The Greenwoods Eldercare Society is an independent not-for-profit organization affiliated with Island Health and BC Housing. The Society is governed by a volunteer Board of Directors with a diverse range of backgrounds including healthcare, education, business, government, and non-profits. The Board of Directors is a governance committee that meets once a month to review and oversee the operations of the Society. Annually, the Board of Directors host an Annual General Meeting (AGM) that is announced in the local newspaper (Driftwood) and serves as both a retrospective review of the year past and a prospective preview of the year ahead. Key roles and responsibilities of Board membership include:
- advocacy
- committee work
- resource development
- liaison with stakeholders and funding providers
This is an active Board, which has a direct and lasting influence on the health and well-being of the organization and the elder population the Greenwoods Society serves.
Members of the Board of Directors
Dorrie Ferster, Past Board Chair
Dorrie brings a wealth of experience to our Board. She is retired Registered Nurse, experienced Nursing Leader and educator with years of general nursing practice in acute care and mental health. Dorrie led the operationalization and care delivery design of a specialized Alzheimer’s and related dementia care site called Czorny Alzheimer’s Centre. She is passionate about residential care and the opportunities to enhance and foster person-directed care and the building of teams and environments which compliment the creation of “the best places to live, the best places to work and the best places to visit.”
Mark Cleveland, Secretary
With a career focusing on organization development, strategic planning and organizational leadership, Mark spent over 40 years working in Canada’s north. Throughout his work career he focused his efforts on the development and expansion of sustainable communities-based services in the fields of education, training and health. Activities included supporting the organization and development of health and education authorities as well as refocusing existing services to better meet patient/client needs. Mark’s career postings included serving as the president of the Northwest Territories college system, Deputy Minister of Health, Deputy Minister of Education, Culture and Employment and serving as Secretary to the NWT Government’s Financial Management Board. Mark has been a resident of Salt Spring since 2016.
Paul Roberts, Director
Has been a research scientist, public servant, and IT consultant – and always a volunteer. He’s a birder and trying to live a low-impact lifestyle. In recent years, Paul has dedicated his energies to organizations that improve the health and well-being of the residents of Salt Spring Island – Lady Minto Hospital (LMH) Auxiliary, LMH Foundation, Salt Spring Senior Services Society and Salt Spring Hospice. He recently joined the Greenwoods Board to pursue those passions.
Wayne Glover, CAE, Board Chair
Wayne moved to Salt Spring in May 2008 while he was still President and CEO of AssociationsFirst, a national association management company based in Toronto. He sold AssociationsFirst in October 2016 and set up a consulting practice on Salt Spring Island. He consults in the areas of project management, strategic planning and Board/committee facilitation. He instructed a leadership workshop for a number of healthcare organizations. Wayne served in many volunteer roles including chairing fundraising events, creating a mentorship program for future leaders in the association sector and serving on the boards of several not-for-profit organizations. He was Board Chair of Volunteer and Community Resources (VCR) Salt Spring and worked on the Governance Working Group of the Salt Spring Community Alliance on the report on possible improvements to the governance of Salt Spring published in October 2018. Wayne brings expertise from a business perspective to help Greenwoods improve continually so that it runs as a strong, healthy and sustainable organization.
Peter Grove, Director
Peter is a retired Chartered Accountant and a Certified Mediator. He has extensive experience managing businesses including finance, human resources, asset management and technology. As a professional mediator he has played a role in resolving commercial and family disputes. Peter and his wife Mary have lived on Salt Spring for 15 years having moved here from Vancouver. Peter served for 6 years on the Lady Minto Foundation Board of Directors. For the last 10 years he has served the community as an Islands Trust Trustee.
Pam Ramsay, Treasurer
Pam has spent over 35 years in health care. She started practicing as a speech-language pathologist but has been in senior leadership roles for the majority of her career. These leadership roles were both at the regional and provincial level and spanned across all parts of the health care continuum. Pam grounds her leadership in creating sustainability, embracing collaboration and harnessing potential within organizations, systems and communities.
