As the WESTEM program comes to an end, we are excited to welcome Dr. Christy Lane as our final guest for WEcast. Dr. Christy Lane is a Startup Founder and award-winning exercise scientist with expertise in big data, wearable devices, and digital health. She has won many international awards for her work in lifestyle medicine and the application of technology in health.  Dr. Lane is the Chair of Health and Physical Education at Mount Royal University and a founding member of the Stanford Wearable Health Lab. She is also the Founder of Vivametrica, a health tech company that uses data from weara ..read more

Spring has sprung at WEcast! To kick off our Spring 2022 series, we invite Keri Drennan, P.Eng, and founder of Impact Leader to chat with us! Keri is also a business advisor (with the WESTEM program as one example), an entrepreneurial coach and is passionate about engaging and inspiring people to think outside of the box.  She is a professional Engineer with 24 years of progressive leadership experience in business and she will tell you that she owes her success to building relationships and shifting cultures and paradigms. Keri has expertise in integrating cultures through transformative lead ..read more

For our final episode of our Winter Series, we are excited to welcome Carrie Watson and Jennifer Kuntz, who are successful entrepreneurs individually, and have recently joined forces to embark on a new endeavour together. Jennifer Kuntz is the owner of Karuna Counselling Inc. She holds a Masters of Social Work degree with a specialization in clinical practice, and has worked with Alberta Health Services or (AHS) for the past 18 years. Jenn is currently the Trauma and Resilience Project Facilitator for AHS, Addiction and Mental Health Program (Calgary Zone), which provides mental health & ..read more

For our 3rd episode of our 3rd season we are very excited today to welcome Roxanne Doerksen CEO, T.R.A.D Worm Industries LTD. Roxanne grew up a farm girl and has a strong connection with the land therefore protecting the land by keeping compostable refuse out of landfill was a 'no-brainer' for her.  She and her family had an amazingly horrible opportunity presented to them as a family when her daughter was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease. At the time they decided that they could try to figure out a way of doing things better or could drown underneath the weight of her sickness. And t ..read more

In the second episode of our Winter series, we chat with founder and master beekeeper of ABC Bees, Eliese Watson.  Since its founding in 2010 ABC Bees has become the leading beekeeping education company in Canada. Over her career, Eliese has taught beekeeping across North America, been featured in Forbes Magazine, and has represented small scale beekeepers to the Canadian Senate. Eliese has developed strong beginner, intermediate, and advanced beekeeping programming that have been shared with thousands of students. Eliese also teaches small-scale apiary production in a 5-week course onlin ..read more

Welcome to Season 3 of WEcast! We kick off 2022 with Stella Sehn as we discuss social entrepreneurship, facing obstacles head-on and her dedication to the Truth and Reconciliation of Canada’s Calls to Action. Stella is a super-mom of three, and she started the 100 % family owned and operated Bee Farm, “Sweet Pure Honey Bee Farm” from scratch with her husband and partner, Sheldon in 2016.   Together they make Canadian hand crafted, handmade, organic, No. 1 Raw White Honey, Beeswax Candles and lip balms using the abundance of healthy crops and wildflowers which surround their prairie f ..read more

For our last episode before the Christmas break, we invite student entrepreneurs Lisa Marie Swanepoel and Julia St. Amand to talk about how they’re starting their own businesses while enrolled as full-time students. Lisa-Marie was born in South Africa and moved to Canada at the age of 10. Her life-long passion for health and well-being has led her to pursue education in public health. She graduated with a Bachelor’s in Public Health from the University of Lethbridge in 2016 and is currently in the final stages of completing her Master of Science in Health Sciences. Lisa-Marie’s entrepreneurshi ..read more

As we continue with our Fall series, we invite Dr. Mishka Singh to talk about her education, what she’s passionate about and her entrepreneurial journey. Mishka Singh is a South African born family physician who enjoys working with a diverse range of patients within the population she serves.  She graduated in 2010 from the University of KwaZulu Natal, Nelson Mandela School of Medicine in South Africa.  Whilst working in South Africa she worked in trauma, emergency medicine and obstetrics.  She moved to Canada in 2015 and has since completed all of her Canadian licencing exams as well as the e ..read more

Shohreh Roshani was born to an Azerbaijani family in Iran, and Azerbaijani’s language, music and culture are very different from the majority of people in Iran. For the first 5 years of her life she lived in a small town in the Azerbaijan part of Iran, among very high mountains with harsh winters that last 8 months of the year. Shohreh then lived in Tehran from the ages of 5 to 23, and when she was 7 years old Muslim extremists came to power in Iran. Since Shohreh and her family were not Muslim and belonged to the Baha’i Faith, this change of government altered her family’s and her community’s ..read more

Welcome back for the  first episode of our fall series! Our guest this month is the inspirational Vice President of Entrepreneurship and Innovation with Economic Development Lethbridge (EDL), Renae Barlow. Renae joined EDL in January 2010. As a past member of the EDL Board of Directors and the Executive Committee, Renae brings over 30 years of senior management expertise in small business and non-profit management to her role. She has experience launching national new initiatives, project management, strategic planning, organizational development, and motivational team management. Renae i ..read more