The future of Calgary is being shaped right now. Join the conversation about the Future of the City with two panel discussions about how we can build Calgary today for a bright and innovative future.

Imagine. Connect. Create.

Calgary is a young, vibrant city and one that is growing quickly. The city grew by 6 per cent between 2022 and 2023 alone. To say the possibilities for the city's future are endless is less of a cliché and more of a call to action. It is time to build our city on purpose, for purpose.

Get inspired at Avenue's Future of the City Festival and celebrate the people and places who are building the future of Calgary today. 

 

Schedule

Doors open: 6 p.m.

Panel 1: 7 p.m.

Panel 2: 7:45 p.m.

Cocktail reception ends: 9:30 p.m.

Panel Discussions

7 - Third Spaces and the City of Belonging

In this panel discussion, Avenue invites you to consider how we build a city of belonging by improving our third spaces — those places that aren't our homes or our workplaces, but "third" spaces that we use to forge community. Panellists include Bethel Afework, co-founder of Alcove Centre for the Arts; Barb Gillard, executive director of visitor experience for the Calgary Public Library,  Jasmine Palardy, co-founder of The Good Future Collective and Global Director, WRLDCTY and Ryan Sirski, Vice President, Office Leasing and Operations at Oxford Properties Group.

7:45 - Calgary's Innovation Strategy: Innovation by Design

Join us for a conversation about building a city underpinned by innovation to help launch startups, scale businesses and spark breakthroughs. Becoming the innovation capital of Canada won’t happen by accident, it will happen by design. Learn what our panellists are doing to make it possible, here. Panellists include Kate Koplovich, Director, Strategy at Calgary Economic Development (CED); Crystal Phillips, Senior Director at the Opportunity Calgary Investment Fund (OCIF) and Kimberley Van Vliet, founder and CEO of WaVv and ConvergX.

 

Light hors d'oeuvres will be served and a cash bar will be available for refreshments.

 

Panelists

 

Third Spaces and the City of Belonging

Bethel Afework, co-founder of Alcove Centre for the Arts

Bethel is an educator, poet, musician, entrepreneur, and nature-lover passionate about making cities more enjoyable. Passionate about making Calgary a more welcoming city for all, Bethel founded Raw Voices in 2016, a spoken word, comedy and music show that runs monthly with open mics and feature performers. Bethel is the Executive Director and Co-founder of Alcove Centre for the Arts (Alcove). Alcove is a recreational art space with the mission to make arts more accessible by creating welcoming spaces where everyone can foster their creativity. Thanks to a partnership with cSPACE, the recreational art space is open for anyone to visit 5 days a week for drop-ins in the heart of downtown at 244 7 Ave SW.

 

Barb Gillard, executive director of visitor experience, Calgary Public Library

Barb Gillard is a visionary leader, responsible for shaping and executing the overall strategy for visitor experience across Calgary Public Library's 22 locations. Barb has more than 20 years' experience working in archives and libraries in both Canada and the United States. As the Executive Director, Visitor Experience at one of North America's largest public library systems, Barb is a champion of creating accessible spaces across the community where everyone belongs. She holds her undergraduate degree from the University of Calgary, a Master of Arts in Public History from Northeastern University, and her Master of Library and Information Science from Western University.

 

Jasmine Palardy, co-founder, The Good Future Collective; Global Director, WRLDCTY

Jasmine Palardy is a community builder who specializes in innovative engagement methods that encourage imagination and collaboration. Her career has been spent balancing the worlds of innovation, tech and design to bring diverse groups together to envision and build better places — from innovation districts to main streets, parks, alleys, higher education labs, cultural institutions and more. She is the founder of The Good Future Collective and is the Global Director of WRLDCTY.

Ryan Sirski, Vice President, Office Leasing and Operations at Oxford Properties Group

 

Ryan Sirski is Vice President, Office Leasing and Operations at Oxford Properties Group, leading the Calgary office. With over 18 years’ experience, Ryan is responsible for Oxford’s Calgary office portfolio including leasing, property management and operations. He is highly involved in the real estate community and previously served as president of NAIOP Calgary. Ryan holds an MBA from the Ivey School of Business at Western University.

 

Calgary's Innovation Strategy: Innovation by Design

 

Kate Koplovich

Born and raised in Calgary, Kate's purpose and passion is building a resilient, diverse economy for Calgary. At Calgary Economic Development (CED), as the Director of Strategy, she does this by leading Uplook: An Action Plan for Our Economy, Calgary's long-term economic plan, the city’s Innovation Strategy, and Calgary Economic Development’s internal strategies.  

Prior to Calgary Economic Development, Kate was with Deloitte's Sustainability & Climate Change team. She holds an MSc in Economics and Policy of Energy and the Environment from University College London and continues to do economic policy analysis at CED to provide insights on Calgary’s economy. Outside of work Kate is an avid outdoors (wo)man, having completed two Half Iron (wo)Mans and a trail ultramarathon. She is also passionate about music and the arts in all its forms.

 

Crystal Phillips, Senior Director at the Opportunity Calgary Investment Fund (OCIF)

Crystal Phillips is the Senior Director at the Opportunity Calgary Investment Fund (OCIF), where she leads strategic investments that strengthen Calgary’s economic future.

Her interdisciplinary background spans competitive sport, neuroscience, and venture capital. She founded and now chairs the Branch Out Neurological Foundation and is an angel investor through the emerging 1A Capital platform. Previously, she was part of the founding team at Thin Air Labs Fund I, helping raise and deploy capital into early-stage startups across Canada.

Crystal is passionate about using capital — philanthropic, institutional, and personal — to drive meaningful progress and create lasting impact in communities.

 

Kimberley Van Vliet, founder and CEO of WaVv and ConvergX

With over 17  years of experience in creating and facilitating cross-industry solutions worldwide, Kimberley is a passionate and visionary leader in the aerospace, defence, security and space sectors. As the founder and CEO of WaVv and ConvergX®, she has enabled the transfer of commercialized technology across multiple industries, resulting in close to $2 billion in deals tracked as a result of the congress. She has also established strategic partnerships with existing companies and organizations in the aerospace, defence, security, and space (ADSS) sector, as well as connected with other ADSS hubs from around the world.

Kim is also a member of the Canadian Delegation of the NATO Industrial Advisory Group (NIAG), where she is the Deputy Chair for the Community of Interest for NIAG-Allied Command Transformation Unit (ACT), overseeing Innovation, C4ISR, Multi-Domain Operations, Digital Transformation, Logistics and Sustainment. In addition, she is part of the leadership team for the new NATO SpaceNet division. Through these roles, she leverages her expertise and network to advance business opportunities and innovation for the ADSS sector and beyond.