Episode 197: Kevin Hartford – Writer/Director

Kevin Hartford is a writer/director based in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
He is a two-time alumnus of the Atlantic Filmmakers Cooperative (AFCOOP’s) FILM 5 program and twice received their nomination to Telefilm’s Talent to Watch program for his feature film To the Moon, which will go to camera in 2023 with support from Telefilm’s Production Program.
His shorts Charlie’s P.O.C. and Disco Apocalypse aired on the third and sixth seasons of CBC’s Reel East Coast and streamed on CBC Gem.

Episode 195: Henry Colin – Writer/Director

Henry Colin is a writer/director based out of Kjipuktuk/Halifax. He is a passionate filmmaker and an all-around cinephile.
Henry has directed a number of award-winning short films, including “Passage” and “In the Cold”. Henry has also directed the award-winning feature film “I Am Not A Hero”.
In 2023 Henry completed principal photography on his sophomore feature “Lost in Time”; a science-fiction chamber piece expected to hit festivals in 2024.

Episode 194: Tia Upshaw – Serial Entrepreneur, CEO & Founder of BWIE AND BWIE BC

Tia Upshaw is a serial entrepreneur, mother of 3, nominee for Business Leader of the Year 2022 & 2023 Halifax Chamber of Commerce, nominee for RBC Woman of Influence 2021,2022 & 2023 and founder & CEO of Blk Women in Excellence.
She is a mentor with Rise & Scotia Bank women’s mentorship initiative in partnership with the Forum.
She also is a well-known motivational speaker, entrepreneurship content creator ( Afrocentric lens) & facilitator with success stories attached to her facilitations.

Episode 193: Lingjie – Bartender

Lingjie was born in China, Shanghai and lived in Japan for 8 and a half years. She started working in the hospitality industry at an American dive bar in Tokyo.
She moved to Canada and met the owners of DearFriend Matt Boyle and Jeff van Horn through the NSCC hospitality program and started working as a server.
Having worked with and learned from so many amazing bartenders in Halifax, Lingjie got introduced to the cocktail world which opened her horizons. Due to her Chinese and Japanese background, she wants to bring more Chinese & Japanese cultural ingredients and creativity into the drinks she makes.
The Chinese liquor “baijiu”, is an amazing spirit, with a long history, and culture as well as different aromas and special flavours.

Episode 192: Moashella Michelle Shortte – Educator/Author/Entrepreneur

Moashella Shortte is a mother, educator, author, entrepreneur, and child and youth advocate.   

She received her formal training at Mount Saint Vincent University, earned an Early Childhood Management Certificate at St. Mary’s University and was granted a “Baccalauréat en sciences humaines” from “immigration et communautés culturelles”, in Montreal. 

She spent most of her formative working years at the East Preston Day Care and Family Resource Centre and ultimately became its Executive Director. 

In 2018, she co-founded Learning4YoungMinds, a company offering online and in-person workshops teaching empathy and socialization to young children; anti-racism training for educators and student support workers; and writing support for BIPOC youth. 

She currently serves on the ECE advisory committee and is filling the role of lead faculty for the Africentric Cohort of the ECE program at the Nova Scotia Community College. 

Moashella defines her mission as providing as many learners as possible with exceptional learning experiences that will help them build a strong, positive foundation for learning for life!

Find out more @moashellamshortte

Episode 191: Chris Henningsen Author/Artist

As a teenager, Chris had managed to narrow down his future to either becoming a Buddhist monk or running the race to be successful. For various reasons, he chose the latter, but he’s always kept one foot in the world of subtle energy and strange events.
As a roughneck, he studied alternative health modalities, and when his encounter with the fossil fuel industry motivated him to study renewable energy, he kept an eye out for hints about the kind of energy he studied in that context. These dual interests have all stayed active, recently leading to two books – one on the spiritual side of programming, and one a children’s book on health.
Chris has an ongoing interest in combining technology with spirituality and hopes to continue his exploration of the weird overlap between those fields in the years to come. He believes there is a lot we don’t know about the world – and that learning more about it all is a great way to spend his finite time on the planet.
His current research on time and quantum mechanics has really stretched his brain, and he hopes to use that flexibility to work on similar projects – he’s interested in bioinformatics and music, but also open to whatever else comes across his path.

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