11 women recognized for leadership in Waterloo region
Recipient Jennifer Gordon surprised even to be nominated
When Jennifer Gordon first heard about a provincial award recognizing leadership among women and girls, she said she immediately began thinking about who might be nominated from among the young people she works with every day.
"I had received the email of the nomination forms from probably five or six people, and all of them were like, 'Oh! You should consider one of the youth in your program,'" recalls the director of youth programs at the YWCA in Kitchener-Waterloo.
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"When someone actually nominated me — instead of saying, 'Well, Jen might know someone,' they said, 'Hmm. Maybe Jen?' — I was surprised."
Gordon wasn't just nominated for the award: she won it, and has been invited to a special recognition ceremony in Kitchener along with eleven other recipients.
The awards are part of Ontario's Leading Women, Leading Girls, Building Community Recognition program, which has been running since 2006.
Leading the next generation
Laura Flatt, community engagement manager at Vidyard, is another local woman to win the award this year.
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"I feel really fortunate to work in a role where I get to do things that I'm really passionate about," she said. "And I think when you're really passionate about your job, you don't necessarily think sometimes of the impact of it."
She hopes her work and the work of other women in the region will pave a way for younger women — that they will see a future for themselves in whatever career they choose for themselves.