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Outgoing UCPBF President, Raya Shadursky, officially opened the conference during a wine and cheeze reception on the Friday evening. Her preliminary remarks identified some of the accomplishments of the Federation during the last two years.
Conference proceedings began on earnest on Saturday morning. After the opening speeches, Colleen Kelly, one of Alberta's leading organizational consultants, engaged delegates in an "ice-breaking" exercise. The goal was to determine an individual's or an organization's managerial type, i.e. analytic, ruler, relater or entertainer.
A plenary session entitled: "Nation Building", and moderated by Andrew Hladyshevsky, founding Director, Canadian Race Relations Institute and President of the Ukrainian Canadian Taras Shevchenko Foundation, set the tone and the pace for the Convention.
Volodmyr Boychuk, Past President, SUSK and self proclaimed student activist, iterated that SUSK is a non-denominational, non-political organization. He also made a plea for each UCPB Association to establish youth leadership awards.
Dr. Orest Talpash, former UCPBF Executive Member and founding Director of the Canada-Ukraine Foundation, summarized the history of Ukrainians in Canada. He suggested that that the contemporary focus should be on assisting the community.
Adrian Boyko, President, the Ukrainian Canadian Congress (Saskatchewan), underlined that 43 per cent of the Canadian population is ethno-cultural", i.e. neither French nor English. He also articulated the criteria that the Saskatchewan UCC utilizes prior to undertaking a new project: it must be a Canadian issue of strategic priority to Ukrainians; it must have benefits for all of society; and, it must enhance the ability to influence the decision makers. Finally, Mr. Boyko noted that a recent UCC resolution was to name two individuals under 25 years of age on each of its local boards.
Roman Onufrichuk, Community Animator, Director of TV Programming for Knowledge Network, described how previous generations developed and built the Ukrainian community in Canada. He felt that part of our legacy was to ensure that their contributions are kept intact as our community evolves and changes. These challenges can be summarized with the question: "How do we honour Baba?"
Dr. David Marples was Saturday's luncheon keynote speaker. His topic was "Independent Ukraine, 1991-1997: A Political and Economic Assessment". Dr. Marples addressed issues such as the relative peace in Ukraine versus that of Russia and the slow pace of economic reform in Ukraine. He noted that Ukraine has attracted only 1.5 billion US dollars in investment since 1991; this is considered relatively modest and is a contributing factor to the slow growth of Ukraine's economy. He indicated that today, many Ukrainians need to be convinced of the benefits of capitalism due to wide spread corruption and crime in the country. Dr. Marples compared many of Ukraine's problems to those of other post-Soviet republics.
I was able to attend the latter two workshops. The "Communications" workshop, given by consultant, Daria Luciw, was especially pertinent. Ms. Luciw distributed a communications manual that covers topics ranging from how to set up a communications plan, criteria of a story newsworthy, successful media relations, special events checklist and tips for creating newsletters.
The "Creative Partnership Building" Workshop was facilitated by Terry Vaughan and Vic Morrison, of Alberta Community Development. There central thesis was that a lack of resources forces groups to work with one other, enabling organizations to achieve their goals. Most "partnering", especially in the context of not-for-profit organizations, is short term, relatively informal and often centred around events. Because these partnerships are short term, immediate solutions associated with partnering must be readily identified and overcome. Use of a facilitator is expedient since s/he has no vested interest in the outcome.
During a Sunday morning session, Dariusz Polanski and Michael Kostiuk gave a one hour demonstration of the Internet, including how to access some the Ukrainian related Internet sites.
"Government Relations" was the title of another plenary session. Participants included UCPBA Ottawa colleague and VP Political Relations UCPBF, Nicholas Turinski. Other participants were: Dr. Peter Savaryn, lawyer (Edmonton); John Petryshyn, lawyer (Winnipeg); Mychailo Waryshyn, educator Emeritus, (Toronto); and, Michael Savaryn, lawyer and Catholic School Board Trustee.
One of the most interesting ideas of the Conference evolved during this session. This issue was, what should we call the Ukrainian community in Canada? Many other peoples are known by a single, easily recognized phrase such as "First Nations" for the Aboriginal people or the "Two Founding Nations" for the French and the English. It was decided that the Ukrainian Canadians should have the title: "Nation Builder". Throughout the conference it was readily used and adopted. "Nation Builder" succinctly describes the contributions and roles Ukrainian Canadians have played in building and developing Canada.
The annual general meeting and election of the new UCPBF Executive took place on Sunday afternoon. Donna Korchinski, freelance writer and broadcaster from Calgary became the new UCPBF President.
A "Canadian Foundation for Ukrainian Studies" Endowment Award was presented for the first time. Peter Savaryn of Edmonton was the recipient. Attendance at the Conference was: 57 full-time and 19 secondary delegates for a total of 76 registered delegates and 59 partial attendees.
The Western hospitality and flavour were paramount in the official and in the out of conference activities. For example, within the conference there was an Internet/computer drop-in centre, a trade fair and a hospitality suite. Square dancers, replete with their costumes, entertained the delegates at a pancake breakfast on Saturday morning. Line dancing lessons were available after Saturday workshops. Saturday evening events were staged at the Ranchman's Saloon, a long established western style dance saloon. A gargantuan buffet dinner and real western style dancing was the order of the evening.
Click here, to see the full size image.
The site itself is overgrown: there is little left of the original internment camp except for random strands of barbed wire and small rock piles where the fence posts once stood.
A second internment site at the Cave and Basin as well as the Banff Springs Hotel were also visited. At the latter site, the internees expanded the size of the golf course from 9 to 18 holes.
Overall, the conference and all ancillary activities were well run and congenial. Delegates, at least this one, enjoyed the western flavour and theme to the convention. Even the weather was almost perfect.
Michael Kostiuk, VP Communications - Internet, UCPBF
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