Land acknowledgement
We wish to acknowledge that LEAP operates on the traditional territory of many nations, including the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishnaabe, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee and the Wendat peoples and is now home to many diverse First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples. We also wish to acknowledge that Toronto is covered by Treaty 13 signed with the Mississaugas of the Credit and the Williams Treaties signed with multiple Mississaugas and Chippewa bands. We are grateful to have the opportunity to work on this land.
Letter from the Chair and Managing Director
At LEAP, every day we actively work to ensure more people in our underserved communities have the opportunity to reach their full potential. Together with our partners and the social ventures in our portfolio, we reimagine how we can solve complex problems with leadership, ingenuity, and compassion.
With deep appreciation for the support and partnership of our entire community of champions, advisors, partners, donors, volunteers, and board members, LEAP reached three important milestones in 2024.
Our initiative Healthy Futures concluded with extraordinary results. Social ventures scaled by 5x on average and measurably shifted the behaviours of over 175,000 Canadians.
We reached the midpoint of our initiative The Equity Opportunity, improving the lives of over 10,000 women from underserved communities, and we have mapped the steps for greater impact ahead.
We completed the Strategic Plan (2019-2024) and realized the success of our shift from scaling individual social ventures to scaling impact on Canada’s most pressing and complex issues.
Looking forward, our new Strategic Plan (2025-2029) continues to leverage the value of collaboration, innovation and collective impact to deliver measurable change. We are squarely focused on four strategic objectives.
1. Drive greater issue-focused impact through additional initiatives and the expansion of our portfolio.
2. Invest in our capabilities and increase our offerings to better support our portfolio, generate insights, and contribute to sector-wide change:
• Sustain impact after the conclusion of an initiative through ongoing education, support and convening.
• Build expertise hubs that will amplify results through leadership development, impact measurement, and knowledge-sharing.
3. Expand our community of partners to power our work and collective ambitions.
4. Develop our people and systems to strengthen our foundation for the future.
It is with gratitude to our community that we celebrate our collective accomplishments to date and invite you to continue to work with us towards our ambitious goals to significantly increase social impact. We know our work is far from over. Together, we can tackle the challenges we face and contribute to a more prosperous, vibrant, and inclusive Canada.
Onwards,
Joan Dea Chair of the Board
Lorna Read, Ph.D. Managing Director
Collective Impact at a Glance
Since 2012, LEAP has been privileged to support the scaling journeys of thirty-one high-impact, high-potential social ventures.
Our world-class private sector partners have amplified the value of our devoted team with their cumulative contributions of more than twenty-two million dollars in pro bono professional services and thousands of hours donated by their employee volunteers.
Our collaborative work has strengthened the programs and services, value propositions, evidence bases, and impact measurement of our social ventures –empowering them to attract millions of dollars of new capital to fuel their next-level impact.
Our innovative model and empowering ecosystem enabled them to scale their reach by an average of seven times.
Collectively, our portfolio has improved the health, well-being, and prosperity of millions of Canadians from underserved communities across every province and territory.
Our Portfolio
Healthy Futures (2019-2024)
Healthy Futures launched in 2019 as LEAP’s first issue-focused initiative. Selected as a partner for the Public Health Agency of Canada’s Multisectoral Partnerships program, we collaborated to promote healthy living and prevent chronic disease for all Canadians, especially those in underserved communities. Working with 10 high-impact social ventures and our private sector partners, we scaled access to programs that promote physical activity, provide healthy, affordable food, or support smoking cessation.
Healthy Futures had a profound impact on Canadians. It scaled game-changing solutions that reached 5x as many Canadians by the end of the initiative. Beyond expanded reach, measurable behavioural change occurred in over 175k Canadians, which will lead to better long-term health outcomes.
LEAP’s work didn’t just engage stakeholders—it transformed them. We helped private sector teams reimagine how they think about and solve for community impact by forging new pathways to connect and collaborate with social ventures. We created forums to unify siloed conversations and relationships across sectors, sparking new conversations and decisive action. Social ventures realized more than ideas and insights—they leveraged a powerful scaling model that drove real-world results. Through that experience, they internalized the blueprint and mindset that can serve them beyond this initiative – a critical skill in a rapidly evolving and challenged sector.
