A First International Institute of Engaged Leadership for the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation

Fellows and Mentors explore Language, Culture, and Identity  with their Spanish, Catalan, and Basque counterparts

Montreal, January 13, 2023 - The Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation is pleased to announce its first International Institute of Engaged Leadership. This Institute, organized in Spain as part of the 2021-2024 scientific cycle "Language, Culture, and Identity", will allow fifteen Scholars to pursue the Foundation's Engaged Leadership Program between January 14 and 20, 2023.

By meeting with a variety of stakeholders in Spain, the 2021 Scholars, with the guidance and training of various Fellows and Mentors, will have the opportunity to experience the complexity and diversity of perspectives on the issues surrounding this topic, and will be able to appreciate how it resonates with the Canadian experience. This Institute is also designed to provide an experiential leadership learning program and to engage its participants in spaces of dialogue that foster a plurality of perspectives.

“The choice of Spain as the location for this first Institute outside our borders is strategic," explained Pascale Fournier, President and CEO of the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation. "As is the case in Canada, the coexistence between a majority language and culture and those of other minority languages and cultures, which are very present, makes Spain an ideal place to enrich the understanding of these issues and to offer an invaluable point of comparison.”

Leadership sessions will be facilitated by Fellows and Mentors from the 2021 cohort, who will occasionally be joined by other speakers to share their experiences as role models for leadership, boldness, and perseverance. They will encourage Scholars to share their own experiences and reflections on a variety of themes, including living in a pluralistic society of languages and cultures.

The Institute sessions will begin in downtown Barcelona before moving to the cities of Bilbao and San Sebastian, nerve centers of the Basque country. The delegation will also visit a coastal village, Pasaia, and the medieval village of San Millan de la Cogolla.

About the Leadership Program

The Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation's Leadership Program is designed to foster the development of a new generation of Scholars who are not only excellent thinkers and researchers, but who also have the potential to transform their ideas into positive action for society. The Foundation's Leadership Program enriches the academic experience of Scholars by preparing them to become Engaged Leaders who will have a significant impact on their organizations and communities. In particular, the program provides Scholars with a pathway to community engagement by exposing them to stimulating debate and a plurality of perspectives and by taking them out of their comfort zone through leadership focused on the development of self, others, systems and the environment.

About the Foundation 

The Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation is an independent and non-partisan charity established in 2001 as a living memorial to the former prime minister. Through doctoral Scholarships, Fellowships, Mentorship, its engaged leadership program and public interaction events, the Foundation supports free spirits who make exceptional contributions to the most pressing social issues.

Source: 
Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation
Photographs available upon request

For information / interview requests: 
Sébastien Fassier
TACT
514 554-0586
sfassier@TactConseil.ca