Award-winning researcher Clyde Hertzman spoke in Saskatoon March 25

WATCH THIS TALK HERE

At noon on Friday, March 25th early childhood researcher Clyde Hertzman, recently named Canada’s 2010 Health Researcher of the Year, gave a free public lecture in Saskatoon as part of a cross-Canada tour. The lecture was held at Convocation Hall on the University of Saskatchewan campus, streamed live on the internet, and is archived here.

The University of Saskatchewan hosted the talk, part of the Royal Society of Canada’s prestigious Governor General’s Lectures, at Convocation Hall. Under this program, the Royal Society sends top scholars and scientists to select universities across the country to give lectures.

Hertzman’s talk, Are we the people we need to be? Early human development and the challenges of the 21st century”, examined how we can face the twin challenges of shrinking our ecological footprint and supporting the earliest stages of development for human beings. Hertzman argues that there is a huge gap between what Canadians know about these issues, and and what we, as a society, are doing about them.

Hertzman is the director of the Human Early Learning Partnership (HELP)and a professor at the School of Population and Public Health at the University of British Columbia. He has led HELP's work in British Columbia using the Early Development Instrument to demonstrate that too many children -- almost one in four -- are considered “vulnerable” by the time they enter kindergarten. This could be cut to 10% by investing in early years programs and supports. At the same time, Hertzman notes that we’re spending enormous resources to support an unsustainable lifestyle for the future, as Canada leaves one of the planet's largest ecological footprints.

The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) honoured Hertzman with its highest honour last November, naming him the 2010 “Health Researcher of the Year" to recognize his work on the effects of the environment on the development of young children.

Late last year, kidSKAN hosted a talk by Hertzman's colleague Paul Kershaw on implementing "smart family policy" to combat this early vulnerability (available on our YouTube channel).

by Mike Chouinard, kidSKAN managing editor. He can be reached at mike.chouinard@usask.ca.