Our Board

Marjorie has over twenty-five years experience in the education field. She is an Alberta-certified teacher and has taught children of all ages ranging from preschool to post-secondary, from public to private schools, and from provincial to international settings. Marjorie is located in Calgary where she currently works in the field of early intervention for a play-based service provider as well as teaches part-time in early childcare certificate and diploma-based programs.

In addition, she delivers presentations and workshops for a variety of organizations. All of these interests allow her to share her passion for play and for helping children and their educators achieve their potential. Marjorie is a mother to two children and a dog named Sophie who also loves to sail.

Lynn is a play and recess specialist. It started in 2001 with her first playful business, Lettuce Make Thyme (for a fun, active lifestyle. No, this was not a catering company, just a play on words), where she was the first to bring Giant Games to North America. And now, with Playocracy, a social innovation company that creates workshops and resources to (1) proclaim and demonstrate the value of play, (2) provide a sustainable and successful solution to recess problems with the Recess Architects Blueprint™ and (3) support global physical literacy.

Lynn has chaired or co-chaired several events, one being the Ontario Physical Literacy Summit (the longest-running physical literacy conference in the world!) As a member of the Kiwanis Service organization, Lynn organized and ran Hamilton Play Days, and she has written articles for magazines and newspapers in Canada and the US. Lynn has also been a member of the US Play Coalition since 2011. Lynn is married to Guy; they have a daughter, Rachael, son-in-law Steve, and grandsons, James and Adam.

Heather has been an educator for over fifteen years. She is an Ontario certified teacher and started her education career as a Kindergarten teacher in Shanghai, China, where she worked within a multilingual, play-based learning environment. Through this experience, Heather came to truly appreciate the power of play as essential to young children’s well-being and found that play was the common language among the children in her classroom. Heather is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Education, Queen’s University.

As a researcher, Heather is interested in the ways that educators and learning environments help to support student thriving and well-being, and endeavours to incorporate the voices of young children into her work. She is a mother of a very active and inquisitive three-year old daughter, who keeps her busy and playing both indoors and out.

Wale joined the Board of IPA Canada in July 2020. He is a financial expert and holds professional accounting designations in Canada, United Kingdom and Nigeria. He has over 10 years experience serving with other service organizations. Twice, he served a local Rotary club as a Treasurer and currently serves as the club’s President Elect.

He is a Chartered Professional Accountants (CPA) Canada Financial Literacy Volunteer and has made presentations to children in their school. Wale enjoys helping kids to maximize the learning (include play) opportunities open to them.

Alex is the founder/editor of the award-winning blog, PlayGroundology. For nearly 15 years he has been publishing stories for international audiences featuring play theorists and practitioners, designers, artists, academics and kids from Canada and countries around the world.  Alex’s rediscovery of play was inspired by his three youngest children’s very active pursuit of fun and adventure. Together, they gambolled through playgrounds in Halifax, Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa and points between.

The backyard of their Nova Scotia home became an ever-changing neighbourhood play zone. In the process, Alex became an advocate for children’s right to play, organizing a variety of public events, appearing in regional and national media, and volunteering with the Canadian chapter of the International Play Association (IPA). The father of five and grandfather of two is a firm believer in the transformative power of play.

Paul currently lives at Spring Lake in the Edmonton Region of Alberta. The majority of his work, volunteer time and as a parent over the last twenty-five years has been involved in planning and developing play spaces and leadership as well as promoting child friendly cities. Paul has been on IPA Canada committees and board for over 20 years.

His favourite quote is:
Time is a game played beautifully by children
Heraclitus.

Shirley has been a frontline early childhood educator for 26 years, having worked in child care centres both in Alberta and Manitoba. She has her Level 3 Early Childhood Education certification and for the last 15 years, she has run an approved family day home in Southern Alberta. She is honoured to work alongside families on a daily basis and loves the benefits found in mixed-age group child care.

She has worked with all ages of children, in infant/toddler programs all the way to school age. She has taught a number of workshops to Family Day Home Educators throughout the years, and has completed the Flight Framework training through MacEwan, is a Shanker Method Champion, and Shirley is also a Facilitator for the Flight Learning Series through MacEwan University. As well, Shirley has been a board member for the Association of Early Childhood Educators of Alberta.