Speakers

Bio for Maneel Chahal

Maneet Chahal-Gill (RN, BScN, MSc) is a passionate community change-maker, who has  a decade of mental health nursing experience and has closely witnessed her family and friends struggle with mental illness.

 Along with working in the field of mental health, Maneet finished her Masters of Nursing in 2018 which looked at the South Asian Punjabi community's experience of accessing mental health services for depression in the Region of Peel.

Maneet co-founded Soch Mental Health in 2017 and has been working to eradicate the mental health stigma in the South Asian community.

Presentation Focus

I will be speaking about the work my nonprofit, Soch Mental Health, has been doing in the community while spotlighting some key projects. The aim of my presentation is to explore Rotary support to scale our impact.

We will meet at noon at the Lighthouse for Grieving Children Facility at 2522 Rebecca Street for lunch and then Anne Smith will speak about the organization and give our members a tour of the building. Lunch details will be provided at a later date.

Anne Smith

Executive Director

Anne joined Lighthouse in 2021 as the Director of Development and within the year moved into the role of Executive Director. She has 20+ years of varied and progressive fundraising experience as well as experience in community development work. In her previous role with a local funder, she got to know about the great work of the Lighthouse for Grieving Children, and the impact they have made in the lives of children and youth. In addition to her extensive background in the non-profit sector, Anne has volunteered with a number of organizations that assist women and children. She holds a Marketing Management Diploma as well as a Business Administration Degree.

Lighthouse

The Lighthouse for Grieving Children provides free peer support for grieving children, youth, and their families in Halton, Peel and beyond.  We offer open-ended, on-going grief support groups to help children and their families re-adjust after the death of a parent or sibling.  We provide a forum for friendship and self-help with others who have experienced a similar loss and develop coping skills after a life-altering death.

Speakers Shivaani Sundralingam and Sami Gupta, Co-Presidents of the Interact Club of Abbey Park High School

Shivaani Sundralingam and Sami Gupta are the founding Presidents of Abbey Park Highschool Interact Club. The club was inaugurated in November 2023 and the ceremony was attended by District Governor Brenda Halloran. Shivaani have just graduated but they have set a solid foundation with a clear vision and strategy and have inspired their members with a very interesting program of activities that they will share with us.