Aide internationale pour l'enfance
   

Board of Directors

In Canada

 

Roxana Robin : General Director

 

Roxana Robin is the founder and general director of Children's Care International. After volunteering at an orphanage in India, she realized the importance of fighting for children's rights and chose to dedicate her life to this cause. It was after her return to Canada that she founded CCI in 2000.

In 2006 Roxana Robin was awarded the Peace Medal by the YMCA of Greater Montreal as well as the Medal of Merit of the Order of the Knights of Saint Catherine of Sinai for her involvement in the fight against the exploitation of children.

           Christine Durocher : President

Christine Durocher is so deeply committed, her entire existence and work revolve around the child.  She is the Chair of CCI’s Board of Directors, and has been involved with this organisation since its inauguration.  Year after year, Christine goes off to Vizianagaram in India to share the daily life of children and parents that are cared for by CCI.  She spreads her deep love for children around Montreal as well, in the very middle of the Saint-Laurent area, as Managing Director of the Tchou-Tchou Daycare Centre, a hub of activity overflowing with happiness.  In fact, this daycare centre is well known for the quality of its services and its educational leadership.  In 2010, the Tchou-Tchou Daycare Centre joined forces with Dr. Gilles Julien, a well-known community paediatrician, in inaugurating a centre for community paediatrics.  This is all the more important because there is a shortage of community resources for families, in that area, plus some 44% of children under 5 years old survive under the poverty level.  This is also one of Montreal’s neighbourhoods where children are more at risk of exhibiting slowness in development at the time they enter school.  In addition to working in the education sector for the past 15 years, Christine is also the author of a guide:  Le Montréal des enfants (A child’s Montreal), published by Editions Stanké.  She dreams of a world where all children are able to enjoy their childhood. 

          Bernard Beauchamp : Vice-President and Treasurer

Bernard Beauchamp is president of Tours Chanteclerc; a tour-operator specialized in organizing travel itineraries since 1970. He is a graduate of the École Supérieure des Transports in Paris, former president of the Association of Travel Agents of Quebec, and current president and founder of the Quebec Tour Operators Association. Father of three daughters, Bernard Beauchamp is personally interested in the fate of children around the world, particularly underprivileged children.

          Hélène Vanier : Secretary

Hélène Vanier holds a Master’s in Art History, and has worked to promote arts and culture for over twenty-five years.  In fact she managed a film festival in Estrie, and presently runs an exhibition centre on Montreal’s South Shore.  In 1999, she spent some time in Nepal where she stayed in an orphanage run by Child Haven International.  She repeated the experience in Bangladesh in 2007.  Those few months spent in the company of children, and her fortuitous meeting with Bonnie and Fred Cappuccino, Founders of Child Haven, convinced her that it was urgent that she take action and commit herself to children’s causes.  In this vein, she has for the past ten years organised fundraising activities for Child Haven and CCI, and wishes to continue taking concrete steps to see that children who are dispossessed or victims of exploitation gain access to education.

          

Hélène Masson : Member of the board

A retired staff member of an United Nations Agency several years past, Hélène Masson now works for various NGOs either as consultant or volunteer, most recently in the field of copy-editing, translation and the organisation of special events. Having lived outside of Canada for a good while, and visited or worked in several developing countries, she maintains that if everyone made an effort to get involved, even just a little bit, this world would be more welcoming and promising for children. Mother of three and grandmother of seven, she firmly believes that the type of future we will enjoy depends not only on the education received by children around the world, but especially on the way they are treated today. An unhappy child will make war; a contented child will strive for peace.

           Sélim Kfoury : Member of the board

Sélim Kfoury earned a PhD in Educational Science from the University of Montreal. After teaching for some twenty years, mainly as assistant professor at that University, he started his own consulting company in 1984, specialising in training and human resource management. He has sat on several governing boards, among others the PACHE, an n.g.o. that collects funds to help the schools in Upper Egypt. Now retired, he works as a volunteer in literacy and francisation programmes for new immigrants. He would like his experience with CCI to benefit dispossessed children and those who are victims of exploitation.

Sue Simatos: Member of the board

Sue Simatos, holder of a BA in Psychology, is Spiritual Animator (Community and Guidance) for John Rennie and Lindsay Place High Schools in Pointe Claire, Quebec. She has been instrumental in providing a forum for students to become involved in social justice issues both globally and locally. Through a social justice team, students support organisations such as CCI, Dans la Rue, Amnesty International, Amcal Youth Services and the Old Brewery Mission, and learn public-speaking and leadership skills in order to become effective advocates for children who are less fortunate than themselves. Ms. Simatos also organises eco-friendly and intercultural volunteer trips to South and Central America, during which students learn responsible citizenship and are sensitised to the needs of developing communities.