Pam was the inaugural Provincial Director of Stroke Services B.C. at the Provincial Health Services Authority and lead numerous evidence-based clinical improvement initiatives in stroke care. Most recently, she was the Executive Director, Lower Mainland Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. This included leading the provincial testing strategy for COVID-19 and the pandemic response for labs.
Pam has always embraced the importance of volunteerism. She continues as an active board member of a national cardiac research organization, with past experience on the board of a community college and activities in support of other not-for-profit organizations.
In her retirement, she welcomes the opportunity to volunteer as part of the Greenwoods Eldercare board as it continues to evolve a much-needed resource serving our Salt Spring Island community.
Silk Questro, Director
A Salt Spring resident since 1980, Silk brings 40 years of communications experience to the Greenwoods Board. As the founder and president of Victoria-based Malahat Group Communications, she led the development of marketing strategies; public information, advertising and fundraising campaigns; branding and visual identities; and a wide range of award-winning projects for clients in the private, public and not-for profit sectors. As strategic communications planner and creative director, she gained particular insights advising clients in the fields of health care, education, environment, tourism, the arts and financial services. The Malahat Group was recognized with a community service award for its work as the pro-bono communication agency supporting United Way of Greater Victoria during several years of successful fundraising campaigns. Now retired, Silk lives on a small south-end farm raising sheep and apples, writing, singing in a band and sailing.
Eleanor Dawson, Director
After a career in law, Eleanor retired to Salt Spring Island. While a lawyer in private practice, she served as a director and officer of a number of animal welfare organizations, including the Canadian Federation of Humane Societies and the Canadian Council on Animal Care. Her concern for compassionate and ethical care led to Eleanor’s interest in residential care and the Board of the Greenwoods Society. She also currently serves as the chair of a charitable foundation that supports humane education programs that teach the values of compassion, empathy, generosity and responsibility.
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Claire Cupples, Director
Claire retired in 2020 after a 30-year career as a teacher, researcher and administrator in three Canadian universities. At that point she went from being a part-time resident of Salt Spring Island (since 2002) to being a full-timer. Her teaching and research were in the fields of molecular biology and microbiology.
Over a 20-year period, she led the Biology Department at Concordia University in Montréal, the Department of Biochemistry and Microbiology at the University of Victoria and the Faculty of Science at both UVic and Simon Fraser University. These positions gave her extensive experience in budget, personnel and infrastructure management in unionized, not-for-profit institutions, jointly financed by student fees and government grants. At all three institutions she had substantial involvement in planning the construction of new science buildings and the renovation and maintenance of older ones.
As Dean of the Faculty of Science at SFU, she led fundraising activities on behalf of the Faculty, working with external donors and internal stakeholders. She also sat on the Boards of various not-for-profit organizations, including Science World, TRIUMF, the Bamfield Marine Sciences Centre, the Science Fair Foundation of British Columbia, and the Canadian Council of Deans of Science.
Jane McCoy, Director
After 13 years as a teacher and administrator in both the public and private sectors in Alberta, Jane began her second career in strategic corporate communications as a management partner
and director of communications at Carewest in Calgary. Then, following two years with a communications firm in the UK, she returned to Alberta, worked as a contributing writer for
various publications including Alberta Venture magazine and as a consultant on various large IT initiatives for the Alberta Government.
Jane regards her role as a management partner at Carewest one of the most rewarding of her two careers and contributes much of her gratitude for those years to her dedicated colleagues
and the close to 1,000 residents across five sites, many of whom, when she came to know them, were a constant source of admiration and inspiration.
In her spare time, Jane engaged in landscape painting, singing, amateur theatre, and poetry writing. She also enjoyed spending time in nature as a birder, hiker, cross-country skier, and
snowshoer – pursuits now well-suited to her retirement on Salt Spring Island.
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