Pat Rivard
With over twenty years of leadership experience in the fields of education and human services, Patrick (Pat) is uniquely qualified to lead communities and organizations in understanding the traumatic impact of a pandemic. Pat brings wealth of experience to the Center for Trauma Informed Practices (CTIP) as a 5 year National Trainer in Traumatic Event Systems (TES), and Violence Risk Threat Assessment (VTRA). Pat has been the keynote speaker for many organizations across Canada, speaking to the ways and importance of creating reasonable meaning in the challenges a pandemic brings to the human experience. He is a contributor and co- author of the nationally distributed Guidelines for Re-Entry into the School Setting and Rising to the Challenge: Staying Connected to our Students. Pat was also the national training lead in North America’s largest urban Violence Threat Risk Assessment (VTRA) initiative, having trained and collaborated with over 100 community agencies and more than 500 police officers. The FOCUS Toronto initiative continues to be a community-based initiative responding to many forms of violence including violent extremism. Pat is currently working in collaboration with Dr. William Pollack, Harvard Medical School and Senior Advisor to CTIP, in threat assessment research. He also recently co-presented with Dr. Marleen Wong from the University of Southern California, integrating her pioneering work in Psychological First Aid with the Trauma Event Systems (TES) model. Pat is an Alberta born Francophone, currently CTIP’s only bilingual National Trainer, and is supporting the province of New Brunswick in the coordination and advancement of their own provincial bilingual VTRA protocols. Pat states, “it is such a privilege to combine my previous careers as a Child Welfare Specialist, Family Counselor, and Educational leader and be able to use them to support communities in the trauma informed threat assessment practices”.