The
I

vol 5/#3

January/February 1993

JI Executive attend January retreat
by Larry Goble

For two nights and two and a half
days, members of the JI Executive Committee met at the Inn of
the Sea on Vancouver Island to
focus on three specific topics: JI
Infrastructure Funding, the JI
Strategic Plan, and sexual harassment in the workplace.
To assist us with these topics
three resource people were invited. Anne Burch, Acting Director, College and Technical
Programs, Ministry of Advanced
Education, Training and Technology, attended the infrastructure
funding session; Dave Whetter,
Principal with Cornerstone Planning Group, facilitated a session
on strategic planning; and
Samantha Sanderson of the Hastings Institute led us through
some exercises and discussions related to sexual harassment.
Each session became a part of
an ongoing process that will lead
us over the next few months to
complete:

Left to right: Anne Burch, Larry Goble •nd P•ul Smith, with
John Laveroclc (back to camera).

(i) a collaborative paper to be

from all JI staff, Board members, and academy client representatives; and
(iii)a follow-up committee to be
formed at the JI to develop a
sexual harassment policy and
an education program for the
benefit of JI staff and students.

written by members of the JI
and the Ministry of Advanced
Education, Training and Technology identifying our unique
infrastructure funding problem and recommending solutions;
(ii) a three-year strategic plan for
the JI that involves input

The general response of all attending the retreat was that the
working sessions were very
productive. The one evening we
had for relaxation brought out
some new musical talents in the
form of Irwin "the guitar picking
blues man" DeVries, along with

John "king of the keyboard" Laverock.
At the end of our first evening
session we had the opportunity to
toast and offer our congratulations to Dr. Tony Williams for successfully completing his PhD
program at Columbia Pacific University (see photo, page 3). Unfortunately, all that studying turned
Tony into the absent-minded professor - he forgot to bring his
saxophone to the retreat to assume his other title of Tony
"Kenny G" Williams.
Larry Goble is President of the
Justice Institute of B.C. 0

Fire Academy • Police Academy • Corrections Academy • Finance and Administration • Courts Academy
Educational Services and Interdisciplinary Studies • Paramedic Academy • Provincial Emergency Program Academy

IDS/Fire Academy co-sponsor
Juvenile Fire Setters Seminar
by Jackie Goodwin

Half of all fires are set by children. Child-set fires can be
divided into several categories,
but generally speaking there is a
difference between the children
who set fires out of curiosity and
those who knowingly set fires
through some other motivation.
On January 8 and 9, 45 people
attended a Juvenile Fire Setter
Seminar sponsored jointly by the
Fire Academy and Interdisciplinary Studies. Presenters for the
two-day seminar were Dr. Chris
Monaco of the Neurodevelopmental Centre in Phoenix, Arizona,
and Joseph Richardson of F.I.R.E.
Solutions, a private counselling
company in Warwick, Rhode Island.
The guest presenters and a
panel of representatives from

Paramedic
Academy
Instructors teach
in Hong Kong
After a busy year teaching EMA 2
courses at the Academy, Doug
Weis, Duncan Low, Norm
Matheson, Bobbie Walkley and
Bill Bailey dashed off to Hong
Kong to teach the Hong Kong
Ambulance Service's managerial
EMA 2 course.
The course couldn't have come
at a better time for the Hong
Kong Fire Services/Ambulance
Command. The service had come
under criticism following a New
Year's eve multi-casualty incident. This first of three scheduled courses demonstrates their
commitment to upgrade their services.
Revenue from these international programs help fund
additional training for BC's paramedics. 0
2

agencies concerned with juvenile
fire setting discussed the local
situation and looked at future
plans and solutions. Panel members were: Bob Jackson, Investigator, Fire Commissioner Office;
Dan Lemieux, representing the
International Association of
Arson Investigators; and Fire
Chief Pat Hampson from Squamish.
Most seminar participants
were fire service members, but
police, social workers and a representative of a foster parents
group also attended.
Presenters and participants all
agreed that the incidence of juvenile fire setting is a community
problem rather than a fire department issue, and that working
with juvenile fire setters requires
a community team approach.
While many people expressed a
desire for more involvement from
agencies under represented at the
seminar, everyone left with work-

able ideas for integrating future
plans.
Seminar co-ordinators Flora
MacLeod (IDS) and Jackie Goodwin (Fire Academy) have compiled notes and comments from
the seminar to forward to participants. They will also look at further training options.

