Bold Leadership, Brighter Future is a one-day professional development event hosted by the New Brunswick Chapter of the Canadian College of Health Leaders. With insightful speakers from across the province, the event will highlight how leadership is already driving meaningful change in healthcare and create space for sharing, learning, and connecting to strengthen New Brunswick’s health system together.
AGENDA
8:15 - 8:45 Registration & Networking
8:45 - 9:45 Welcoming remarks
9:45 - 10:00 Networking break
10:00 - 11:00 Dr. Stephanie Smith - Calm in Chaos
11:00 - 11:15 Networking break
11:15 - 12:15 Jacquelynn Carter, RN & Dr. Angus MacDonald - Simulation
12:15 - 13:15 Lunch and networking
13:15 - 14:15 Dr. John Dornan - Leadership Insights from the New Brunswick Minister of Health
14:15 - 15:15 Natasha Lemieux (Horizon) & Maily Lockhart & Sara Jane Vermette - Building a foundation for New Brunswick's Family Health Teams: Lessons learned in dyad leadership and engagement
15:15 - 15:30 Networking break
15:30 - 16:30 Jan Seely & Tina Learmonth - Long-Term Care Alliance of New Brunswick.
16:30 - 16:45 Wrap up
Featured Speakers:
Dr. Stephanie Smith
Dr. Stephanie Smith is a military emergency medicine physician based in Fredericton, NB, and the recipient of the 2024 College of Family Physicians of Canada Early Career Development Award. After a career as a Captain and Medical Officer in the Canadian Armed Forces, she made a transformative shift to pursue her lifelong dream of becoming a physician.
Dr. Smith is a sought-after speaker on compassionate leadership, crisis communication, and resiliency. She developed the CALM Leadership approach, a practical toolkit rooted in her military and medical experiences to support leaders navigating high-pressure environments with clarity and care.
Jacquelynn Carter, RN & Dr. Angus MacDonald
Jacquelynn Carter, RN, BN, MHPE (Candidate)
Nurse Educator | Simulationist |
Jacquelynn Carter is a registered nurse with over 11 years of experience, primarily in emergency care, with additional time in critical care. A natural leader and educator, she currently serves as a Nurse Educator with Horizon Health Network, where she focuses on simulation-based education, clinical mentorship, and interdisciplinary team training.
Jacquelynn has played a key role in developing and implementing simulation programs at the Miramichi Regional Hospital, the Dr. Everett Chalmers Hospital, and for the Dalhousie Family Medicine residency program in Moncton. Her work in simulation is grounded in the belief that experiential, team-based learning is essential to high-quality, collaborative care. She brings a strong nursing perspective to these programs, reinforcing the vital role nurses play in shaping patient outcomes and team dynamics.
She has also taught at the University of New Brunswick and is currently completing her Master’s in Health Professions Education, where her research focuses on supporting nurse preceptors to become confident educators and emerging leaders.
Jacquelynn is passionate about fostering environments where healthcare professionals—across all disciplines—can grow together. Her leadership work is rooted in the power of simulation, mentorship, and collaboration to build safer systems, stronger teams, and future-ready healthcare leaders.
Dr. Angus MacDonald
Emergency Physician | Medical Educator | Simulation Leader
Dr. Angus MacDonald is a practicing emergency physician at Horizon’s The Moncton Hospital. With over five years as Department Head of Emergency Medicine and an equal tenure as Medical Education Coordinator, Dr. MacDonald has made many contributions to medical leadership and education in New Brunswick.
Deeply committed to the growth and mentorship of future physicians, he has been recognized twice with the Moncton Specialty Preceptor Award and is a recipient of the national Culture Change Champion Award from the Canadian Federation of Medical Students.
Dr. MacDonald is a certified simulationist with more than seven years of experience in the design, delivery, and evaluation of healthcare simulation programs. He serves as the Site Simulation Lead for Dalhousie Family Medicine in Moncton and is particularly passionate about the impact of translational simulation to drive systems improvement and safer patient care.
Outside the clinical and academic worlds, Dr. MacDonald is an enthusiastic alpine ski racing coach, now sharing his lifelong passion with his daughter through coaching and mentorship on the slopes.
Honourable Dr. John Dornon, New Brunswick - Minister of Health
A widely known and consulted specialist in the fields of Endocrinology, Internal Medicine and ICU, Minister Dornan has been intimately involved in acute health care delivery in New Brunswick for more than 37 years.
Throughout his career, Minister Dornan’s extensive clinical acumen and progressive leadership has led to significant positive change in the health care system. Strategic alliances enabled him to start the first New Brunswick-based specialist training program, a pinnacle accomplishment, and he played a key role in the amalgamation of many smaller surgical disciplines into one surgery department in the Saint John area. Amalgamation of Horizon-wide departments started under Minister Dornan’s leadership.