By the Numbers
Healthy Futures was recognized as a leading example of intersectoral collaboration for impact in public health by the Pan American Health Organization.
5x
average scale across the cohort from 1M+ to 6M+ lives impacted every year
• Over 6M accessed healthy food, with widespread rapid scaling in response to food insecurity during the pandemic
• 50k increased their physical activity and improved their habits
• 60k quit smoking
175k+
people demonstrated behavioural changes that lead to better long-term health outcomes
4x
program sites across Canada
Healthy Futures offered an important test case: showing the model to be an effective means to support social venture scaling and growth, improving the quality of services and programs… and fostering trust and the type of honest discussion needed to address challenges and issues throughout the public health sector.
~ Social Research and Demonstration Corporation
5x
healthy food available to underserved communities
112k years of life gained because of smoking cessation
Challenger Baseball at Jays Care Foundation
Challenger Baseball is Jays Care Foundation’s adaptive baseball program, run in partnership with Little League Canada and Baseball Canada to empower children, youth, and adults with physical and cognitive disabilities. Operating through schools, communities, and sports leagues, Challenger Baseball builds core life skills—teamwork, communication, determination, resilience, inclusion, and courage—while ensuring accessible, inclusive environments where participants gain confidence, increase physical activity, and join a supportive community.
During Healthy Futures, LEAP and Jays Care Foundation developed a scaling strategy for Challenger Baseball that supported their pivot to virtual programming during COVID-19 and then fueled dramatic post-pandemic growth. The strategy identified key partnership geographies and influencers, audience-specific outreach and retention tactics, and tools to measure effectiveness and impact.
Focusing on the right growth markets and key audience influencers delivered exceptional results. Community partnerships surged by 9x. Simultaneously, their audience-first approach to recruitment, training, and engagement communications significantly improved volunteer recruitment and retention rates. Feedback mechanisms and measurement tools captured the depth and substance of program impact unlike ever before.
These expansions scaled Challenger Baseball’s reach by 7x, impacted over 13,000 young athletes last year with programming that measurably improved physical, mental, and social well-being.
The strategies’ exponential power extended across the organization. By applying the same thinking, tools, and approaches developed for Challenger Baseball, they tripled another nationwide program’s reach—demonstrating the amplified ripple effect of LEAP’s model.
“We have shifted our partnership mindset to talking to aggregators… It has changed our way of thinking and will lead to dramatic growth. There has [also] been a philosophical and transformative [change] in how we present things externally… the highest impact has been the transferable content and mindset shift.”
~ Jules Porter, Director of Programs, Challenger Baseball (during Healthy Futures)
The Equity Opportunity (2021-2026)
Grounded in a vision for a thriving and inclusive economy, and informed by our learnings and insights from Healthy Futures, LEAP’s second issue-focused initiative tackles the urgent need to advance the economic well-being of women.1 Catalyzed in response to the unprecedented setbacks women experienced during the pandemic, The Equity Opportunity provides a platform to collaborate with seven visionary women leaders to scale their high-impact, high-potential solutions to this intractable issue and impact thousands of women from underserved communities.
The climate of uncertainty puts into bold relief the significance of our collective progress at the initiative’s midpoint, reached at the end of 2024. We are inspired by the grit and dynamism of our cohort leaders, whose tenacious efforts transform the lives of the women they support on their journeys toward economic inclusion and stability.
Even with high-impact results to date, this issue remains urgent and demands our collective and deepened response. The number of women living on low incomes increased over the past three years. Across all income levels, the gender wage gap persists. The ratio of women in leadership roles has increased minimally, and there remains an alarming lack of representation of women from underrepresented communities.
We continue the initiative with a heightened awareness that women continue to face significant barriers. Our determination to overturn those has only compounded. Convening with each other and with LEAP’s network of private and public sector partners, champions, and advisors has catalyzed a highly collaborative cohort with an appetite for next-level partnerships and collective action on the issue. We will seize the opportunity to reimagine impact through deep collaboration and build on our collective momentum to change the lives of underserved women across the country, and the ecosystem that supports them.
