BCIT Distinguished Awards Gala

Clive Beddoe
Principal Founder and past Chairman and CEO, WestJet

In September 2007, Clive Beddoe was appointed WestJet Chairman of the Board of Directors having previously held the roles of President and Chief Executive Officer. Mr. Beddoe was instrumental in making WestJet one of the most successful airlines in recent aviation history. His keen business acumen has shaped the development of WestJet’s corporate culture, executive team, and strategy. In December 2019, Mr. Beddoe resigned from his position as Chairman of the Board following the purchase of WestJest by Onex Group. In January 2019, WestJet took possession of its first Boeing 787 Dreamliner, and named the plane after its Founder and former Chairman Beddoe.

A true entrepreneur, Mr. Beddoe has a strong background in financial planning and strategic management that was gained through several successful real estate and business enterprises. From 2008 to 2013, he also served as a director of the Alberta Investment Management Corporation (AIMCo), which is one of Canada’s largest and most diversified institutional investment managers with more than $90 billion of assets under management.

Mr. Beddoe has received numerous awards. In 2009, he was inducted into the Marketing Hall of Legends – Visionary category, and, in 2008, was recognized by the University of Victoria’s School of Business as its Distinguished Entrepreneur of the Year. In 2007, he was recognized with the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Canadian Youth Business Federation. He has received honorary degrees from two Canadian universities. In 2012, he was inducted into the Canadian Business Hall of Fame and, in 2013, the Calgary Business Hall of Fame. In 2014, he was inducted into Canada’s Aviation Hall of Fame.

Mr. Beddoe has been personally involved in numerous organizations, most notably the Boys and Girls Club of Canada. He was born in England, and immigrated to Canada in the 1970s. He resides in Calgary, Alberta.

Clive Beddoe shares his advice to students: “Anything is possible. You can really do anything in your life. I was nearly 50 when I started WestJet…Young people should know you don’t have to worry or panic as to what you’ll do in life. In time it will become apparent, these things evolve.”

Read Clive’s inspiring story and watch his video.

Carol Lee
Chair, Vancouver Chinatown Foundation
CEO & Co-founder, Linacare Cosmetherapy Inc.

Carol Lee is CEO and Co-founder of Linacare Cosmetherapy Inc., a company that manufactures and sells therapeutic skincare products. Linacare is headquartered in Vancouver’s historic Chinatown district. With longstanding family ties to the history of Chinatown, she is strongly committed to the revitalization of the area and is the Chair of the Vancouver Chinatown Foundation, Chair of the Vancouver Chinatown Revitalization Committee, and Honorary Patron of the Chinese Canadian Military Museum.

She serves on several other boards and organizations including the Harvard Business School Canadian Advisory Board, the Faculty Advisory Board of Sauder Business School, the Leadership Council of the Perimeter Institute of Theoretical Physics in Waterloo, Governor General David Johnston’s Rideau Hall Foundation, and is Chair of the Rideau Hall Foundation Innovation Committee. She is also a member of federal Finance Minister Morneau’s Advisory Council on Economic Growth.

Ms. Lee has a Bachelor of Commerce from the Sauder School of Business at the University of British Columbia and an MBA from Harvard Business School. She is the recipient of the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Medal and an Honorary Doctorate of Laws degree from the University of British Columbia

Read Carol’s inspiring story and watch her video.

Katie Klumper
Principal, Deloitte Digital & HEAT

Katie Klumper graduated in 2004 from BCIT’s Marketing Management – Communications diploma program. Currently, as Principal of Deloitte Digital and HEAT (New York creative agency owned by Deloitte), she is charged with innovating the future advertising agency model to best serve clients and brands. Previously, she was President of KBS, a multi-national A-list advertising agency.

Ms. Klumper has guided clients through some of their most innovative marketing initiatives and firsts. Some of her clients have included BMW, Red Robin, Keds, Homegoods, and Samsung. Her experience spans big branding efforts to innovative technology, all designed to shift culture. She is an active member of the equality movement, designing programs for females to excel to c-suite positions, as well as movement groups like Female Quotient, Heymama, Female Founders Collective, and The Chief. She has been recognized by the AdWeek 50 as one of the top 50 most indispensable marketing, media, and tech executives; named a 40 Under 40 recipient by Direct Marketing News; given the Advertising Women of New York (AWNY) Mother of the Year award; and, most recently, recognized as an AWNY Game Changer.

Read Katie’s inspiring story and watch her video.

