Laura is a 36-year-old small business owner. She has two kids, aged 5 and seven. Currently on leave from her Ph.D. in history, she is working hard to maintain her small restaurant afloat throughout the these difficult times. Laura has spent her life fighting to guard the places we love. Over the past few years, she has grown captivated with getting children out into nature. Every Monday, Laura is joined by just a few other parents who take their children outside for ‘forest school’- which was a response to an absence of meaningful opportunities for out of doors play in our institutions. Providing access to the outside for vulnerable children and youth is one area of education policy that she would love to make a difference in.
Laura has been an environmental activist since she was a young child. She was raised within the country where her neighbours have at all times been farmers, observing their wisdom and likewise their struggles. Her political engagement began as an undergraduate student where she became involved in environmental advocacy groups because she was deeply concerned in regards to the lack of commitment on behalf of all governments on meeting the Kyoto Protocol targets.
In 2018 Laura ran as a Candidate in her home riding of Dufferin—Caledon and it was probably the most meaningful experiences of her life. While recognizing there continues to be much work to do, considered one of the things that she has learned is that to make transformative change, we must devote all of our schools in life to doing this work. By representing the Green Party, Laura hopes to indicate others that we have to be daring and imaginative in how we go about making these changes. The establishment has failed us. Laura believes that the people in her community and across Ontario deserve higher leadership. We’d like a government that works for the people – in earnest.