ACE Bloggers

Arts & Culture with ACE

Vote for us and for our aboriginal communities

I’m not even going to attempt to hide the fact that this is a blatant plug for our Pepsi Refresh Project Grant...

Yeehaw!!

I love the Calgary Stampede. There, I said it. Calgarians are definitely torn when it comes to the idea of the Stampede....

And who said?

The girls were having a blast… their friends had all arrived for the party. There was a pink frosted cake, gifts to be...

The show will go on!

The pilot for the ACE ARTS Tour has now officially been completed. It is a bittersweet ending, no doubt. I will...

The New Black is... the new black.

The New Black was right under my nose the whole time – all I had to do was stop and take a look. Funny how that happens...

Grassroots Enterprises

Preparing for Tomorrow

It would be so nice not to have to work in July and August. Unfortunately for many of us it is unavoidable if we want to...

Recreation Matters

This week I talked to yet another young person who is totally convinced that making money is the route to happiness....

Knowing Your Community

I talked to a friend last week who is seriously considering a move west in her search for new opportunities for both...

New Times May Require Rethinking our Infrastructure

Systemic change is hard work. And, it doesn’t happen without courageous leadership.  Last week I was in London,...

Leading Locally

Carrie’s decision to run for local election was prompted by frustration with a northern Town Council that too often...

Promoting Physical Activity

What are our messages???

So...What do you think of these pictures?How do they make you feel?Who relates to them?Why do we use them?Should we be...

What is our message? Part 1

I am not sure about you, but I know I get annoyed when I see happy, thin, young women (usually with non-sweaty hair,...

Glorious glorious paths

I was able to go back to my home town, Lethbridge for some holiday time. The unique thing about this visit was it not...

"I need to be motivated...."

Overall I think those of us in the physical activity field have done an okay job on creating awareness. Canadians are aware...

Growing more than vegetables

Sometimes, we forget that physical activity is really just our body moving. We tend to always think about planned physical...

THE CATALYST

Book of the Year

Active, committed, and engaged communities happen when individual citizens decide that it is in their interest to live in...

The Best Defense

It was a warm summer day, and I was listening on-line to the smooth jazz on KWJZ Seattle, chilling out with a cold pop as I...

What's His Role?

Alberta’s Culture Minister Lindsay Blackett’s blunt assessment of Alberta’s film and television industries pulled no...

Duke's Lesson

There are very few old-time ranchers who, when facing St. Peter at the gates of the Holy Corral, won’t confess to...

A Bad Idea!

Alberta’s Liberal Party recently announced a twelve-point plan for improving political governance in Wild Rose country....

Pioneerleadership's Blog

Garbage Bears

I remember visiting Banff when I was a youngster in the late 60s. Coming from the Saskatchewan prairies, I was in awe of...

I see your lips moving but I can’t hear you…

I’m sitting in a meeting—a very long meeting. I shift my weight on the chair so my aching back doesn’t cause my mouth...

Grieving for the Gulf….and perhaps Canada

My heart aches when I think of what is happening to the life in the Gulf of Mexico.  With one of the biggest ecological...

How to manipulate good people to commit atrocities – engage in the wrong kind of education…

I just watched CBC’s six-part documentary series Love, Hate and Propaganda. If I was a little skeptical about information...

Soap Operas, Cultural Shifts and Peace

“There are places in the world where the success of a soap opera is measured not just in TV ratings, but in human...

Carolyn's Blog for ACE Communities

Garage Sales Unite

My neighbourhood is in an older area where there is a mix of long term residents and more recently moved in people, like...

Babes in the Kitchen

These babes were beautiful... all under 18 months old! At a recent ACE Community Building Workshop in Youngstown the local...

No Bananas for 80 Years

Imagine not eating bananas for 80 years!The story starts out at a Growing Rural Tourism Conference in Camrose. A dynamic,...

The Hidden Volunteer

Recently I discovered that my neighbour takes a shopping bag along with him when he takes his daily walk and picks up...

The Good "Stuff"

What if there was a newspaper or publication that only focused on the good news? What a motivating piece of literature that...

View From the Hill

Humanitarian, Business Leader, Social Entrepreneur and Award Winning Philanthropist, these are some of the words that often used when referring to Ian Hill.

