"We are truly excited to welcome Catherine to the CPC leadership team," said Karen O'Neill, chief executive of the CPC.

"Catherine has a strong track record as a sport technical leader within the Canadian sport community and is an outstanding choice to build on the success of the CPC."

Gosselin-Després' new role will see her responsible for a number of key areas such as the delivery of Games and high performance programmes, athlete recruitment, development and retention, as well as the general overseeing of the CPC's sports department as a whole.

Gosselin-Després comes into the role off the back of a highly successful stint as chief executive of Synchro Canada, the governing body for synchronised swimming in Canada.

During her time at Synchro Canada she was instrumental in leading the organisation through a number of successful initiatives and necessary transformational changes.

She successfully led sport technical and administrative personnel in the creation and implementation of a new strategic plan for the organisation.

"Catherine is an outstanding talent who rapidly became a successful leader in her career," said Mario Welsh, President of Synchro Canada.

"Since joining Synchro Canada in 2005, her contributions for both international and national areas have been exceptional.

"She has succeeded the accomplishment of the centralisation of our National team, as we know it today, and the structure of our National competitions is noteworthy."

Prior to joining Synchro Canada, Gosselin-Després worked as programme coordinator at CanoeKayak Canada and was responsible for developing and implementing the highly successful "All Paddle" initiative for people with a disability at the grassroots level of both canoeing and kayaking.

Gosselin-Després' "All Paddle" initiative is thought to have resulted in a great advocacy effort to have canoe and kayak included in the Paralympic Games programme

Gosselin-Després is due to start in her new role on November 4.

"I'm very excited about joining the CPC and leading a very talented and dedicated group of individuals," said Gosselin-Després.

"The CPC has laid such a great foundation through the leadership of Rob Needham [former Executive Director of Sport] and I'm looking forward to working with our sport community to continue building a vibrant and sustainable Parasport system."

Contact the writer of this story at [email protected]


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