Cultural Humility, Part 2: Self-Care and Resilience

20 November 2025

10:30 AM - 12:00 PM PT / 1:30 PM - 3:00 PM ET / 7:30 PM - 9:00 PM CET

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Registration Rates:

Member/Group Member	$50
Student Member	$50
Retired Member	$50
Non-Member	$250

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The course will be presented in English, but participants will be free to ask questions English, French, or a bilingual format.

About the Course

In this presentation, Dr. Nadia Ferrara will share the transformative principle of Cultural Humility, and how to apply this principle through self-care and resiliency practices. Learning to connect with your authentic selves, builds a foundation for practicing Cultural Humility. Dr. Ferrara calls upon us all to self-reflect, to self-evaluate, to confront our biases and assumptions, to establish boundaries, and to embrace accountability for our actions. Cultural Humility fosters self-awareness and constant learning, which forges a foundation for consequential accountability—ensuring that respect, inclusivity, and a sense of belonging are woven into the fabric of our organizations.

This presentation will provide you with tangible applications of Cultural Humility, and strategies for applying Cultural Humility principles in your daily life. Dr. Ferrara shows you how to positively reinforce your mentality, and how to distinguish real self-care and faux self-care, along with real-world scenarios and examples. Dr. Ferrara introduces her “head, heart, and hand” approach in fostering organizational well-being, cultivating empathy to connect with our humanity, and committing to intentional actions to create transformative change. This approach creates a ripple effect, building organizational cultures where employees feel valued, heard, and empowered.

Learning Objectives

After engaging in this session, participants will be better able to:

Understand the principle of Cultural Humility: Participants will be able to define Cultural Humility and explain how it fosters self-awareness, inclusivity, and respect within organizational settings.
Apply self-care and resiliency practices: Participants will learn how to incorporate self-care and resiliency practices into their daily lives to build a foundation for practicing Cultural Humility and confront biases.
Implement the "head, heart, and hand" approach: Participants will be able to apply Dr. Ferrara’s "head, heart, and hand" approach to cultivate empathy, promote organizational well-being, and create lasting, transformative change in their workplace culture.

Instructor

Nadia Ferrar, PhD, Indigenous Services Canada and the Privy Council Office

Dr. Nadia Ferrara is a dedicated public servant and a passionate humanitarian. She is currently the Ombudsperson at Indigenous Services Canada and the Privy Council Office. Prior to this, she was Senior Director at Parks Canada where she established the Values, Ethics, Diversity and Inclusion Directorate. Nadia gained ombuds experience when she was the Executive Director at the Office of the Federal Ombudsman for Victims of Crime, Department of Justice. Nadia also worked at Women and Gender Equality Canada, and before that, at Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada for over a decade, where she worked closely with First Nations and Inuit Health Branch and developed policies and frameworks in collaboration with Indigenous partners.

Nadia remains on Faculty at McGill University as Adjunct Professor in the Department of Anthropology where she supervises graduate and undergraduate students in her spare time.

Before entering the Government of Canada in 2003, Nadia worked as an art therapist for 16 years, specializing in cross-cultural psychotherapy with Indigenous peoples in Quebec and Ontario, Canada. Her education includes a Master of Arts in Art Therapy, a Master of Science in Transcultural Psychiatry, and a Doctorate in Medical Anthropology.

In addition to her publications of several journal articles and chapters in various books across North America and in Europe, Nadia has published books on her work as an art therapist and anthropologist with the Crees of Northern Quebec. One of her books, Reconciling and Rehumanizing Indigenous-Settler Relations, is a reflection on her work as an applied anthropologist and advocate for Indigenous Peoples. Her latest publication is entitled, In Pursuit of Impact: Trauma and Resilience Informed Policy Development, and it illustrates the application of a human-centered approach, as Nadia urges us to reconnect with our humanity.

Nadia is also an artist. One of her sculptures, The Friendship Knot, is permanently placed at her former high school in Montréal, where she was born and raised. Nadia has a daughter, Mikayla, and currently resides in Ottawa, Ontario with her life partner, Lorna.

Additional Details and Event Policies

Ombuds Online Seminars focus on emerging topics of interest to ombuds, while others teach diverse skillsets that can enhance an ombuds’ practice. Seminars allow for a deeper dive and more interactive experiential learning formats than a webinar. You can register for a live seminar, or you can purchase that seminar on-demand.

Professional Development Hours (PDH)

This course has been submitted for 1.5 PDH pending approval.

Closed Captioning and Languages for Online Courses

IOA is dedicated to making meetings and content more accessible. All IOA Live Seminars will offer closed captioning. This service will also be available for IOA committee meetings upon request. Participation for all is encouraged; if you have any questions please email the IOA office at [email protected].

This course is presented in English. Captions are available in English by default. Individual participants may choose to see their captions translated into one of the following languages: Arabic, Bangla (beta), Chinese Simplified, Chinese Traditional, Czech, Danish (beta), Dutch, Estonian, Finnish, French (France), German, Hebrew (beta), Hindi (beta), Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Malay, Norwegian (beta), Polish, Portuguese, Romanian (beta), Russian, Spanish, Swedish, Tamil (beta), Turkish, Ukrainian, or Vietnamese.

Cancellation Policy

Notification of cancellation must be submitted in writing via email to [email protected]. All cancellation requests received 21 days in advance of the event start date, will be issued a refund less a $10 USD processing fee. No refunds will be given thereafter except in the event of extenuating circumstances. Requests for registration cancellation must be submitted in writing via email to [email protected].

Substitute attendees will be permitted. Substitution requests must be in writing via email to [email protected] no later than two days before the event's start date. If you have any questions, please contact the office at [email protected].

Nonpayment Policy

Full payment of registration fees is required 7 days before the start of a course. If payment is not made prior to the start of the course, event details will not be released to you and your registration may be canceled. The IOA office will contact registered individuals with a balance due before canceling their registration. If you have any questions, please contact the office at [email protected] or by phone at +1-206-209-5275.

Subject to Change or Cancellation

All IOA Courses are subject to change and/or cancellation.

IOA asks that all registered attendees confirm system requirements and test their computers prior to the start of each virtual session. If the Zoom or other platform used experiences a failure that is beyond our control, IOA may reschedule the session. If an attendee experiences a technical failure on their end, and the session is being recorded, attendees may watch the recorded session. If the session is not recorded, no refund will be issued.

Recording Acknowledgement

Each virtual session may be recorded. These recordings may be provided for later viewing and may be used for promotional purposes, advertising, and other print and online materials at the sole discretion of IOA. By registering for a virtual session you consent to be recorded by IOA when attending live sessions.