Derek Manky
Chief, Security Insights & Global Threat Alliances, Fortinet

Derek Manky graduated in 2003 from BCIT’s Computer Systems – Data Communication Systems diploma program. He has served on BCIT’s Computer Systems Technology Program Advisory Council since 2011.

Mr. Manky is Chief, Security Insights and Global Threats Alliances, with Fortinet. Fortinet secures the largest enterprise, service provider, and government organizations around the world. Fortinet empowers its customers with intelligent, seamless protection across the expanding attack surface and the power to take on ever-increasing performance requirements of the borderless network. Only the Fortinet Security Fabric architecture can deliver security features without compromise to address the most critical security challenges, whether in networked, application, multi-cloud, or edge environments. In addition, more than 200 security threat researchers, engineers, and forensic specialists comprise the FortiGuard Labs threat research team operating around the world, to track and protect customers against the evolving threat landscape. The team collaborates with the world’s leading threat intelligence organizations. Fortinet ranks number one in the most security appliances shipped worldwide and more than 400,000 customers trust Fortinet to protect their businesses.

Mr. Manky formulates security strategy with more than 15 years of cybersecurity experience. His ultimate goal is to make a positive impact towards the global fight on cybercrime. He provides thought leadership to industry, and has presented research and strategy worldwide at premier security conferences. He plays a strategic and visionary role in consulting with leading CSOs/CISOs of Fortune 500 companies worldwide, across multiple industries. As a cybersecurity expert, his work has included meetings with leading political figures and key policy stakeholders, including law enforcement, who help define the future of cybersecurity. Mr. Manky is actively involved in several global threat intelligence initiatives including NATO NICP, INTERPOL Expert Working Group, the Cyber Threat Alliance (CTA) working committee, and FIRST—all in effort to shape the future of actionable threat intelligence and proactive security strategy. He works globally with the security industry and Computer Emergency Response teams (CERT) to provide context as well as streamline mitigation advice and threat forecasts. Within Fortinet, Mr. Manky has created a global program to enable deep learning of the threat landscape for technical security architects as well as threat researchers, to combine technical IT skills with valuable threat research knowledge. It also helps provide training and education to the global FortiGuard Labs team to ensure consistency and advancement of skills within the company to keep up with the ever-evolving threat landscape.

In effort to educate, Mr. Manky is regularly featured in top-tier media and guest articles including CNN, Bloomberg, NBC, MSNBC, Wired, CSO, Forbes, The Wall Street Journal, and The Financial Times. He was also the recipient of CRN’s ‘Security Superstar’ award. He is an advisory board member of INSEC WORLD. He continues to dedicate his career to security, research, and education. Mr. Manky resides in the Lower Mainland, British Columbia.

Read Derek’s inspiring story and watch his video.

Jamie Finley
Research Assistant, Natural Health and Food Products Research Group, BCIT

Jamie Finley is a Research Assistant with the Natural Health and Food Products Research Group (NRG) in Applied Research at BCIT. He was nominated for his contributions—which are rooted not only in his commitment to BCIT’s applied model but also in his experience as a student and staff person who is Deaf—to BCIT and to the broader community. His approach to sharing information, educating those with whom he works, and ensuring a better environment for anyone who experiences a difference for which BCIT is not always set up, makes all of us better at what we do. His contributions are in many roles—as a researcher, a team member, a Faculty and Staff Association (FSA) member, and an advocate.

Mr. Finley was also nominated for his participation in the FSA as a Tech Rep and Equity Caucus member, his involvement in CAUT activities, and his collaboration with the FSA staff and board for advancing its practices. He is also one of NRG’s specialists in fermentation, identification of micro-organisms, and microbial load criteria for agricultural products. His overall goal at NRG is to advance the state of practice for characterization and quality control of commercial and research-based natural health products.

He began his career as a co-operative student with the Michael Smith Laboratories at the University of British Columbia and BCIT’s NRG. He went on to characterize lipids, plasmid DNA, and siRNA for a leading molecular therapeutics company and was involved in developing chemical characterization methods for therapeutic study. Prior to joining NRG full time, Mr. Finley worked as a microbiologist for a leading BC analytical laboratory where he analyzed the microbiological and chemical parameters of different materials.

His work is embedded in the principle of ongoing learning, always seeking to learn something new every day. This is exactly the kind of learning that BCIT delivers, promotes, and advances. His work with NRG influences the direction of industry through building relationships with stakeholders and providing expertise to ensure quality products.