By the Numbers2
10k
women supported in their journey to economic well-being
5k
women completed training or coaching programs
women secured employment or enrolled in post-secondary education
4k 170%+ 3k 90%+
average increase in annual incomes
businesses started or grown, with a 250% increase in the business revenue growth rate
3k
women earned a degree or certification
participants have a greater sense of professional and personal confidence
Newcomer Women’s Services Toronto
Newcomer Women’s Services Toronto (NEW) empowers newcomers to build their lives in Canada by providing settlement services, women-only English classes, skills development, leadership programs and employment services for youth and adults.
When they joined The Equity Opportunity, NEW’s goal was to scale their Sister2Sister Advanced Leadership Program (S2SALP), a six-month intensive skills and leadership development program that bridges the gap between employer needs and newcomer women’s skills through training and experiential learning opportunities. The program builds leadership capacity for racialized newcomer women while supporting their upskilling, upward mobility, and economic integration and advancement.
Within two years into their scaling journey, 8x as many women were graduating each year and the overall client base had grown by over 15x. However, economic and political headwinds drove increased demand alongside funding uncertainty. This precipitated a strategic shift to reimagine their organizational structure and centralize all women’s programs under a unified pillar.
Driving continued scale through this new and powerful structure requires redesigning and realigning internal systems and functions while amplifying assets and diversifying resources. This work is underway with tremendous determination and energy so that more newcomer women and their families may reap the rewards of their high-impact programs and services.
“Today’s [scaling strategy] session gave me hope that we are on the right path to unlocking NEW’s full potential. This work is not possible without LEAP’s ongoing support and commitment. The energy and excitement I saw today speaks volumes of what we can accomplish together and the impact we can create. We couldn’t be more proud of our work and partnership with LEAP.”
~ Sara Asalya, Executive Director
Our People
Team
Lorna Read, Ph.D., Managing Director
Sophie Armstrong, Donor Relations and Communications Coordinator
Celina Chen, Portfolio Manager
Steve Cumming, Vice President, Portfolio
Gina Leslie, Portfolio Director, The Equity Opportunity
Yash Mehta, Senior Manager, Portfolio
Raeshelle Morris-Griffith, Head, Leadership Lab
Jennifer Verschraegen, Vice President, Philanthropy & Partnerships
Thank you to our team for their commitment and to our board members who amplify our value with their leadership, expertise, and insights. and 30+ exceptional advisors and champions who give their time and expertise (see website for listings)
Board
Joan Dea, Chair of the Board
Gordon Baird, Partner, McCarthy Tétrault
Janet Bannister, Founder & Managing Partner, Staircase Ventures
Kilian Berz, Managing Director & Senior Partner, BCG
Helen Burstyn, C.M., Crescent Investment Partners
Mark Davis, Consultant, MAD Solutions
Nan DasGupta, Senior Partner Emeritus and Senior Advisor, BCG
Ashim Khemani, Founder & CEO, Stem Capital
Joe Manget, Chairman & CEO, Edgewood Health Network Inc.
Godyne Sibay, Senior Strategic Advisor, McCarthy Tétrault
Our Partners
Thank you to our private sector partners and their teams whose longstanding contributions of expertise, insights, and pro bono support continue to multiply the power of our model.
Our Donors
Thank you to our donors, whose steadfast commitment to scaling impact fuels our innovative approach.
Joan Dea & Lionel Conacher • Mark & Susan Davis
Helen Burstyn • Nan DasGupta & Michael Bernstein
Joe Manget & Christina Mauro-Manget
Janet Bannister • Kilian & Katharine Lake Berz • Ralph & Jeanie Davis
Ashim & Alka Khemani • Joan & Jerry Lozinski
Allard-Paterson Family Foundation • Ann Armstrong • Sophie Armstrong
Kathryn Babcock • Gordon Baird & Maia MacNiven • Kate Banting
Lisa Dymond • Shawn Ford • Philip Moore • Morell Chow Family Foundation
Lorna Read • Jennifer Verschraegen • Hua Yu
Nine individuals who prefer to remain anonymous
81 Bay Street, Suite 4810
Toronto, Ontario M5J 0E7
Charitable Registration No 830400305 RR0001
leap-pecautcentre.ca
