Beckie Scott retired in 2006 as Canada’s most decorated cross-country ski racer in the history of the sport. A three-time Olympian, Beckie won gold in Salt Lake City in 2002, becoming the first Canadian (and first North American woman) to win an Olympic medal in cross-country skiing. She followed that up with Olympic silver in 2006, and a record 17 World Cup podium finishes. In the final year of her career, she finished second in the Overall World Cup Standings.

On retirement, Beckie was elected to the International Olympic Committee’s Athlete Commission for an eight-year term. A widely respected leader in anti-doping, Beckie served as Chair of the World Anti-Doping Agency’s Athlete Committee from 2013-2019. Beckie is recognized globally for her advocacy and work on behalf of athletes’ rights and clean, fair, doping-free sport.

Beckie is an Officer of the Order of Canada, and an inducted member of the Canadian Sports Hall of Fame, Canadian Olympic Hall of Fame and the Canadian Ski Hall of Fame. She is a member of the Alberta Order of Excellence, holds Honorary Doctorate of Law degrees from the Universities of Alberta and British Columbia and frequently works for CBC Sports as a broadcast analyst.

Beckie is the founder and CEO of Spirit North, an organization committed to improving the lives of Indigenous children and youth through the transformative power of sport and play. Spirit North is recognized as one of Canada’s leading sport-for-social-development organizations.

Dr. Cheri L. Bradish was the Loretta Rogers Research Chair in Sport Marketing with the Ted Rogers School of Management from 2013-2018. She is currently Director of the Future of Sport Lab and Chair of Marketing Management. She comes to Ryerson after sixteen years at Brock University where she was the first faculty hire and founder of their successful Bachelor of Sport Management (BSM) degree. At Brock, she served in a number of leadership roles during her tenure, including in the Chair capacity. A sport marketing expert, her area of scholarship interest is with regards to sport business strategy and trends including innovation and entrepreneurship, sport and social impact, and women in sport leadership.

Among a number of conference proceedings and publications, her research has appeared in leading journals including: the Journal of Sport Management, the International Journal of Sport Management and Marketing, the Sport Management Review and the Sport Marketing Quarterly. Cheri also has significant experience in the sport industry, including work with the Florida Sports Foundation, Nike Canada Inc., Florida State University Department of Athletics (NCAA), Vancouver Grizzlies (NBA), and the Vancouver Organizing Committee for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Games (VANOC). She has been widely acknowledged for her teaching, receiving the 2013 Brock University Faculty Award for Excellence in Teaching; and in 2011 was chosen as the Canadian Olympic Committee’s representative to attend the International Olympic Academy (IOA) Session for Educators of Higher Institutes of Physical Education in Ancient Olympia, Greece. In 2017, she received a Research Recognition Award from the Ted Rogers School of Management. She is a member of the Canadian Association for the Advancement of Women and Girls in Sport (CAAWS) Board of Directors, as well as a former varsity athlete (volleyball) at the University of Guelph (Ryerson University Communications, 2016).

Norm O’Reilly is recognized as one of the leading scholars in the business of sports. He is currently Professor and Assistant Dean of Executive Programs in the College of Business & Economics at the University of Guelph. Dr. O’Reilly is also the founding Director of the International Institute for Sport Business & Leadership at Guelph, a think-tank devoted to improving the sport business globally.

He was previously the Richard P. and Joan S. Fox Professor of Business and Chair of the Department of Sports Administration at Ohio University’s College of Business. Dr. O’Reilly has expertise in a range of business topics, including analytics, marketing, sponsorship, social media, sport finance, social marketing, tourism management, and management education. He has authored or co-authored eight books, 14 case studies in the Harvard/Stanford series, and more than 100 peer-reviewed journal articles. Dr. O’Reilly is the lead researcher on the Canadian Sponsorship Landscape Study, a highlight of the annual Canadian Sponsorship Forum since 2007, currently in its twelfth edition.