Workshops that build common ground.
Our interactive workshops support people to build meaningful, safe and trusting relationships across diverse experiences. Current offerings explore themes of substance use, community health, and gender & sexual diversity.
Need something different covered? Check out our curriculum development services.
Current Workshops
Safer Together: Staying Connected Through Substance Use
“The opposite of addiction is connection” - Johann Hari
People’s substance use can have profound impacts on the people around them. This can make it really difficult to stay connected to people who are using drugs at the interpersonal, family and community level. Stigma often makes these forms of disconnection much worse. At kitchen tables, in schools, shelters, public spaces, and policy rooms, people are struggling with the same core question:
How do we stay safe and connected when someone we care about — or someone in our community — is using drugs? How do we protect others while also protecting ourselves?
Safer Together is a workshop designed to help individuals, communities, teams, and leaders navigate this complex reality with clarity, compassion, and practical tools. Whether you’re supporting someone directly or shaping services, policies, or community responses, this session gives you the skills to stay safely connected to each other regardless of where someone is at in their substance use — without falling into fear, stigma, disconnection, or shame.
Connection isn’t just a personal value — it’s a protective force. If we want to support healing, reduce harm, and strengthen communities, we need to know how to stay in relationship, even when it’s hard.
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Explore how boundaries around substance use can protect without isolating
Understand why connection is a protective factor — and isolation increases harm
Identify practical approaches for supporting safety at both the personal and community level
Recognize how prohibition-era ideas have shaped public attitudes and private reactions
Identify system-level solutions that protect communities
Practice staying engaged with loved ones, neighbours, and community members, even when it’s hard
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Who It’s For:
Community members, families, and frontline workers navigating personal or local substance use issues
Municipal leaders, public servants, and health decision-makers facing policy tensions and community concerns
Nonprofit and agency staff supporting people who use drugs or managing service boundaries
School, housing, and outreach professionals witnessing the human and political impacts of this crisis daily
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This workshop is available in two formats:
A 1-hour session — introduces key concepts and creates shared language
A 3-hour session — offers deeper discussion, practical frameworks, and real-world application
All sessions include:
A free 30-minute consult to tailor the content to your team’s needs
In-person or online delivery options
A participatory, trauma-informed learning environment
Please note: travel costs apply for in-person sessions outside our facilitators immediate service areas.
Beyond Fear: A New Conversation About Drugs, Public Safety & Community Health
The toxic drug crisis has become the leading cause of death for people aged 19–59 in British Columbia. In every sector — from health care to education to community services — people are asking: Why is this happening, and why can’t we seem to agree on what to do?
At the heart of this crisis isn’t just policy failure — it’s fear. Fear of loss. Fear of change. Fear for our children and the ones that we love. These fears shape not only how we respond, but whether we’re able to have the conversations we need to move forward.
Beyond Fear is a workshop designed to help people across systems, sectors, and perspectives build a shared understanding of the drug crisis — one that starts with honesty, connection, and clarity.
This is not a debate. It’s a reset that seeks to open up new ways of working together.
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Explore how fear, stigma, and public narratives have shaped our current drug policies
Understand the relationship between prohibition, policy, and the unregulated drug supply
Learn why our current approach often feels like control — but results in more chaos
Discover a new framework for talking about drugs, safety, and regulation in a way that builds connection instead of division
Leave with the confidence and language to invite others into this difficult but essential conversation
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This workshop is designed for people working in:
Health authorities, public health, and substance use response
Nonprofits, especially those serving youth, families, or housing-insecure communities
Education and school-based supports
Government and municipal leadership
The recovery community and organizations seeking new ways to engage
Peer-led and drug user organizations (offered at no cost)
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This workshop is available in two formats:
A 1-hour introductory session. It provides a clear overview of the issues and is ideal for teams with limited time or looking to start the conversation.
A 3-hour full workshop. This version allows for deeper exploration, interactive dialogue, and more opportunities to build shared language and applied insight.
Both formats include:
A free 30-minute consult to tailor the content to your team’s needs
In-person or online delivery options
A dynamic, interactive learning space focused on connection, not lectures
Please note: travel costs apply for in-person sessions outside our facilitators immediate service areas.
Reimagining Gender & Sexual Diversity
Education about gender and sexual diversity often does the important work of highlighting how queer and trans people are different. This workshops starts by asking what connects us across diverse experiences.
Reimagining Gender and Sexuality explores how we are all shaped by gender and sexual norms and how that affects the way we relate, communicate, lead and build community.
This training builds on the knowledge and leadership of 2SLGBTQIA+ people and movements, offering an approach that is rooted in humility, connection, and shared humanity to move beyond surface level inclusion and towards strong, transformed relationships. This is not just about terminology or policy checklists. It is about understanding why we think the way that we do and how it shapes our relationships with colleagues, clients and community members. This approach can empower teams, professionals and communities to build skills that work across diverse contexts and that are adaptable to evolving language and cultural norms. This is a longer term investment in culture change and connection.
It is designed for people of all identities, backgrounds and comfort levels. Whether you are LGBTQ2S+ yourself, a cautious ally, or a leader trying to foster inclusion in your workplace or community, you will find a space here to reflect, learn and grow without shame.
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Reflect on how we have been socialized into gender-based norms, and how this affects their beliefs, behaviour and relationships
Understand how our experiences of gender & sexuality are interconnected and how this can empower change that benefits all of us and protects gender & sexually diverse people.
Build shared understanding and language that moves beyond assumptions and shame
Learn skills to grow, including learn about other people’s experiences and make mistakes with confidence and care
Practice tools for creating safer environments in workplaces, classrooms, community settings, and policy
Understand how inclusion strengthens organizations and communities, (i.e. team cohesion, mental health, service outcomes, and leadership)
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Who It’s For:
Leaders, human resources staff, and decision makers building inclusive cultures
Professionals of all types (i.e. education, health, government, community services) looking to strengthen their abilities to work across diverse experiences
People who are uncertain but looking to promote connection and well-being for queer & trans people
Anyone trying to work with more integrity, clarity and connection
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Reimagining Gender and Sexuality is available in two formats:
1 hour session — introduction to key ideas and shared frameworks
3 hour session — deeper reflection, discussion and action planning
All sessions include:
ll sessions include:
A free 30-minute consult to tailor the content to your team’s needs
In-person or online delivery options
A participatory, trauma informed space that meets people where they are
Please note: travel costs apply for in-person sessions outside our facilitators immediate service areas.
Our Approach
Connected
We approach all conversations with authenticity, humility and curiosity to promote a sense of connection between participants.
Dynamic
Applying an approach grounded in critical pedagogy and adult learning, participants learn alongside the instructor in dialogue.
Participatory & Engaged
Our approach to education meets learners in what they already know to build on existing strengths and ensure relevance to their work and experiences.
Safe
Applying principles of trauma-informed practice, cultural safety and taking a strengths-based approach, we create safe space for vulnerability and creativity.
Questions before getting started?