Michele Lemonius is responsible for business development, including research and project development, and building partnerships. She holds an MA in Conflict Analysis and Management from Royal Roads University, an MA in Adult Education from St. Francis Xavier University and is currently completing a Ph.D. in Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Manitoba.
As a researcher, educator and peace activist, she continues to facilitate a process that encourages creating spaces for dialogue, and self-discovery; that embraces all experiences as integral parts of one whole; that allows each human contact to be an experience of critical reflection where meaning is challenged in an effort to provide personal and professional growth.
Michele has worked in the social service sector from the front line to Director of Programs for over 15 years, addressing homelessness, domestic violence and the creation of solution-focused community programs in Toronto, Peel Region and Waterloo Region. As a trained mediator, she has facilitated organizational mediations, and community mediations while volunteering with St. Stephen’s Conflict Resolution Team. Michele has exercised her philosophy as an educator inside the classroom, where she promoted inclusivity in the classroom environment, encouraging and motivating students to reach beyond the boundaries of their experiences to embrace differences.
Michele was born in Jamaica and immigrated to Canada over 30 years ago and has strong ties to the Jamaican diaspora in Toronto where she spent most of her life. She has conducted qualitative, multi method research in organization and community, specific to the causes of conflict in the workplace, and the experiences of Jamaican immigrant women in Canada.