Brian Rosenberg

Visiting Professor, Harvard Graduate School of Education

Brian Rosenberg is currently visiting professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. From 2003 until 2020, he served as the 16th president of Macalester College. He is the author of ”Whatever It Is, I’m Against It:  Resistance to Change in Higher Education,” published in 2023 by Harvard Education Press. His articles on higher education appear regularly in The Chronicle of Higher Education and have also appeared in publications including The New York Times, The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times. He serves as Senior Advisor and Director at the African Leadership University and as a member of the board of the Teagle Foundation. 

Rosenberg received his BA from Cornell University and his PhD in English from Columbia University. Prior to arriving at Macalester, he served as dean of the faculty at Lawrence University and as professor and chair of the English Department at Allegheny College. He is the author of two books and many articles on Victorian literature.

Cindy Forbes

Member, Ontario Blue-Ribbon Panel on Postsecondary Education Financial Sustainability

Cindy Forbes has been a Corporate Director since 2020. Prior to that time, she served as Global Chief Marketing and Chief Analytics Officer of Manulife Financial after serving as Global Chief Actuary for six years and Chief Financial Officer, Asia for the prior five years.

Cindy Forbes currently serves on the boards and as Audit Committee Chair of Greenshield Insurance Canada and Munich Re of Canada. She is a past Board member of Risk Committee Chair of Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan and Prosperity Group Holdings. She was Chair of the University of Waterloo Board of Governors from 2016-2022 and served as a member of Ontario’s 2023 Blue-Ribbon Panel on the Financial Sustainability of Ontario’s Post-Secondary Education Sector.

Ms. Forbes is a Fellow of the Canadian Institute of Actuaries and the Society of Actuaries and holds an Honours Bachelor of Mathematics and an Honourary Doctor of Mathematics from the University of Waterloo.

Ms. Forbes was named one of Canada’s Most Powerful Women by the Women’s Executive Network in 2011 and again in 2015.

Don Avison

Chair, BC Post-Secondary Institution Sustainability Panel

D.J. Avison, KC is the past CEO and Executive Director of the Law Society of British Columbia and has held senior public service roles across Canada, including Deputy Minister of Justice for the Northwest Territories and Deputy Minister of Education/Advanced Education in B.C. He led the University Presidents’ Council and its successor, the Research Universities Council of B.C. He has received numerous honours, including the Queen’s Golden Jubilee Medal, the BC Net Lifetime Achievement Award and recognition from the First Nations Education Steering Committee for his contributions to First Nations Education. He was recognized as a Distinguished Alumni of Thompson Rivers University and received a Leadership Award from Life Sciences in British Columbia. Don has served on several boards, including the Foundation for the Centre of Disease Control, the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research, the Centre for Drug Research and Development and the B.C. Oil and Gas Commission.

Joseph Wong

Vice-President, International, University of Toronto

Professor Joseph Wong was appointed the University of Toronto’s Vice-President, International on April 6, 2021 for a five-year term, after serving as interim Vice-President effective July 1, 2020. In his previous role as the University’s first-ever Associate Vice-President and Vice-Provost, International Student Experience, Joe opened up new avenues to international learning opportunities for U of T students.

Joe is currently a professor in the department of Political Science as well as in the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy in the Faculty of Arts and Science. Joe previously held the Roz and Ralph Halbert Professorship of Innovation at the Munk School from 2013 to 2023, as well as the Canada Research Chair in Health, Democracy, and Development for two full terms, 2006 to 2016. He was the Director of the Asian Institute at the Munk School from 2005 to 2014.

Joe is the author of many academic articles and several books, including Healthy Democracies: Welfare Politics in Taiwan and South Korea (2004) and Betting on Biotech: Innovation and the Limits of Asia’s Developmental State (2011), both published by Cornell University Press. Most recently (2022), he and Dan Slater published From Development to Democracy: the Transformations of Modern Asia, with Princeton University Press. Joe is the co-editor, with Edward Friedman, of Political Transitions in Dominant Party Systems: Learning to Lose (2006), published by Routledge, and co-edited with Dilip Soman and Janice Stein Innovating for the Global South (2013) with the University of Toronto Press. Joe’s articles have appeared in journals such as the Lancet, the Annual Review of Political Science, Bulletin of the World Health Organization, Perspectives on Politics, Comparative Political Studies, Politics and Society, and Governance, among many others.

