{"id":2661,"date":"2018-12-11T14:10:27","date_gmt":"2018-12-11T19:10:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/bpapm\/?post_type=cu_people&p=2661"},"modified":"2025-12-18T10:11:34","modified_gmt":"2025-12-18T15:11:34","slug":"jennifer-breakspear","status":"publish","type":"cu_people","link":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/bpapm\/people\/jennifer-breakspear\/","title":{"rendered":"Jennifer Breakspear"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Jennifer Breakspear worked as a paramedic in Eastern Ontario for ten years, until she felt the need to find work that didn\u2019t take such a heavy toll on her \u201cbody and heart\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So she accepted a job as a local staff person for The Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), and enrolled in night courses at Carleton. It was something she\u2019d long wanted to do but couldn\u2019t make fit in a paramedic\u2019s shift work schedule.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI took courses in different subjects\u2014French, political science\u2014and found my passion for learning. I discovered I loved going to school, chewing over new material and engaging with professors and students about ideas,\u201d says Ms. Breakspear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When she heard about the human rights policy stream in the new BPAPM program, the 35-year-old immediately signed up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI had identified as a queer woman in my teens and had long been a human rights activist for LGBTQ rights, so the opportunity to work on issues directly related to that was exciting,\u201d recalls Ms. Break\u00adspear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She enrolled in BPAPM\u2019s first cohort and became part of a tight-knit group, despite the age difference.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe quickly formed a little study group who would come to our place to study. It was an intense workload and you either had to pull together or sink alone,\u201d she recalls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ms. Breakspear says they were all excited to be part of this new adventure and she remembers the wonderful faculty, staff and the guest lecturers in the BPAPM program.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey cultivated a supportive environment,\u201d she says. \u201cThey brought a passion to the program that made it an exciting and fun place to be.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They also taught her about policymaking\u2014knowledge she still draws on as the Executive Director of PHS Community Services Society, a non-profit organization that offers supportive housing, healthcare, harm reduction and community development in Vancouver\u2019s Downtown Eastside and beyond.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cProfessors Les Pal and Calum Carmichael took us through the steps of policymaking: researching, identifying issues, analyzing current policy and implementing it,\u201d says Ms. Breakspear. \u201cNow when I walk into a meeting with government policymakers I have a good sense of how to engage with them, where they\u2019re going and how to ad\u00address the issues important to our organization.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The PHS Community Services Society operates 18 social housing facilities and shelters in Vancouver and two in Victoria. The organiza\u00adtion opened the first legal supervised injection site in North Amer\u00adica.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs the leader of one of the largest non-profit supportive housing organizations in BC, I engage with all levels of government on pressing issues,\u201d she explains. \u201cGetting a degree in public policy was one of the best ways I could have prepared for this career, even though, at the time,  I didn\u2019t have any sense of where I might end up. I really appreciate that  I developed a solid grounding upon which to build my career at Carleton. \u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She says her work reflects her upbringing, which taught her to str\u00adive to change her community for the better. Her previous roles were as executive director of Qmunity: BC\u2019s Queer Resource Centre, and executive director of Options for Sexual Health. Then and now, her focus has been on building relationships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI often think of my work as relationship management. I meet a lot of people every day and I\u2019m astounded by how often I refer back to them. Maybe we hire them down the road or call them for advice,\u201d says Ms. Breakspear. \u201cMy advice to new graduates is to dive into your community and be fearless about getting to know people.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This story was replicated from the Faculty of Public Affairs website<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2233,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"cu_people_first_name":"Jennifer","cu_people_last_name":"Breakspear","cu_people_initials":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"cu_people_type":[30],"cu_people_expertise":[],"class_list":["post-2661","cu_people","type-cu_people","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","cu_people_type-alumni"],"acf":{"cu_people_job_title":"Executive Director, PHS Community Services Society","cu_people_degree":"BPAPM, 2003","cu_building":false,"cu_people_office_num":"","cu_people_pronoun":"none","cu_people_designation":"","cu_people_email":"","cu_people_phone":"","cu_people_phone_ext":"","cu_people_linkedin":"","cu_people_bluesky":"","cu_people_twitter":"","cu_people_instagram":"","cu_people_facebook":"","cu_people_website":"","cu_people_orcid":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/bpapm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_people\/2661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/bpapm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_people"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/bpapm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/cu_people"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/bpapm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/bpapm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_people\/2661\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3846,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/bpapm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_people\/2661\/revisions\/3846"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/bpapm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2233"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/bpapm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"cu_people_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/bpapm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_people_type?post=2661"},{"taxonomy":"cu_people_expertise","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/bpapm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_people_expertise?post=2661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}