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The beginning | What drives us | About our founder | Acknowledgments | Contact us |
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About our Founder
Ms. Poole has been recognized for excellence in her projects by the International Association of Business Communicators, of which she is an accredited member. She holds a Master’s degree in peace and conflict studies from Royal Roads University in British Columbia, where she serves on the advisory board for the Applied Communications program and has a long involvmenet with networking organizations for professional women, visitation and advocacy for incarcerated women, and Toastmasters International. She has been a solo parent since 1993 and considers herself first a mother, with four teenage children (Naomi, Zoë, Daniel, and Adam), and for two years a long term foster child (Aryan) who in May 2004 was reunited with his extended family. In June 2004, the family repatriated to Canada to join her daughter Naomi, author of Stop! Don't Eat Me, who is studying in Ottawa. The concept of PeaceDiviners™ initially evolved over the course of 2000–2003 when Ms Poole became increasingly disillusioned with the lack of impact of large development projects on the poor people they were purported to serve. At the same time she observed much smaller amounts of money used effectively by the social entrepreneurs in those same communities. The PeaceDiviners™ core principles, mission and goals have remained the same from the start, although the strategies to achieve them continue to transform and expand Her Philosophy For the sake of future harmony on the planet it is essential that those in the privileged classes take personal responsibility for future generations, regardless of position or motive. All lifestyles will be affected as population growth, combined with lack of education and choice, continue to pressure our natural resources and ecosystems. Personal security is also at stake as hunger and desperation grow. No matter what the condition of people’s hearts or level of empathy, the world’s problems are at everyone’s doorstep and the extent to which we assist will affect the quality of our own lives. We’ve run out of excuses to keep our heads in the sand. We simply can’t keep believing that the world’s ails are not our personal problems. As individuals, we each have our own responsibility to do our part to solve them. The events of September 11 alone proved to us that the world cannot be compartmentalized. Global poverty and conflict is everyone’s problem. Poverty, our first concern, includes many aspects of life and is not only measured by income or hunger. Poverty of education, for example, is a huge problem, especially for girls in many developing countries, as is eco-poverty, and lack of rights, voice, water, or simple human dignity. We are working to facilitate understanding between the worlds of the ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots’ and to encourage our exceptional partners in the field who are accomplishing what governments alone cannot. |
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Penelope (Penny) Laurie Poole was born in segregated South Africa in 1958 and emigrated to Canada in 1960 with her anti-apartheid parents. At Ryerson University in Toronto (1978) she finished her undergraduate in print journalism, which she practiced for a decade — including four years in Greece, where she edited a monthly magazine and an English language daily newspaper. She was on staff of several provincial daily newspapers in Canada as reporter or editor and has written freelance for numerous trade and news periodicals. She left print journalism in 1987 and worked for six years as a corporate communications advisor for a large Canadian utility, then spent 11 years overseas (1993-2004) as an international development consultant in the field of communication and public affairs, working for various donor organizations and NGOs, where she first came into close contact with the world of the social entrepreneurs.