During his time as CEO of Horizon Health Network, Minister Dornan assembled a competent expert team that has advanced care in our province. Starting a Regional Program Management structure is an important and significant evolution in a large Regional Health Authority, one of the bigger RHAs in Canada.
Today, his passion is to help the Government of New Brunswick create collaborative teams that include nurses, doctors, nurse practitioners, social workers, physiotherapists and others – which will, in turn, result in increased access to reliable primary care for all New Brunswickers.
Minister Dornan and his wife, Gail, have two children, Robin and Andrew. An avid but slow runner, Minister Dornan has run 26 marathons, including Saint John’s inaugural Marathon by the Sea. His friends and dog Jack run and walk the trails of Rockwood Park regularly. He keeps bees in his back yard and enjoys a modest harvest annually.
Natasha Lemieux (Horizon)
Natasha Lemieux is the Vice President Community for Horizon Health Network.
Originally from New Brunswick, Natasha is a dynamic and collaborative senior health care leader with over 20 years of experience in large hospitals, as well as diverse community, rural and long-term care settings.
Natasha began her career as a Registered Nurse in the float pool at Horizon’s Saint John Regional Hospital. After holding a management position in long term care, she returned to leadership at Horizon as a Nurse Manager and Clinical Coordinator in Saint John. Since then, she has held senior leadership roles at Homewood Health Centre in Guelph, Ontario, most recently as Vice President of Patient Services, Clinical Education and Chief Nursing Officer since 2017. Natasha also has recent experience as a Surveyor with Accreditation Canada.
Natasha attended a Master of Psychiatric Nursing from Brandon University, and holds a Masters Certificate in Healthcare Management from York University, a Bachelor of Arts and a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Dalhousie University. She also completed a Prosci Change Management certification and is a Lean Six Sigma Black Belt.
Maily Lockhart
Maily is Horizon’s Executive Regional Director, Primary Health Care Co-Lead. Over the last 15 years, she has worked with health system leaders to support the transformation of health systems by bringing in and implementing innovative solutions.
Maily’s various leadership roles within the Saskatchewan Health Authority and Horizon involved developing and delivering provincial health programs, supporting health and human resource planning, engaging with national health care innovators, and facilitating the development of organizational, strategic, and operational plans with health care leaders.
She also has extensive experience working with physicians, having supported physician recruitment and retention strategy development with the Physician Recruitment Agency of Saskatchewan and helping Saskatchewan-area physicians transition from paper-based practices to electronic medical records in team-based practices with the Saskatchewan Medical Association.
Maily holds a Bachelor of Science with a specialization in Physiology and Development Biology from the University of Alberta and a Master of Public Health with advanced training in Community Health and Epidemiology from the University of Saskatchewan. She is a certified Prosci change management practitioner, health care Lean Improvement Leader and has a Professional Leadership Certification from the University of Saskatchewan’s Edwards School of Business.
Sara Jane Vermette
Sara Jane is an experienced, relationship-centred health care leader with more than a decade of experience in strategy, engagement, and quality improvement in complex health system environments. As Regional Director of Primary Health Care Engagement at Horizon Health Network, she leads strategic provider, stakeholder, and community engagement, from a systems transformation lens, aligning primary care planning with population needs and provincial priorities.
With a Master’s in Healthcare Administration from Université de Montréal, certifications in engagement and working with conflict (International Association of Public Participation – IAP2), change management (Prosci), and patient safety (Health Care Excellence Canada), she specializes in designing and facilitating effective and inclusive engagement processes, to enable change and transformation. Having been part of the Bravely Lead - Courageous Leadership Project, this tailored coaching enhanced her leadership approach, deepened her capacity to foster meaningful dialogue, and strengthened her skills in guiding collaborative solutions.
Sara Jane has held various roles in New Brunswick’s health care system, spanning community engagement, patient safety, quality improvement, planning, policy development, business intelligence and community health research. This experience has led to a strong focus on integrating meaningful engagement and a human-centred approach to systems transformation, translating insights into action to support sustainable change.
Jan Seely
Jan is the President of the New Brunswick Special Care Home Association and has been in this role for 15 years. Additionally, she is an experienced owner/operator of an established Long-Term Care home that has been in operation for nearly 3 decades. These years have afforded many opportunities for growth and development as well as offering leadership in the Long-term Care Sector in a variety of ways. Jan actively works with many partner organizations in the province to advance long-term care. She is diligent in her efforts to directly improve funding and standards for the sector. She served as the Chair of the Human Services Coalition of NB for three years and was vital in securing the initial investment in compensation rates for employees. Since 2016 these initial efforts have blossomed into a nearly 50% increase for thousands of community health and social services workers in the province.
Tina Learmonth
Tina is the New Brunswick Home Support Association (NBHSA) President and Regional Director for Bayshore Home Care Solutions. A passionate leader, Tina champions the right to high-quality care in your chosen setting and seniors' rights to age in place.
FEES:
CCHL Member: $70
CCHL Student: $20.00
Non-Member:$100
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