Jackie Goodwin is an Instructor with the Fire Academy. 0

At the JI Executive Committee retreat on Vancouver Island (left to right):
Sam Mec/cbach, Phil Crosby.Jones, Irwin DeVries, Dean Winram, Larry Goble,
Anne Burch (Ministry of Advanced Education, Training and Technology}, Pat Ross,
Paul Smith, and John Laverock. (See story, page 1.)

The JI News Vol 51#3

•••SPOTLIGHT•••
On staff...
Changes
IUrsti Renwall has been hired
as the new Blake Hall
Receptionist effective March 31.
Kirsti previously worked as a receptionist at St. Paul's Hospital.
Coral Dorosh has left the
Library for a new career at Chancery Software where she will be
the technical support person for
libraries for the MacSchool product. Candice Shaw has taken
Coral's position and will now be
responsible for acquisitions and
serials.
Lucie Etienne has been
awarded Candice Shaw's position
to look after interlibrary loan and
circulation. Lucie has a Library
Technician Diploma from Vancouver Community College and has
worked at the Vancouver Health
Department Library and the Science and Technology Division of
the Vancouver Public Library.
She is originally from Golden,
and has just returned from a sixmonth working holiday in Switzerland.
Two recent additions to the
Paramedic Academy will help
polish the academy's courses.
Sharon Kervin joined the Paramedic Academy in January as a
program designer. Sharon came
from the BC Tel Instructional Services group. She is a former nurse
and has a Master's degree in
adult education. Karen Essex,
an SFU honours student in English, is with the Paramedic Academy on a four-month co-operative
program. During her time with
the academy Karen will revise,
edit and write course updates.
Terry Garrow was the successful applicant for the Paramedic Academy's new Emergency
Medical Dispatch Co-ordinator
position. Terry has experience as
a manager and practising dispatcher. He joined the academy
in early February and is now
developing continuing education

TheJ/News Vo/5/#3

~
~

J

Tony Williams, Director of the Paramedic Academy, explains one of the finer points of
his dissenation to JI President Larry Goble while Assistant Ubrarian Christin• Babec
looks on. Tony was presenting a copy of his PhD dissertation to the JI Library. Tony
completed his PhD in Health and Human Services, with a specialty in medical
education, from Columbia Pacific University, California, in January. For his
dissertation, he studied the use of video conferencing to teach clinical skills. His
experiments showed that medical s/cill• can be taught and evaluated through this
medium as effectively as through traditional c/aaaroom methods.
Tony's paper came second out of 64 re...rch papers submitted the the Journ11I of
Emergency Medical S.rvices for its 1990 conference. His study will also be reported
to the International Council for Computer Communication.

and recruit training for the BC
Ambulance Service's dispatchers.
His goal is to bring dispatch training to the same level of recognition as that enjoyed by other
academy programs.
Michelle Robinson has joined
the Corrections Academy staff as
an office assistant in a regular,
part-time position to assist with
the Employment Readiness Program.
Shauna Lappin will start
with Corrections Academy in
early April on a two-year term
appointment She will be assisting with the implementation of
the Employment Readiness Program.
Ron Painter, Director of the
Surrey Pre-Trial Services Centre,
has been seconded to the Corrections Academy for three months
starting March 1, to assist in developing a training program for
institutional shift supervisors.
Ron will work closely with Paul
Pershick and John Laverock to
develop the new supervisory program.

Karole Conway has returned
to Corrections Academy as Program Director, Institutional
Programs. For the past seven
months Karole has been working
at the Vancouver Metro Regional
Office on a project to analyze use
of auxiliary callboards in correctional institutions.

