Response-Based Practice Certificate Program

Allan works as a family therapist, independent scholar, and consultant with a primary interest in promoting socially just and effective responses in cases of violence and other forms of adversity. Allan is pre-occupied with the question of how humans preserve dignity – in the full contextual sense of the term – in response to humiliation. In this respect, Allan is the grateful student of the Kaska Dena Elders living on Kaska homeland on northwestern Turtle Island. Allan and his partner, Cathy, are the parents of five adults, grandparents of six truly grandchildren, and spiritual kin to two golden retrievers. Allan and his colleagues (Nick Todd, Shelly Dean, Cathy Richardson, Linda Coates…and many others) are best known for developing Response-Based Practice, a method of individual and family therapy, a framework for research and analysis, and a guide for practice across the institutions that respond in cases of violence, broadly defined. Allan provides training and consultation in Canada and abroad.

Dr. Cathy Richardson/Kineweskwêw is a Métis/Cree therapist and professor at Concordia University in Montreal/Turtle Island, Canada. She specializes in violence prevention and recovery and has a Response-Based counselling practice. She is an advocate for police and child protection reform to end racial profiling and mother-blaming in social services, and consultant to the Royal Commission and TRC, making several recommendations for structural and systemic change. She is interested in the intersections between violence towards Indigenous women and girls, as well as the treatment of the Earth. Cathy is also an author, researcher, counsellor, supervisor, cancer survivor and mama.

Linda has received international acclaim from researchers, legal & mental health professionals, and victims’ advocates for her work on the connection between violence and language in diverse settings. She has worked closely with Allan Wade and Nick Todd in developing the Response-Based approach to community work and therapy with victims and perpetrators and is Associate Professor of Psychology at Okanagan College. Linda has published numerous articles and book chapters on the connection between violence and language.

Shelly Dean is grateful to live and work on the Tk’emlups te Secwepemc territory, in the Southern Interior of British Columbia, Canada, within the unceded traditional lands of the Secwepemc Nation. Shelly is a child and family therapist, a practice supervisor, and a consultant to organizations. As a therapist, she works with children, youth and adults who have experienced violence and other forms of adversity, with a special interest in victims of institutionalized violence. Prior to opening the Centre for Response-Based Practice in the Interior of BC, Shelly was the Chief Operating Officer for a large non-profit organization providing a wide-range of services to children and families. She was also a foster parent for just over 15 years. Shelly works with many other professionals who are interested in Response-Based Practice, as a clinical supervisor and an organizational consultant. She has also taught in the Master of Counselling Program at City University of Seattle and the Master of Education Program at Thompson Rivers University.