN from Lakehead University, Thunder Bay, Ontario; a critical care nursing certificate from the Health Sciences Centre, Winnipeg, Manitoba; a Master’s degree in Nursing from the University of Manitoba, Winnipeg; and a PhD in Nursing from Curtin University, Perth, Western Australia. She has held numerous education, leadership, and administrative positions in hospitals and universities in Canada. She presently holds the position of Professor and past BN Program Director, Faculty of Nursing, University of New Brunswick, Moncton Campus.

Carol Bellringer, CPA, CA, FCA

Carol Bellringer is the former Auditor General for the Province of British Columbia and former Auditor General for the Province of Manitoba.

A Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA), Ms Bellringer holds a Bachelor of Commerce from Concordia University, Montreal, and an MBA from the Warsaw School of Economics/Université du Québec à Montréal. She was named a Fellow of the Chartered Accountants of Manitoba in 2006, and in B.C. in 2015, in recognition of her contributions to the community and the profession.

In addition to her professional experience, Ms Bellringer has held several board positions for businesses, charities, and arts organizations. She currently serves on the board of the International Federation of Accountants and is a member of the Auditing and Assurance Standards Oversight Council. She is a past board member of the Manitoba Chapter of the Institute of Corporate Directors, the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, Manitoba Hydro, the Canadian Auditing and Assurance Standards Board, and CCAF-FCVI Inc.

Linda Cloutier, BA, MA

Linda Cloutier is a certified teacher of the Transcendental Meditation technique in British Columbia. Before becoming a TM teacher she worked for 20 years in the areas of program management, planning and analysis with the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), an organization that administered Canadian foreign aid programs in developing countries.

Rhonda Day, BA, BEd

Rhonda Day is a retired school teacher with over 30 years of experience as a public high school English and Drama teacher and 43 years of experience as a teacher of Transcendental Meditation. She is a three-time nominee for Alberta’s Excellence in Teaching award. Currently Rhonda teaches Transcendental Meditation to the general public and is an advisor on the teaching of Transcendental Meditation at the high school where she formerly taught.

Debbie Lawless, RPN

Deborah Lawless first trained to be a nurse’s aide and then began working in geriatrics, with a focus on dementia care, working in the field for 20 years. She then completed a three-year diploma in psychiatric nursing and now works in that area.

As a psychiatric nurse, she has the responsibility of advocating for the individual to ensure the person’s choices are recognized, communicated and promoted, and that the rights of the individual are upheld. Her experience in mental health and addictions ranges from eating disorders to geriatrics, forensics and tertiary mental health.

Lorraine Mock, CCC

Lorraine Mock is a member of the Respect Group Inc. team, an organization that creates online education programs on anti-bullying, abuse, harassment and discrimination. She volunteers with the Canadian Mental Health Association, facilitating bi-monthly mental health resilience support groups. She is also a volunteer with Emergency Social Services where she has been trained to prepare for any tragedy that displaces people in the community. Her latest endeavour is volunteering with Covenant House, an organization that supports homeless youth in Vancouver.

Maria Perri, RN

Maria Perri started working as a registered nurse in 1994 at Vancouver General Hospital, first on a general surgical unit for two years and subsequently on a reconstructive orthopaedics unit for 16 years. She is now a case manager with a geriatric psychiatry outreach team.

Dr Ann Royer, BA, MA, PhD

Dr Royer recently retired from the Quebec Regional Public Health Agency and the Centre for Research on Primary Care and Services at Université Laval. She remains associated with the Faculty of Medicine of Université Laval as a clinical lecturer in the Addictions Certificate Program.

Dr Royer was involved with the evaluation of public health intervention programs, including tobacco-related interventions and preventive clinical practices, and the assessment of partnerships and mobilizations around healthy lifestyles. As well, she oversaw the research of graduate students interested in tobacco control and the evaluation of public health interventions.

For a number of years, Dr Royer was a member of the Board of Directors of the Canadian Council on Tobacco Control, the advisory committee of the Quebec Survey on Tobacco, Alcohol, Drugs and Gambling among Secondary School Students and reviewer for the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Canada’s federal funding agency for health research.

Ami Stadnick, BA, MSc, R. Psych

Ami Stadnick received an MSc in Marriage and Family Therapy from Loma Linda University. She worked for many years as founding Director of Family and Community Support Services for the town of Hinton, Alberta. From 2001 to 2015 she was Counselling Supervisor for Alberta Health Services, Adult Outpatient Addiction & Mental Health Treatment Program. She also fulfilled requirements for obtaining her psychologist’s license by interning at the Red Deer Hospital Psychiatric Department, and the Alberta (Psychiatric) Hospital in Edmonton.

She is now retired from counselling and teaches the Transcendental Meditation program full time in Edmonton and northern Alberta.

Les Sylven, BA, MA, PhD candidate

Les Sylven is Deputy Director of Police Services, Policing and Security Branch, Province of British Columbia and Former Police Chief for the Central Saanich Police Service. He has over 29 years of operational policing and leadership experience. Les began his career with the RCMP in 1988 but the majority of his career has been spent as a police officer in Victoria, Esquimalt, and Central Saanich, British Columbia. In 1996, he joined the Victoria police department where he served as officer in charge of the West division and rose in the ranks to become Inspector, heading the Human Resources Department. Prior to being promoted to Chief, he was Deputy Chief in Central Saanich from 2011 to 2015.

Highlights in his career have included Major Crime Investigations, Critical Incident Command, Emergency Response Team, Media Relations, Human Resources and Youth and School Liaison Programs.

Chief Sylven has completed his Masters Degree in Leadership Studies at Royal Roads University and is currently working on a PhD at the University of Victoria where he is researching contemplative practices in police leadership.

Kathleen Thomson, Constable (retired), Saanich Police Department

Kathleen’s first career was in broadcast journalism, where she worked at numerous radio and TV stations in British Columbia. During her time at Q Radio in Victoria, Kathleen was one of the media cyclists on the Cops for Cancer Tour de Rock cycling team in 2002. Being a member of the team and getting to know many officers helped fuel Kathleen’s interest in policing.

After training at the Justice Institute in New Westminster, Kathleen was hired by the Saanich Police Department in 2003. During her 11 years as a police officer Kathleen worked in General Patrol, on the Mountain Bike Squad and in the Detective Office.

In her retirement, Kathleen enjoys volunteering at Our Place, an outreach shelter in downtown Victoria.