He is also a co-lead with the Diversity Circles team for an upcoming event on allyship and audism, spoke at the April 2018 FSA general meeting on ‘Equity in a Nutshell’, and shared his experiences attending the CAUT Equity Conference on the FSA blog.

Mr. Finley graduated in 2003 from BCIT’s Biotechnology diploma program and in 2005 with a Bachelor of Science (Honours) from the University of British Columbia.

Read Jamie’s inspiring story and watch his video.

Michelle Wan
Software Developer, Elastic Path Software

Michelle Wan graduated with distinction from BCIT’s Computer Systems Technology (Cloud Computing option) diploma program in February 2019. As a high-achieving student, valedictorian nominee, and student leader, she exemplifies BCIT’s commitment to innovation, collaboration, and excellence.

Ms. Wan has brought national acclaim and media attention to her work and to BCIT. Extending herself far beyond most students in her program, she presented her innovative individual and student group work across Canada, as well as at prominent industry events including the BCTECH Summit, CACCN Dynamics of Critical Care, and the CAN-CWIC Celebration of Women in Computing.

While a student, she worked on two very prominent projects. The first is an app that manages data from a BCIT-created concrete strength tester, allowing it to help save lives in earthquake-prone locations. The second is an Alexa Lab Simulation (for BCIT’s Specialty Nursing Simulation Lab) which received widespread interest for its innovation as well as its ability to help nurses work more effectively and reduce errors.

After completing a summer internship with Vancouver-founded Elastic Path Software in 2018, Ms. Wan was offered a job three months prior to graduation. She is now a Software Developer with Elastic Path.

Read Michelle’s inspiring story and watch her video.

Distinguished Alumni Award

Frank Rizzardo
President and General Manager, Emcon Services
Civil and Structural Engineering, Diploma, 1973
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Distinguished Alumni Award

Suki Sekhon
President, CSR Group of Companies
Marketing Management – Real Estate, Diploma, 1984
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Outstanding Student Leadership Award

Nadia Dobrianskaia
Computer Scientist, Simba Technologies
Computer Systems Technology, Diploma, 2015
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Faculty & Staff Association Award

Amy Fell
Acting Director, BCIT SITE Centre
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Honourary Doctorate Recipients

David Emerson
Chair of the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada
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Honourary Doctorate Recipients

Diana Swain
Senior Investigative Journalist, CBC News
Host, CBC News Network
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Distinguished Alumni Award

Marty Edwards
Director of the Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team, US Department of Homeland Security
Automation and Instrumentation, Diploma, 1990
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Distinguished Alumni Award

Randy Smallwood
President and Chief Executive Officer, Silver Wheaton
Mine Engineering, Diploma, 1990
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Outstanding Student Leadership Award Recipient

Lauren Lee
Security Operations Officer, Vancouver International Airport
Airport Operations, Diploma, 2015
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Faculty & Staff Association Award

Ralph Hargreaves
Retired, BCIT Assistant Instructor
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Honourary Doctorate Recipient

Dominic Barton
Global Managing Director, McKinsey and Company
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Honourary Doctorate Recipient

Julie Payette
Chief Operating Officer, Montreal Science Centre
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Distinguished Alumni Award

Markus Frind
CEO and Founder, Plenty Of Fish Media Inc
Computer Systems Technology (CST) Diploma, 1999
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Distinguished Alumni Award

John Knappett
Chief Executive Officer, Knappett Group
Geomatics (Survey) Engineering, 1974
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Outstanding Student Leadership Award Recipient

Deanna Hill
Media Strategist / Buyer, MacLaren McCann
Marketing Management Communications, 2014
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Faculty & Staff Association Award

Thomas Abbuhl
BCIT Department of Civil Engineering – Faculty / Work Experience Coordinator
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Honourary Doctorate Recipient

Bill Good
Host, CKNW
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Honourary Doctorate Recipient

Launi Skinner
CEO at First West Credit Union
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Distinguished Alumni Award for Lifetime Achievement

Mark Angelo
Chair, The Rivers Institute at BCIT
Past Program Head, BCIT Fish, Wildlife, and Recreation
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Distinguished Alumni Award for Professional Leadership

Peter Hrdlitschka
DiplT ’78, Building Technology
President, Ledcor Construction Limited, Western Canada
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Distinguished Alumni Award for Entrepreneurial Innovation

David Yochlowitz
DiplT ’87, Administrative Management, ’90 (OLA), Bachelor of Business Administration
Chief Executive Officer, ABC Recycling
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Excellence in Teaching and Research Award

Dr. Sanja Boskovic
Chief Instructor, BCIT Power Engineering
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