Our team

Am Johal, Co-Director

Am Johal has been Director of SFU's Vancity Office of Community Engagement since December 2010, and is an associate with SFU's Institute for the Humanities and SFU's Centre for Dialogue. He is also a member of the Advisory Committee of SFU's Labour Studies Program. He is the author of Ecological Metapolitics: Badiou and the Anthropocene (Atropos Press, 2015) and co-author with Matt Hern, with contributions from Joe Sacco, of Global Warming and the Sweetness of Life: A Tar Sands Tale (The MIT Press, 2018).

Stuart Poyntz, Co-Director

Stuart is Professor in the School of Communication and has been a Visiting Scholar at Queensland University of Technology, Griffith University, Hong Kong Baptist University and the University of British Columbia. He was also President of the Association for Research in Cultures of Young People. His research addresses children’s media cultures, theories of public life and urban youth media production. He has published four books and is currently Principal Investigator of the SSHRC-funded research project, Youthsites: Charting the non-formal arts learning sector in creative lives, and Lead Investigator of the Social Media and News Section of the SSHRC-funded research project, IMPACTS: Collaborations to Address Sexual Violence on Campus. He has published widely in national and international peer-reviewed journals, including Oxford Review of Education, Canadian Journal of Communication, Popular Culture, Journal of Children and Media, Cultural Studies, Journal of Youth Studies, Studies in Social Justice, Review of Education, Pedagogy and Cultural Studies, and the Canadian Journal of Education, and in various edited collections.

Joanna Habdank, Program Manager

e joanna_habdank@sfu.ca

Joanna Habdank has worked extensively in areas of community development with a focus on program and policy development for immigrant and refugee populations. She has six years of non-profit management experience preceded by five years working as a journalist. Her work has appeared in the Vancouver Sun and other publications throughout Canada. She has an MSc in Human Rights (LSE) and MA in International Journalism (Cardiff). Her research interests have explored the extent to which legal frameworks can be applicable to the protection of rights for women facing precarious migration situations such as displacement and trafficking. 

Tara Mahoney, Research and Engagement Manager

Tara Mahoney is the Research and Engagement Manager with SFU’s Community Engaged Research Initiative (CERi). With over 15 years of experience in community organizing and a PhD in Communication from Simon Fraser University, Tara has been at the forefront of innovative projects that bridge the gap between academic research and community-driven solutions. She teaches climate communications in the Climate Action certificate program at SFU and has published widely on topics related to community-engaged research and public engagement with climate issues. Prior to her role with SFU CERi, Tara was the co-founder and creative director of public engagement agency Gen Why Media, instructor with Civic Innovation Change Lab at RADIUS SFU and the Research Fellow in Climate Change Communications at the David Suzuki Foundation. To learn more about her engagement work and publications visit creativepublics.ca

Jessie Lee, Communications Specialist

e cericoms@sfu.ca

Jessie Lee is the Communication Specialist at CERi. She is a SFU graduate with a BA in Interactive Arts and Technology and a minor in Communication. She joins the team with a background in digital marketing, graphic design, and web development. Her interest in digital media has risen in her education and work experiences. She hopes to use creative digital approach to spread awareness and enhance community engagement. 

Kari Grain, Special Research Associate

Kari Grain is a practitioner-scholar at the intersection of higher education, social justice, and community engagement. She earned her PhD in Education at UBC as a Vanier scholar, where her research focused on local community impacts of international service-learning in Uganda. For the past five years, she has worked as an educational consultant, focusing on experiential education, community-engaged research, and the scholarship of teaching and learning. Her research has been published in the Journal of Experiential Education, the Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, and the Canadian Journal of Studies in Adult Education. She is currently a sessional instructor in UBC’s Faculty of Arts and Faculty of Education and has been collaborating in varying capacities with SFU scholars since 2017's Community2University Expo.

Joanna Ashworth, Research Associate

Joanna Ashworth researches, teaches and practices methods of democratic engagement including convening mini publics for public policy formation. She is a filmmaker, educational programmer and curriculum designer focusing on dialogic leadership and collaborative governance in the related fields of green infrastructure, energy transitions, climate change mitigation and regenerative agriculture practices. She is a research associate with Participedia.net and past co-chair of the Teaching, Training and Mentoring Committee and Senior Associate with the Wosk Centre for Dialogue where she has led programs and partnerships for more than ten years. Recent publication:

Ashworth, J. (2020). 9 Art-ful Methods of Democratic Participation: Listening, Engagement, and Connection. In L. Levac & S. Wiebe (Ed.), Creating Spaces of Engagement: Policy Justice and the Practical Craft of Deliberative Democracy (pp. 208-225). Toronto: University of Toronto Press. https://doi.org/10.3138/9781487519889-011

Grey Nguyen, Event Specialist

Grey Nguyen is an Event Specialist at SFU’s Community-Engaged Research Initiative (CERi). As a recent SFU graduate majoring in Communication and minoring in Business, she joins the team with adequate experience in event management, including program planning and fundraising. Grey’s interests and concerns mainly lie in the development of youth as social change agents and the influence of media technology on social issues.

Steven Ta, Communication Assistant

Steven Ta is the Communication Assistant at CERi. Steven is a recent graduate from the School of Communication at SFU. A Vancouver native, he comes to CERi with interest in Community-Engaged Research stemming from issues such as gentrification. Through his studies, he has developed a passion for understanding the ways discourse and media shape public perceptions.