Sadia Anwar President

Sadia Anwar is the president of the Alberta Association for Multicultural Education. She is deeply invested in serving the community and is a strong advocate of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. She is passionate about connecting people of all backgrounds – women, men, gender-nonconforming people, indigenous and immigrants, of diverse faiths, abilities and ages – who are all deserving of equality, and inclusion. Sadia continues to embody these principles to amplify voices using education, mobilization, dialogue, engagement and collective action.

Sadia was the co-chair for the Red Deer Welcoming and Inclusive communities, and she sits on the Alberta Hate Crimes Committee.

Sadia recognizes promoting Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion in our communities can be a big task that requires social change and transformative dialogues. She believes this can be done by supporting organizations with ongoing dialogue, education and special events in highlighting the importance of multiculturalism.

Sadia looks forward to creating a lasting change in the community that values diversity and celebrates the contributions of people of ALL backgrounds, regardless of their ethnicity, race, colour, abilities, religion, socioeconomic status, culture, sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity.

Sadia encourages all of us to listen with our heads then move through our hearts and have the courage to change. She believes the work in our personal and professional lives must be to build relationships with someone whom we don’t know and whose story is different than ours. Acknowledge our privileges and use those privileges to benefit someone else. This is how we can create a ripple effect of change.

Sadia is privileged and humbled to be in this position and looks forward to making relationships and connecting with people. She believes relationships drive our work and we need to extend ourselves, as the heart of racial justice work is relationships.

Larry Ofner Director

Larry is a retired teacher and administrator with the Edmonton Catholic Schools. Larry was a principal in one of the original Multicultural Lighthouse Schools. Since retiring in 2000 he has spent 2 years in the missions in Kiribati teaching school, serves on the Catholic Charities fundraising board, volunteers at Marian Centre (soup kitchen) and at the Edmonton Christmas Bureau.

Larry is active with the Knights of Columbus. Larry has been a member of AAME’s board of directors since 1996.