Joe has been a visiting scholar at Harvard, Oxford, and other institutions in the US, Asia, and the UK. He has worked with international organizations and governments in Asia, Africa, the Americas, and Europe. Joe’s current research focuses on poverty and innovation. Joe founded the Reach Alliance at the Munk School of Global Affairs. Inspired by the UN Sustainable Development Goals, Reach is a research-intensive initiative involving both faculty and students, which examines how development interventions reach the “hardest to reach” populations around the world. The Reach Alliance recently scaled globally, including partnerships with universities in South Africa, Ghana, the UK, Singapore, Australia and Mexico.

Joe teaches courses in the Department of Political Science, the Munk One program, and the Munk School of Global Affairs. Through his engagement with the Asian Institute and as the Co-Founder of the Global Ideas Institute, Joe works with students from select Toronto-area high schools to provide intensive research and mentoring opportunities. Students are encouraged to learn about the world, to think in a global context, and are given opportunities to tackle global challenges. Nominated by his students, Joe was the recipient of the Faculty of Arts & Science Outstanding Teaching Awards in 2012-2013.

Joe received a B.A. (Hons.) in Political Science from McGill University in 1995, and an M.A. and Ph.D. in Political Science, in 1996 and 2001, from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Stephen Lucas

Chief Executive Officer, Mitacs

Dr. Stephen Lucas was appointed CEO of Mitacs in October 2024.

He is an accomplished public policy leader with more than 35 years of experience with the Government of Canada, including 10 years as a Deputy Minister. He served as Deputy Minister of Health Canada from 2019-24, and was previously Deputy Minister of Environment and Climate Change and Deputy Secretary of Plans, Consultations and Intergovernmental Affairs at the Privy Council Office (PCO). Prior to that, he was Assistant Secretary for Economic and Regional Development Policy at PCO and Assistant Deputy Minister for Science and Policy and for Minerals and Metals at Natural Resources Canada. Dr. Lucas started his career as a research scientist at the Geological Survey of Canada.

Dr. Lucas has a Bachelor of Science with Honours in Geological Engineering from Queen’s University, and a PhD from Brown University in structural geology and tectonics.

In 2025, Dr. Lucas was appointed as a Member of the Order of Canada and received the Vanier Medal of the Institute of Public Administration of Canada for his public service contributions and leadership, including during the COVID-19 pandemic. He is a recipient of the King Charles III Coronation Medal, Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal, and Queen’s University 125th Award for Engineering Excellence and Gold Medal in Geological Engineering.

Weldon Epp

Assistant Deputy Minister (Indo-Pacific), Government of Canada

Weldon was appointed Assistant Deputy Minister (then-Asia Branch) on January 16, 2023.

Prior to his appointment, from 2019 to 2023, Weldon was the Director General of the Northeast Asia Bureau at Global Affairs Canada. After joining the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade in 1996 as a Foreign Service officer, he served in the China and Mongolia Division, Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs Division, and Assignments Division.

Abroad, he served in Beijing as second secretary and vice-consul, in Taipei as director of general relations, and in Jakarta as political counsellor for relations with Indonesia, Timor leste and ASEAN Secretariat. He was the director of the Policy Research Division at Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada, and most recently served as Consul General in Guangzhou and Shanghai.

Jennifer Ditchburn

President and CEO, Institute for Research on Public Policy

Jennifer Ditchburn is the President and CEO of the Institute for Research on Public Policy. She is a not-for-profit sector executive and seasoned communicator working to make complex public policy issues and politics better understood by Canadians. From 2016 to 2021, she was the Editor-in-Chief of the IRPP’s influential digital magazine, Policy Options.

Prior to joining the IRPP, Jennifer spent two decades covering national and parliamentary affairs for The Canadian Press and for CBC Television. She is the winner of three National Newspaper Awards, the recipient of the prestigious Charles Lynch Award for outstanding coverage of national issues, and three Canadian Online Publishing silver awards for her columns. In 2015, she was named one of the 10 most influential Hispanic–Canadians. Jennifer sits on the board of the Banff Forum, an influential Canadian leadership network. She is also a fellow at Carleton University’s Political Management program, and an inductee in the Hall of Distinction at CEGEP John Abbott College.

Jennifer is the co-editor with Graham Fox of the 2016 book The Harper Factor: Assessing a Prime Minister’s Policy Legacy (McGill-Queen’s University Press). Her research on the history of the Canadian Parliamentary Press Gallery appeared in five chapters of the 2016 book Sharp Wits & Busy Pens (Hill Times Publishing). She has a Bachelor of Arts from Concordia University and Master of Journalism from Carleton.