When University of Toronto Chancellor Rose Patten began to speak about mentorship and leadership at this week's celebration marking 20 years of a program she created, the packed Music Room at Hart House hushed.
"So much potential goes unspotted," she told the room filled with mentors and mentees on Tuesday afternoon. "The more we can learn and ply our knowledge for spotting potential and nurturing and developing it, the better off we're going to be in the leadership world."
Patten has been a champion of mentorship at U of T and throughout her career. The Rose Patten Mentorship Program celebrates the contributions of its mentors and mentees each year, but for this year's 20th anniversary, it honoured all 600 mentors and mentees who have taken part over the years. Patten gave a small gift to volunteers who contributed at least six years to the program.
"Dr. Patten is probably the quintessential mentor," Kelly Hannah-Moffat, U of T's vice-president of human resources and equity, told the gathering. "She had the foresight from very early in her career to understand the role of mentoring - especially as it applies to those with different opportunities, and to women and racialized people and employees within different kinds of corporate contexts and public-sector interests."
Hannah-Moffat, whose office sponsors the program, also praised its senior leaders and participants.
Among those honoured on Tuesday were Louis Charpentier, who retired as secretary of U of T's Governing Council in 2015 and was co-founder of the program, Fran Wdowczyk, who is a leader of the program at U of T Scarborough, and Sheree Drummond, secretary of the Governing Council who has served as a mentor for 10 years.
"I can get very personal about this," Charpentier said. "I have worked very closely with Rose when she was chair of Governing Council, and I have respected and appreciated her incredible leadership gifts.
"She has served, in many ways, as a mentor to me."
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