PowerShift 2026

Making Sport Everyone’s Game

A pan-Canadian summit to reimagine sport, play, and movement as human rights.

ABOUT

POWERSHIFT 2026

Sport, play and movement are foundations of thriving communities and people–not luxuries. Yet access is uneven, systems are fragmented across Canada and experiences in sport and play fall short in reaching their full potential.


It’s time for a shift.


As the world turns to Canada for the FIFA World Cup, Play for Dignity is convening a landmark, three-day summit to unleash sport as a lever for dignity, equity, and wellbeing through the power of human rights.


We’re bringing together 300 leaders from across the sport, play and movement who are ready to roll up their sleeves and help co-create what a rights-based sport system could look like in Canada. This is an active space — for debate, design, challenge, and collaboration. If you’re ready to build, not just observe, this is for you.

REGISTER NOW

INTRODUCING OUR CO-HOSTS

Shireen Ahmed Headshot

Shireen Ahmed

SPORTS ACTIVIST, journalist, a Senior Contributor with 
CBC Sports

  • Shireen Ahmed is a multiplatform journalist, a Senior Contributor with CBC Sports, a public speaker, and an award-winning Sports Activist focusing on the intersections of race and gender in sports. She is a global expert on Muslim women in Sports.

    She is a 2019 TEDxToronto Speaker and is the national ambassador to Sakeenah Canada, an organization that offers essential services to women and families who have survived violence.

    She is on the Board of Directors of Hijabi Ballers, a friend of Black Girl Hockey Club, part of the Executive Committee of the Muslim Women in Sports Network, and mentors students and budding sports journalists in official and casual capacities.

    Shireen’s passion for sports, politics and women’s issues has been recognized by Sports Media for its candid discussions. Her work has been featured and discussed in The Guardian, TIME magazine, Sports Illustrated, The Walrus, Football Weekly, Racialicious, Chatelaine, The National Post, espnW, Globe and Mail, MSNBC Democracy Now! and TRT World. Shireen’s work was published in Best Canadian Sports Writing 2017. Her expertise is sought after by a host of international news outlets. In 2021, her academic work was published in Sports Media Vectors: Gender and Diversity, Reconstructing the Field.

    She is part of the team of women who created the weekly Burn It All Down podcast. The first feminist sports podcast that analyzes sports culture from an intersectional feminist lens.

    Shireen holds a Master of Arts degree with a specialty in Media Production. She currently teaches Journalism and Sport Media at Toronto Metropolitan University.

Adrian Harewood photo 
Associate Professor, School of Journalism & Communication, Carleton University

Adrian Harewood

 

  • Adrian Harewood is an Associate Professor in the School  of Journalism  and Communication at Carleton University. He’s the host of the current affairs podcast In Bed with the Elephant (Apple, Spotify, YouTube). He's the former host of CBC Ottawa’s drive home radio show All in A Day and was the anchor of CBC Ottawa News at Six from 2009-2022.

    In 2020 he won the Canadian Screen Award for Best Local Anchor. Adrian has been the guest host of national programs on radio and television including The Current, As It Happens, The House, Counterspin, Hot Type and Power & Politics. He was the host of programs on BRAVO and PBS including Literati, The Actors, The Directors, Playwrights & Screenwriters.

    Adrian is on the board of Journalists for Human Rights and the Writers’ Union of Canada. He has a BA in Political Theory and History from McGill University & a MA in History from Carleton University.

SUMMIT PROGRAMMING

  • Shifting Power to Communities: Grassroots, Innovation & Human-Rights-Based Approaches

    This workshop centres the everyday practitioners—coaches, organizers, community leaders, youth workers, and nonprofits—who animate Canada’s sport and play ecosystem. It explores the practice of human rights in action: how organizations embed dignity,  inclusion, safety, reconciliation, and belonging on the ground. It highlights innovations that expand access, improve participant experience, and build new forms of collaboration across sectors.

    Because Canada’s community sport system is under-resourced and highly fragmented, this track surfaces the practical tools, relational capital, and collaborative models needed to overcome silos. 

    Participants will share lessons from what’s working, including grassroots innovations, platform and access-expanding models, and community partnerships that unlock new value.

  • Shifting Power Through Rights, Governance & Investment

    This workshop focuses on the structural levers needed to realign sport in Canada with human rights, community wellbeing, and public-good outcomes. It examines the policy pathways that can shift the system—from federal frameworks and funding models to governance reforms and the emerging momentum behind a Canadian Bill of Rights for Sport and Play. Participants will engage with the next steps following the Future of Sport Commission, the role of federal/provincial/territorial governments, and the tools that can rebalance the ecosystem toward equity, safety, and access.

  • Shifting Cultural Power: Storytelling, Representation & the Mavericks of Movement

    Culture shapes what Canadians believe sport is for—and whose stories, bodies, and experiences matter. This workshop highlights storytellers, journalists, filmmakers, artists, athlete-advocates, and community “movement mavericks” whose voices reimagine the narrative of sport, play, and movement in Canada.

    It explores how narratives can either reinforce exclusion or spark belonging, joy, and social change. Participants will delve into sport in media (traditional and digital), the rise of new storytelling platforms, and the cultural forces shaping public perception—from local community leagues to major tournaments like the World Cup and Northern Super League.

SHIFTS

  • Reclaiming sport for community wellbeing

  • New voices and narratives that shift culture

  • Sharing a collective language and vision around implementation

CORE THEMES

END STATE

A shared framing, collective agenda, community of practice, and post-summit action plan to inform ongoing systems change

REGISTER FOR POWERSHIFT 2026

Frequently Asked Questions

  • We are currently in the midst of shaping the summit programme and reaching out to speakers we hope to confirm for May. A draft programme and confirmed speakers will be shared towards the end of March. Keep an eye out on our social channels for updates too.

  • PowerShift is designed as an active experience.

    Rather than choosing between sessions, all participants will move through three facilitated tracks together over the course of the summit. Each track is a working space where we’ll explore ideas, test assumptions, and co-design possibilities for a rights-based approach to sport, play, and physical activity in Canada.

    At the end of each day, we’ll come back together to reflect on what’s emerging, the progress we’re making, the tensions we’re encountering, and the ideas worth carrying forward.

    PowerShift isn’t a sit-back conference. It’s a space for people who want to think, question, and build together.

    If that feels exciting to you, we’d love for you to join us.

  • Tickets are $565 including sales tax. We’re operating on a cost recovery model.

  • If you’d like to attend but the cost is prohibitive please reach out. We have an allocation of tickets donated by partners.

  • We have a block booking reserved at a discounted rate for Summit attendees at the Omni King Edward Hotel. You can book via this link.

  • Tickets are refundable up until April 30th 11.59pm. Tickets can be transferred until May 20th 11.59pm. If you require assistance please reach out to a member of our team.