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RDC’s Business Development VP prepares to leave work he excelled at

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From Michael Donlevy – VP, Business Development at Red Deer College

Investing in education inspires student success

I was inspired to accept an offer from former Red Deer College President, Ron Woodward, to join the Executive Team at RDC in 2001. This was initially through my involvement as a volunteer on the RDC Campaign Cabinet that raised $7.2 million – still a lot of money today – to help build the College’s Library Information Common. I was inspired by the College’s leadership and vision, along with a foundational commitment to student success from those leaders and by faculty and staff, inspiration that has continued under the leadership of current President Joel Ward.

Coupled with this was my own belief in the value of RDC to Red Deer and Central Alberta as essential to what makes our region a special place to live. Our family grew to love the community we now call home and being able to make a mid-career change and remain in Red Deer was exciting. Now, as I retire from RDC after 18 years, having been privileged to serve in variety of meaningful and influential roles, I remain just as inspired and passionate about our College – soon to become Red Deer University.

Along the way, that inspiration has been fueled by my deep belief in the importance of investing in education – and not just by Governments who often see post-secondary education only as an expense line item in a budget. It is why I dedicated my efforts, along with the teams that I had the privilege of leading, to seek to inspire corporate entities, business owners and individuals to consider the value of RDC to our region and to invest in the success of our students. Over the years, that came about in many ways, through incredible donations, committed sponsorships, major events and “in-kind” contributions.

Sometimes, fundraisers are viewed less positively – hold onto your wallet, here they come again. Yet I have witnessed the laudable and inspired efforts of colleagues in so many charitable organizations throughout Alberta and beyond, who want to inspire donor investment in causes so critical to the fabric of our communities.

I am proud to be a fund development professional and to strive for success in this good work. Because at the core, it isn’t about fundraising, it is about seeking to build respectful relationships, earning the trust of individuals that we will honour and steward their investment, large or small, in a way that preserves the trust we have been given.

The experiences I’ve enjoyed over almost 20 years of working with RDC’s amazing group of senior administration colleagues, staff and faculty, being part of helping learners achieve their educational goals, has been a true privilege. But so memorable and humbling, has been the opportunity to engage donors, alumni, partners, sponsors, volunteers and community members. They showed me, time and again, their own passion for RDC, their commitment to our students and so often, the true meaning of generosity and philanthropy.

I have been honoured to work with donors who, during the saddest times of their lives, would establish a student award in memory of their spouse, son or daughter. As well, in the best of times, donors from our own community came forward to invest in RDC with major, transformational gifts, whom we have gratefully recognized. And in challenging times, I have seen businesses and their owners support new programs, believing in the value of investing in RDC to build and expand.

Because of these investments, we have been able to construct incredible new facilities, bring new programs to life and create scholarships for students, whose lives have been changed in remarkable ways.  As RDC becomes RDU, I hope you will also be inspired to invest in the exciting future that lies ahead for the College – and continue to make a meaningful difference in the lives of our learners.

Michael Donlevy, Vice President, Business Development at Red Deer College, will be retiring at the end of June.

After 15 years as a TV reporter with Global and CBC and as news director of RDTV in Red Deer, Duane set out on his own 2008 as a visual storyteller. During this period, he became fascinated with a burgeoning online world and how it could better serve local communities. This fascination led to Todayville, launched in 2016.

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SPARC Red Deer – Caring Adult Nominations open now!

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Red Deer community let’s give a round of applause to the incredible adults shaping the future of our kids. Whether they’re a coach, neighbour, teacher, mentor, instructor, or someone special, we want to know about them!

Tell us the inspiring story of how your nominee is helping kids grow up great. We will honour the first 100 local nominees for their outstanding contributions to youth development. It’s time to highlight those who consistently go above and beyond!

To nominate, visit Events (sparcreddeer.ca)

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Addictions

‘Harm Reduction’ is killing B.C.’s addicts. There’s got to be a better way

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From the Frontier Centre for Public Policy

By Susan Martinuk 

B.C. recently decriminalized the possession of small amounts of illicit drugs. The resulting explosion of addicts using drugs in public spaces, including parks and playgrounds, recently led the province’s NDP government to attempt to backtrack on this policy

Since 2016, more than 40,000 Canadians have died from opioid drug overdoses — almost as many as died during the Second World War.
Governments, health care professionals and addiction experts all acknowledge that widespread use of opioids has created a public health crisis in Canada. Yet they agree on virtually nothing else about this crisis, including its causes, possible remedies and whether addicts should be regarded as passive victims or accountable moral agents.

