Emeritus Board Members

Rizwan Tufail

Rizwan Tufail is one of the most experienced members of the ICL teaching team, having taken Marshall Ganz’s curriculum during a full-semester course while studying for his Master’s degree at Harvard’s Kennedy School in 2012. Rizwan teaches ICL's flagship Building Skills for Change workshop and supports the growth of youth, ECEs, African community leaders, and countless other leaders striving to make change across Canada. His dedication and commitment to ICL come from a genuine love for storytelling and a passion for teaching others the skills they need to make the change they want.

Rizwan is a technological wizard with over 25 years working in the industry. He has worked for industry leaders such as Microsoft and Mozilla and runs a public policy consulting house. The need to fight for technological equity drives him to be a change leader. The vast benefits of technological advancement are not experienced by all segments of the population. In our fast-paced world, while most of us are racing ahead, Rizwan fights for those who are being left behind.

Lyndsay Macdonald

Lyndsay Macdonald is a passionate early childhood educator (ECE) and a full-time professor at Humber College. Mentored by some of Canada's most notable child care advocates, Lyndsay has a deep commitment to a vision of universal, affordable, childcare and professional pay for all early childhood educators. In her spare time, Lyndsay is obsessed with her dog Murray.

William Flores

William first became politically active in 2014. His time on that campaign working under veteran leadership towards a progressive mayor would inspire him to get more involved in his community. After getting his feet wet in the mayoral campaign where he learnt the basic skills of community organizing, William would eventually pursue further training with Project Organize and continue to work with the Spanish-speaking community in Toronto. William looks forward to working with other community organizers to build power in their struggle for social justice. William currently works at For Youth Initiative to empower young people in marginalized neighbourhoods.

Susan Kwong

Susan Kwong knows that communities are stronger when people come together. From collaborating with diverse stakeholders to facilitate lasting success, to working one-on-one with newcomers and marginalized individuals, she is dedicated to helping build Toronto’s communities. Having worked in municipal, provincial and federal constituency offices for over 10 years, Susan organized many issue based campaigns. Throughout Susan’s organizing career, she demonstrated an ability and passion to build partnerships, develop leaders, and take action for social change. With her legendary enthusiasm, Susan has been instrumental in building networks of dedicated volunteers to collaborate with many community development and outreach activities and political campaigns. Susan has a Masters in Social Work, a B.A. (Hons.) in Economics and Labour Studies and a B.A. (Hons.) in Social Work. Susan currently works as the Chief Operating Officer at B Space. In her free time, Susan and her camera can be found capturing the beauty of the Canadian outdoors or 36,000 feet in the air, on her way to a new adventure.

Kathleen Kellett

Kathleen Kellett is Associate-Dean, Undergraduate Studies, in the Faculty of Arts at Ryerson University. A specialist in Franco-Canadian literature, she teaches in the Department of Languages, Literatures and Cultures as well as the Immigration and Settlement Studies program. Her research interests include minority literatures and cultures, popular culture, the impact of the arts on our daily lives.

Amanuel Melles

amanuel melles (aman) is the Executive Director of the Network for Advancement of Black Communities (NABC) at York University and Principal of Aman Consulting. He brings more than 25 years of senior management experience and expertise in settlement and immigration, community health, community development, community peacebuilding, funding and philanthropy. aman held various senior roles with OCASI, Lawrence Heights Community Health Centre, Family Service Toronto and United Way Toronto (UWT). He was on the Senior Management Team at UWT and the Director of Programs and Capacity Building where he led the development of the Organizational Capacity Building Unit and was responsible for leading several innovative and creative capacity building, leadership development, evaluation and granting programs aimed at building non-profit sector capacity. aman is on the Board of Directors of the Social Innovation Institute, InterChange Community-based Peacebuilding Institute, and the Institute for Change Leaders, and chairs the Peace Leadership Member Group at the International Leadership Association. He was appointed by the Mayor of Toronto to the Partnership and Accountability Circle of Toronto’s Confronting Anti-Black Racism Five-Year Plan. As a former marine ecologist, aman often brings ecosystem thinking to his work with organizations and communities. aman is the recipient of the Jane Jacobs Prize, the New Pioneers Award and the African Canadian Leadership Award.

LinkedIn: https://ca.linkedin.com/in/amanuel-melles-a6b8811a

Elizabeth Harvey

Elizabeth Harvey is a passionate and transformative not-for-profit executive dedicated to empowering individuals and groups to affect positive change for themselves, and for and within their communities.

Elizabeth has worked in politics, association management, health care advocacy, health promotion, and most recently as a senior bureaucrat in an Indigenous government.

She has lead teams that championed the passing of Ryan’s Law – ensuring that Ontario schools allow children to carry their asthma rescue inhalers, ran the impactful Driven to Quit Campaign – that engaged tens of thousands of Ontarians to quit smoking for a month (or more) for the chance to win a new car, and built a highly successfully environmental not-for-profit that engaged community members to deliver energy efficient lightbulbs – whilst informing hundreds of thousands of their neighbours across the country and sparking positive behavioural change.

Most recently, she has supported Métis governments at the local level to build capacity to advance self-government, and fostered the government-to-government relationship between the Métis Nation and Canada.

A descendant of settlers, Elizabeth loves to sing in a choir, writes haiku poetry, and is married to a wonderfully supportive husband and the proud mother of two inspiring teenaged daughters.

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Emeritus Board Members

Rizwan Tufail

Lyndsay Macdonald

William Flores

Susan Kwong

Kathleen Kellett

Amanuel Melles

Elizabeth Harvey

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