Recognition
Robin Blencoe, Minister of
Municipal Affairs, Recreation
and Housing, has appointed Fire
Academy Instructor Jackie
Goodwin as a member of the
Public Education Subcommittee
of the Fire Safety Advisory Council. The subcommittee was established to provide a forum for
discussion on problems and initiatives related to public fire safety
education. It will report to the
Fire Safety Advisory Council,
which will make recommendations to the Fire Commissioner
on such matters. Jackie's term of
service extends from January
1993 to December 1994. 0

3

Community Program Workers
Preventing
program to be launched
peer youth
in March
violence
focus of
new training
program
A new training program co-sponsored by the provincial Ministry of
Attorney General, the Solicitor
General Canada, and the Justice
Institute of BC, will provide crime
prevention practitioners, school
personnel, probation staff and
youth and child care workers with
an understanding of the continuum of peer violence.
The program is being offered in
response to the growing incidence
of peer violence among adolescents. It will provide a framework
for introducing non-violent strategies to resolve conflicts among
teens whose behaviour ranges
from bullying, theft of clothes or
personal items, to random physical assaults and use of weapons.
Many of these violent situations
occur among adolescents who are
not members of gangs or other
organized groups.
The five-day training program
will be offered in three Lower
Mainland communities and will be
divided into two components. The
first component will provide participants with an understanding of
the dimensions of adolescent peer
violence, explore the links between socio-economic and family
concerns with increased violent
behaviours, and present practical
approaches to intervene in potentially violent or violent incidents.
The second component will present specific skills that can be used
by adolescents to prevent, defuse
or mediate angry or potentially
violent situations. 0

4

The Corrections Academy's Employment Readiness Program for
Community Program Workers is
off and running. Information
packages have been sent to over
600 prospective applicants, and
Corrections Academy staff have
delivered public information sessions on the new program
throughout the province.
The Community Program
Worker training program is intended for people who want to
qualify for positions as community workers in the fields of corrections and related human
services. Career options for graduates include the role of probation officer, family court
counsellor, youth worker, parole
officer and specialized counsellor.
The program is divided into
two components: a three-week
prerequisite program which applicants can complete on a part-time
or full time basis; and a 15-week
component which offers a series
of modules covering such areas as
adult or youth probation work,
family court counselling, supervi-

sion of sex offenders, and other selected areas.
The first prerequisite program
will start on March 29, and the
first full program begins on June
28. To enquire about public information sessions and application·
procedures, call the Corrections
Academy at 222-7293. 0

Next deadline
for
submissions
to the

JI News
•

IS

April 21,

1993
The JI News Vol 51#3

JI structure removes walls
between agencies
by Irwin DeVries

From its earliest days, the Justice
Institute was envisioned as a
place where people from different
agencies within the justice and
public safety community could
work together and learn from one
another. This opportunity to
open lines of communication
among agencies is perhaps the
most distinguishing characteristic
of the JI.
It is never a simple task to
bring together groups from different walks of life and get them to
talk to one another. It is much
easier to promote communication
within a group where common
values, experiences and languages are shared. The JI was designed largely to remove some of
the walls between the agencies
that provide justice and public
safety services to professionals
and the public.
Because the JI is organized
along academy or divisional lines,
it is easy to become overly focused
on our own areas of responsibility, rather than to take the broader view of what the organization
is all about. It is particularly difficult to open cross-divisional lines
of communication when we all
have urgent priorities within our
own work units.
To help overcome some of these
barriers, the JI has built in a
number of features, such as crossdivisional committees, joint program activities and shared
facilities. However, beyond these
formal organizational features,
there are many opportunities to
interact with other divisions in
meaningful and productive ways.
Many of these opportunities
can be found by individual initiative. It can begin by talking to
someone, a counterpart from another academy, at a meeting, to
find out what kind of expertise he

