Text Size IncreaseDecreaseReset

The International Institute for Child Rights and Development

Staff & Board Members
Dr. Philip Cook - Executive Director
philip.cook@iicrd.org

Philip Cook holds a Ph.D. in Cross-Cultural Psychology from Queen’s University, and is the founder and current Executive Director of the International Institute for Child Rights and Development (IICRD).

Since 1994, Dr. Cook has overseen the Institute’s growth as a leader in linking children’s rights and healthy development to broad issues of human development and participatory governance across diverse cultures and situational contexts. During this time, IICRD has been working in partnership with a cross section of UN agencies, governments, and international non-governmental organizations, and children’s organizations.

These partnerships have resulted in policy design, community based research initiatives, school based programs and projects with marginalized children, youth and their communities on various issues including: child participation in local governance, youth leadership and development, support for Indigenous children, child participation monitoring and evaluation, intergenerational programs, promoting the rights of sexually-exploited children and caring for children orphaned by HIV/AIDS.

Suzanne Williams - Project and Legal Director
swiicrd@uvic.ca

Suzanne Williams is a lawyer and IICRD's Deputy and Legal Director.  She is a founding director of IICRD and has been instrumental in its development and growth since 2001.  

Suzanne has provided specialized child rights expertise on several initiatives in partnership with organizations such as UNICEF, Save the Children, Plan International, and the Association of Universities and Colleges Canada.  She has worked closely with lawyers, judges and government representatives to improve hearing children's views in family law decision-making and designed a course for lawyers for CLEBC that won an international award for outstanding achievement from ACLEA in 2008.   She has made child rights presentations to numerous audiences including at the Third World Congress Against the Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents (Brazil), and the Federation of Law Societies National Family Law Program.  Suzanne currently leads the Child Protection Partnership, with Microsoft, UNICEF, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police’s National Child Exploitation Coordination Centre (NCECC), the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), and partners from Thailand and Brazil that targets the sexual exploitation of children enabled by worldwide use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT).  She is also an advisory member to the 2010 edition of Plan International's Because I am a Girl publication, and is conducting research for the National Judicial Institute of Canada. 

Suzanne has practiced law for over 15 years including at a national law firm where she represented private and public sector clients before tribunals and courts, and at Canada's Department of Justice providing advice on economic development, treaty implementation and other Aboriginal law matters.  She is a member of the bar in Ontario and British Colubmia, holds an LL.B., B.A. (Honours) and has extensive training in mediation and conflict resolution. 

Dr. Stuart Hart - Deputy Director and Director of Professions and Academic Institutions
shiicrd@uvic.ca

Stuart Hart is one of IICRD's Deputy Directors and is the Founding Director of the Office for the Study of the Psychological Rights of the Child and Professor Emeritus of the School of Education, Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis.

He is the present Chairperson for the Children’s Rights Committee and Past President of the International School Psychology Association, the Past President of the National Association of School Psychologists (USA), and the Past-President of the National Committee for the Rights of the Child (USA).

He is a director of CRED-PRO, our international program of child rights education for professionals serving children and families. He has presented and published extensively on psychological maltreatment of children and on children’s rights. He is a member of the NGO Advisory Panel for the UN Secretary General’s Study on Violence Against Children and he is on the editorial boards of Child Abuse and Neglect – The International Journal, School Psychology International, and the Journal of Emotional Abuse.