Becoming a Community Builder: Part 6

A great woman once said: “It takes as much energy to wish as it does to plan.” Summer is upon us and so too is the...

Becoming a Community Builder: Part 5

Well it’s that time of year…Holiday weekend wrapping up, summer in view, Recreation and Parks month just a little while...

Becoming a Community Builder: Part 4

Spring is upon us and we are all getting ready for all that it means in the Recreation and Parks/Quality of Life...

Becoming a Community Builder: Part 3

Becoming a Community Builder, “Big Picture Thinking” is the third of six webcasts based on community leadership...

March Webcast-Big Picture Thinking

Becoming a Community Builder, “Big Picture Thinking”. Capra said that for leaders to be effective today, they needed...

Insights

Building Community Capacity

From April 30 - May 1, 2010 the Indigenous Sport Council (Alberta) hosted their Sport and Recreation Conference. The...

Maskwachees Declaration

In February 2000 the delegates representing Federal/ Provincial Governments, educators, First Nation communities...

Facilitate with Fun, Fervor and Focus!

Facilitate … with the 3Fs

Fun, Fervor, and Focus … When I started my blog about facilitation, I thought long and hard about why I was writing it,...

Facilitate … with trust and belief in the abilities of others!

I watched in awe, appreciation, delight, and humility as participants facilitated sessions at the three-day ACE Communities...

Facilitate … with attention to time and truth!

Time is important yet truth is more important than time! I’m not sure of the source of this statement or if it is one...

Facilitate … fierce conversations!

… robust, intense, strong, powerful, passionate, eager, unbridled…These are the words used to describe a fierce...

Facilitate … by focussing on participants!

I have just finished three weeks of facilitating highly rewarding and highly challenging sessions. I have been privileged...

Connecting 4Excellence

Revving it up

Next time you step into your vehicle or hop on your bike rev up the engine. It'll put a smile on your face, remind you of...

How will you spend your DASH?

Recently a buddy of my husband's suddenly passed away. WAIT, WAIT - it gets better there's high-quality leadership stuff in...

Celebrating with "RECkless abandon"

It was a gala affair. 70 people converged at BR& (aka Brand) in Calgary on June 19th, 2010 to launch the newly...

Connect with your whole brain first thing in the morning.

After yawning and stretching, brushing teeth, and pouring coffee, juice or water, how do you start your day? It may be with...

Are you a Mewe or a Weme?

A Mewe is one who uses their individual ability, charisma, drive, as the place from which energy, drive and passion directs...

POPULUS community planning inc.

Being Host(ed)

We explored how conversational leadership takes place, and how through conversational leadership, the doors open to...

Birthday Bike

As we have just wrapped up an Art of Hosting and Harvesting gathering in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada yesterday, I sense a...

The Art of Cultivating Professional Ingenuity

Event: Sept 17-19, 2010, Pigeon Lake, Alberta. Register now. A variety of people working and volunteering in a variety of...

The Itch

My son was asking me last week about what to do about mosquito bites. He was wondering if there was a way to make them stop...

City By Design

The Edmonton Journal’s Sarah O’Donnell and Edmonton programmer Mack Male, have painted a picture for Edmonton residents and...

ARPA Children in Nature

Update on Children in Nature

It has been a while since my last mail out, but there is some interesting work being done that I want to share with...

Pan-Canadian Survey to Determine a "Communities Perspective" on Children/Youth and their Connection with Nature

The Alberta Recreation and Parks Association (ARPA) has undertaken work on an online survey instrument for the above noted...

Children in Nature

Hello All!Welcome to the New Year!Marion Price of the Provincial Consortium on Youth in Recreation in Ontario sent a note...

Foresight

Professional Competencies and TrendScanning

ACE Communities has developed a leadership competency framework that places emphasis on vision, big picture thinking,...

Arts in the US - 1998 to 2007

'Americans for the Arts' has just produced the National Arts Index - an annual measure of the health and vitality of the...

Potential for Permanent Shift in Tourist Behaviour

The UN World Tourism Organization expects global tourism to rebound strongly after "one of the most difficult years", the...

The Great Outdoor Recreation Debate

Over the past couple of decades, we have concluded that demand for outdoor recreation will remain high and more stable that...

Fitness Predictions for 2010 - What's Hot

It's that time of year again - when leadership organizations in the fitness world make their predictions for the upcoming...