Fuelled by the deadly manufactured opioid fentanyl, Canada’s national drug overdose rate stood at 19.3 people per 100,000 in 2022, a shockingly high number when compared to the European Union’s rate of just 1.8. But national statistics hide considerable geographic variation. British Columbia and Alberta together account for only a quarter of Canada’s population yet nearly half of all opioid deaths. B.C.’s 2022 death rate of 45.2/100,000 is more than double the national average, with Alberta close behind at 33.3/100,00.

In response to the drug crisis, Canada’s two western-most provinces have taken markedly divergent approaches, and in doing so have created a natural experiment with national implications.

B.C. has emphasized harm reduction, which seeks to eliminate the damaging effects of illicit drugs without actually removing them from the equation. The strategy focuses on creating access to clean drugs and includes such measures as “safe” injection sites, needle exchange programs, crack-pipe giveaways and even drug-dispensing vending machines. The approach goes so far as to distribute drugs like heroin and cocaine free of charge in the hope addicts will no longer be tempted by potentially tainted street drugs and may eventually seek help.

But safe-supply policies create many unexpected consequences. A National Post investigation found, for example, that government-supplied hydromorphone pills handed out to addicts in Vancouver are often re-sold on the street to other addicts. The sellers then use the money to purchase a street drug that provides a better high — namely, fentanyl.

Doubling down on safe supply, B.C. recently decriminalized the possession of small amounts of illicit drugs. The resulting explosion of addicts using drugs in public spaces, including parks and playgrounds, recently led the province’s NDP government to attempt to backtrack on this policy — though for now that effort has been stymied by the courts.

According to Vancouver city councillor Brian Montague, “The stats tell us that harm reduction isn’t working.” In an interview, he calls decriminalization “a disaster” and proposes a policy shift that recognizes the connection between mental illness and addiction. The province, he says, needs “massive numbers of beds in treatment facilities that deal with both addictions and long-term mental health problems (plus) access to free counselling and housing.”

In fact, Montague’s wish is coming true — one province east, in Alberta. Since the United Conservative Party was elected in 2019, Alberta has been transforming its drug addiction policy away from harm reduction and towards publicly-funded treatment and recovery efforts.

Instead of offering safe-injection sites and free drugs, Alberta is building a network of 10 therapeutic communities across the province where patients can stay for up to a year, receiving therapy and medical treatment and developing skills that will enable them to build a life outside the drug culture. All for free. The province’s first two new recovery centres opened last year in Lethbridge and Red Deer. There are currently over 29,000 addiction treatment spaces in the province.

This treatment-based strategy is in large part the work of Marshall Smith, current chief of staff to Alberta’s premier and a former addict himself, whose life story is a testament to the importance of treatment and recovery.

The sharply contrasting policies of B.C. and Alberta allow a comparison of what works and what doesn’t. A first, tentative report card on this natural experiment was produced last year in a study from Stanford University’s network on addiction policy (SNAP). Noting “a lack of policy innovation in B.C.,” where harm reduction has become the dominant policy approach, the report argues that in fact “Alberta is currently experiencing a reduction in key addiction-related harms.” But it concludes that “Canada overall, and B.C. in particular, is not yet showing the progress that the public and those impacted by drug addiction deserve.”

The report is admittedly an early analysis of these two contrasting approaches. Most of Alberta’s recovery homes are still under construction, and B.C.’s decriminalization policy is only a year old. And since the report was published, opioid death rates have inched higher in both provinces.

Still, the early returns do seem to favour Alberta’s approach. That should be regarded as good news. Society certainly has an obligation to try to help drug users. But that duty must involve more than offering addicts free drugs. Addicted people need treatment so they can kick their potentially deadly habit and go on to live healthy, meaningful lives. Dignity comes from a life of purpose and self-control, not a government-funded fix.

Susan Martinuk is a senior fellow at the Frontier Centre for Public Policy and author of the 2021 book Patients at Risk: Exposing Canada’s Health Care Crisis. A longer version of this article recently appeared at C2CJournal.ca.

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