Measure What Matters: Community Stewardship and Nature in Urban Parks

Catherine Reining is the Project Coordinator for ParkSeek, a pan-Canadian initiative to gather information about population health impacts of parks, protected areas and recreational facilities led by the Human Environments Analysis Laboratory (HEAL) at Western University. Her research interests include planning and management in parks and protected areas for human health and well-being, conservation, and environmental education.

Catherine holds a Masters of Environmental Studies and Bachelor of Arts in Geography from Wilfrid Laurier University as well as a Bachelor of Education from Brock University. Catherine is also a Lab Coordinator in the Department of Geography and Environmental Studies at Wilfrid Laurier University.

With a background in landscape architecture, international development cooperation, and social impact measurement, Jia currently manages the Research and Analytics Unit at the City of Toronto’s Parks, Forestry, and Recreation Division’s Policy and Strategic Planning Branch to provide decision-support to improve quality of life for the public. She has a special interest in community development through design, performance measurement, and socio-ecological resilience research. 

Jia brings to the City of Toronto a decade of experience in international development cooperation, working in over a dozen countries in the global south on improving organizational and program effectiveness within non-governmental organizations and government agencies. She has worked with Plan International, the World Bank (Asia), Ministries of Health in Tanzania, Mali, Ghana, Bangladesh, as well as donors including Dubai Cares, Global Affairs Canada, Global Sanitation Fund, and African Development Bank. 

In Canada, Jia has developed organizational effectiveness strategies for the Ontario Trillium Foundation and created a social impact measurement toolkit for Park People, a public space NGO. She has also worked with Toronto-based design firms Office Ou and the Planning Partnership.

Ariane is the Conservation Projects Manager with Stanley Park Ecology Society (SPES) and is a Registered Professional Biologist. She is originally from Montreal and did her master’s in biology at the Université de Montréal. She joined SPES in 2015 as an environmental educator, where she had the opportunity to connect people of all ages with nature in Stanley Park, Vancouver. In 2017 she joined the conservation team and has been planning habitat restoration and collaborative research projects within Stanley Park. Ariane loves to share her passion for the natural world with the community and to work on projects that make a difference for the Park’s ecology.

Sue Arndt is a Program Manager at Park People. Sue leads Park People’s National Network and Cornerstone Parks program, building relationships across Canada with municipal staff, non-profits, and community members to grow the parks movement across the country. She brings to this role, over 15 years of experience in the field of urban ecology, working in the non-profit and private sectors managing partnerships, community consultations and large-scale programs.