Delyse Sylvester

Working with Ashoka changed my life. It gave me a language and a framework to define and act on my drive to change broken communication systems. Ashoka has given me — and tens of thousands of others — the drive to be a changemaker every day. I’m delighted to be able to bring my insights back to this incredible Ashoka Canada team.

As Co-Director of Community at Ashoka’s Changemakers, Delyse Sylvester led more than 60 co-branded global campaigns, raising more than $23 million to scale innovations globally and developing collaborative initiatives with The Monitor and the New Yorker. In her more than three decades of social innovation expertise, Delyse has connected thousands of social entrepreneurs with corporate leaders, thought leaders, funders and new media partners. She established Indigenous Cultural Rights programming in Canada and the South Pacific with CUSO International, and led a team to establish the first B.C. Rural Innovation Chair as Executive Director of the Selkirk College Foundation. Delyse is an Executive in Residence at Simon Fraser University’s Beedie School for Business. There, she founded Social Currents, a next-generation audience research and engagement initiative aimed at helping to build the Canadian culture and constituency for enduring social and environmental solutions.