The JI News Vol 51#3

or she has. Try reading the
course calendar from another division - is there a course there
that might meet the needs of one
of your students?
The JI has a valuable core of
experts in a wide variety of justice and public safety- as well
as instructional - spheres. Perhaps an administrative support
person has exceptional computer
skills. Or there may be a faculty
member with expertise on writing
exams who can do a workshop for
staff in your division.
Apart from work-related benefits, there are possible personal
advantages as well. For example,
Al Lund, Director of PTEC, is an
internationally recognized guinea
pig judge (no, I'm not making this
up); he found an excellent pet for
my eight-year-old daughter (and I
get to clean the cage). Another
example ... stock person Gordon

Bryan is an experienced guitar
builder who gave me some
advice on how to adjust my guitars.
I have had the privilege of
working in three different divisions or academies within the JI,
and over this time have in one
way or another interacted in a significant way with every academy
or division. The best part of these
interactions has been getting to
know many of my "neighbours"
across the JI. Believe me, we
have an incredible gathering of
quality people in the Justice Institute. If you haven't yet experienced the benefits of working at
the JI beyond what you are doing
in your own division, I would encourage you to look up and see
what you're missing.
Irwin DeVries is Program
Director, Courts Academy. 0

B.C. Ambulance Service
Executive Director graduates from
Paramedic Academy
by Tony Williams

Nick Haazen, Executive Director
of the BC Ambulance Service,
wanted to learn about his organization from the ground up.
For the past 18 months he has
been visiting every comer of the
province, riding in ambulances
and talking to every segment of
the Service. He also travelled to
Sechelt, on weekends, to take the
EMA 1 course.
In January, Haazenjoined the
EMA 2 class at the Justice Institute. He demanded that he be
treated exactly as every other student, and he was: he stayed with

them at the Sands Best Western
Motel, travelled by class transport, and completed all of the
tasks and requirements demanded of the other students.
Completing an EMA 2 is no
easy task. Completing it while
running the Service was a huge
job. Word has it his light was
often on at 4:30 am to accomplish
this. At his class graduation dinner, his classmates gave him a
warm farewell by singing "That's
what friends are for."
Tony Williams is Director of the
Paramedic Academy. 0

5

JI Move Update
by Barry Hawkins

The JI Express to the New Westminster campus is well underway. So far, the express bus has
picked up more than of 21 firmsexcluding Ministry, city and JI
groups - as part of the project
team.
Recent activities have included
• the appointment of Professional Business Interiors the
furniture and equipment consults for the project, and
• completion of a security review
of the design.
The project is moving into a
very busy phase: the 80% design
submission to the Ministry will be
made the first week of March;
and final working drawings will
continue as the May tendering period approaches. In the meantime, site work will start soon,
when a number of trees that

would otherwise b.e destroyed by
campus construction will be relocated.
The next major milestones for
the project will be approval from
the Ministry to proceed to construction, and issuance of tender
documents.
To keep JI staff up-to-date with

move-related events, a set of noon
hour sessions have been scheduled for March 26 in the Blake
Hall Theatre. The building model
and latest design information will
be presented during these sessions.
Barry Hawkins is Project Manager for fhe JI's new facility. 0

Examination requests
increase in Fire Academy
The Fire Academy is experiencing
a major increase in examination
requests for volunteer certification and the officer training
programs. In February, the Academy processed 1, 780 requests.
This is the most for any month
since the inception of the program
in 1986. Exam requests for the
past five months have been: October 601, November 587, Decem-

ber 1,238, January 760, and February 1, 780.
With an average of 120 new enrolments in the programs each
month, the Academy is nearing
more than 3,000 active participants. This has created a tremendous workload for staff and has
resulted in an additional staff person being assigned to the examination area on a full time basis. 0

Notes & Notices
JI "mini-move" to take place
in March
Visitors and students will see
some changes to the JI's Jericho
campus at the end of March. Lawrence Hall, which has housed the

6

Fire Academy, Paramedic Academy, Library, Media Centre and
eight classrooms for the past 15
years, has reached the end of its
useful life. All of the current occupants will be moving up the hill to
MacDonald Hall on March 20. 0

The JI News Vol 5/#3