2022 Partners In Education Virtual Luncheon - Toni De Mello

This Virtual Luncheon is open to Local Presidents, Senior Administration, Trustee's and Local Executive Members.

Thursday February 10th, 2022

11:00am-11:30am - Virtual Reception - Join your Local's breakout room for conversation before the session begins.

11:30am-12:30pm - Toni De Mello

A Zoom link will be provided to you with your payment confirmation.

Toni De Mello's Biography

With over 20 years of experience coaching and consulting on diversity, equity and inclusion, Tanya moves conversations beyond the basics to dig deeper. She explores the nuances of everyday experiences and challenges in the workplace and in our communities. By moving past definitions and handouts to help folks wrestle with the material in their daily lives, her trainings move beyond transaction to transformational. When participants leave, they have strategies that will work for them, and take into account their current situations and limitations.

Tanya is a human rights lawyer, a member of the Ontario bar, and has served in the United Nations High Commission for Refugees and the World Food Programme in Geneva (Switzerland), Senegal (West Africa) and Columbia (South America). She was the Director of Human Rights at Ryerson, in the Office of the Vice President, Equity and Community Inclusion for 4 years before becoming the Assistant Dean, Student Programming, Development and Equity at Ryerson University Faculty of Law in 2020.

She holds a dual Bachelor of Economics and Political Science from the University of Waterloo; a double Master in Public Policy and Urban and Regional Planning from Princeton University; and a dual law degree from McGill University. She recently successfully completed her PhD at the University of Toronto on bias in hiring where she examined recruitment and interview processes and focused on the fit interview where people say “This person would be a great fit for our company!” and she asked: “What does it mean to fit? Who fits? And who doesn’t?” She is considered an expert on equity and inclusion in Canada.

Tanya has experience creating curricula and advising on curricular reform that embeds equity, diversity and inclusion in courses. She has created innovative and award-winning practical experiential learning programs, and volunteer and work opportunities for students locally and internationally. Tanya has years of experience developing programs on issues of recruitment, retention and advancement of underrepresented groups in businesses and organizations across Canada and the US, with an additional focus on the legal industry in Toronto. She has 20 years of working in the postsecondary sector in governance, student affairs and admissions, and for the last 10 years, in human rights.

Tanya’s lectures focus on personal narrative, weaving together her work at the United Nations on three continents, in local and international big business and government services, and arguments at the family dinner table. In doing so, she creates an intimacy that allows participants to move forward in their learning. This style has led to praise for Tanya’s ability to give a keynote or training that all people can digest and apply almost immediately.