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Our Team

RESEARCH

Shane Sweet - McGill University

Shane’s research aims to understand and promote participation and well-being among people with physical disability by co-constructing and co-disseminating the research with the community. He achieves these goals by applying, testing and integrating theory, and developing conceptual models across two steams: Peer support and physical activity.

Phone: (514) 398-4184 x09903
Fax: 514-398-4186

Email: shanesweet [at] mcgill.ca

Heather Gainforth - University of British Colombia

Using integrated knowledge translation, Heather’s research aims to identify, develop and implement novel strategies to build strong collaborations between researchers and communities. Her research also aims to close the gap between health behaviour change and practice by getting research evidence into the hands of research users.

Kathleen Martin Ginis - University of British Colombia

Kathleen’s research program focuses on physical activity participation in community-dwelling people living with spinal cord injury. In particular, she is interested in how we can use principles. Kathleen works closely with numerous community-based organizations on research and knowledge translation projects to advance physical activity and other types of social participation among Canadians with disabilities.

Lee Schaefer – University of Saskatchewan

Lee’s research is focused on teacher education, specifically, physical education teacher education, youth development through wellness and physical activity, the impact of the outdoors on youth physical activity levels. He uses novel qualitative methodologies such as narrative inquiry to explore physical and health education research.

Vanessa Noonan – Praxis Spinal Cord Institute, Director, Research & Best Practice Implementation

Using her physical therapist experience, Vanessa practices in, and researches, aspects of spinal cord injury, in both acute and rehabilitation settings. She has been responsible for both leading translational research and best practice implementation at the Praxis Spinal Cord Institute.

Jordan Herbison - Vancouver Island University

Jordan's research focuses on how group dynamics shapes opportunities and experiences in rehabilitation, sport, and exercise. In the peer mentorship context, Jordan is examining how mentors' interpersonal experiences with their organization and mentees affects their well-being. Jordan is a professor in the Faculty of Education at Vancouver Island University.

Rob Shaw – University of British Colombia

Rob’s research focuses on ‘deconstructing’ the peer support experience for people with spinal cord injury to better understand how specific elements of peer support contribute to its effectiveness. For his Postdoctoral work Rob is aiding in the development of a toolkit that will guide organizations in the implementation of a new evaluation tool that will examine the impact of their peer support services.

COMMUNITY PARTNERS

Haley Flaro – Ability New Brunswick Inc. Executive Director

Haley is the passionate executive director of Ability NB with over 20 years of experience in the non-profit sector specifically with health and disability sector organizations. She is a community developer who believes non-profit organizations must actively engage in both direct service delivery and public policy development to impact change.

Launel Scott - SCI Saskatchewan

I began my professional career as a Registered Nurse, and in 1985 I joined the Canadian Paraplegic Association Saskatchewan as a Rehabilitation Counsellor. After varied roles in various health-related organizations, in 2017 I accepted the Executive Director position with Spinal Cord Injury Saskatchewan, thus making a full circle in my career journey. We revamped the way we work with our clientele, specifically to an “holistic approach”. Additional priorities included improving our peer initiatives reborn as the “Peer Mentorship Network” (PMN), SC Saskatchewan recruiting, training and certifying peer mentors from across Saskatchewan.

Christopher McBride - Spinal Cord Injury BC, Executive Director

With over 20 years experience as a spinal cord injury researcher, research centre executive, volunteer, and now community service leader in the spinal cord injury sector, Chris has a passion for making a difference for people with spinal cord injury, their families and those with related disabilities throughout BC.

Jocelyn Maffin - Spinal Cord Injury BC, Associate Director Service Delivery

Jocelyn has been involved in several roles using her vast experience working to help those with a SCI, particularly in the areas of peer support and information sharing. In her current role at SCI BC, Jocelyn helps create innovative communities of support to help people with SCI and their families adjust, adapt, and thrive. Growing up with paralysis, Jocelyn thrived because of the peer support she had through parasport, and enjoys contributing to the development of peer support opportunities for others.

TRAINEES

Zhiyang (George) Shi– McGill University

Zhiyang completed his undergraduate study majoring in Sports Rehabilitation at Tianjin Medical University (China). Throughout his study, he became strongly interested in people living with mobility impairments partaking in physical activities and exercise. He is working to publish his study looking at Peer Mentoring effects, and completing his PhD under Shane’s guidance, in the area of developing Peer Mentor Programs.

Olivia Pastore- McGill University

Olivia’s research looks at 1) understanding the psychological processes that lead to compassion fatigue among peer mentors with spinal cord injury (SCI) and 2) co-developing and implementing a self-compassion program to reduce compassion fatigue and enhance well-being among SCI peer mentors.

Lily White- McGill University

Lily is doing her Master's program at the Theories and Intervention in Exercise and Health Psychology lab. Her research seeks to support the implementation of the SCI peer support evaluation tool within Canadian provincial community organizations.