Canadian Statistics Advisory Council

Chairperson, Dr. Howard Ramos

Chairperson

Professor and Chair of the Department of Sociology, Western University

Dr. Howard Ramos is the Chair of the Department of Sociology at Western University and Professor. He investigates issues of social justice and social change and has published five books and over 50 articles and chapters on social movements, human rights, Indigenous issues, environmental advocacy, urban change, economic and tourism development, technology, ethnicity, race, immigration, and equity, diversity and inclusion in higher education. Dr. Ramos has worked with a wide range of advocacy and community organizations and is committed to knowledge translation and evidence-based policy.

Annette Hester

CSAC Member

Head of TheHesterView Inc.

Annette Hester heads TheHesterView Inc. and focuses on new approaches to working with data. She collaborates with leading experts in their field to deliver excellence in data structuring and in data visualization.

Ms. Hester was a faculty member of the University of Calgary Haskayne Global Energy EMBA, served as a senior advisor to the Deputy Minister of the Government of Alberta and was part of the policy team for the leadership campaign of Alberta's Premier, Alison Redford, Progressive Conservative Party of Alberta. Ms. Hester has extensive experience as a consultant for leading oil, gas, and energy companies in North and Latin America, and to governmental agencies in several countries of the Americas, primarily Brazil and Canada.

Ms. Hester has a master's degree in economics and has written for a variety of multilateral institutions, academic publications and think tanks.

Dr. Céline Le Bourdais

CSAC Member

Professor, McGill University

Céline Le Bourdais is Distinguished James McGill Professor of Sociology at McGill University. Often motivated by public policy issues, her research examines the profound demographic changes that families experience in Quebec and Canada.

Dr. Le Bourdais was the founding Academic Director of the Quebec Interuniversity Centre for Social Statistics (QICSS), which provides researchers with access to Statistics Canada micro-detailed data, and she played a key role in the development of the Canadian Research Data Centre Network (CRDCN), to which QICSS belongs. She was also a member of the National Statistics Council. Dr. Le Bourdais is a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, and she received the Canadian Population Society Award for her contribution to demography and the Thérèse Gouin-Décarie Award from the ‘Association francophone pour le savoir’ (ACFAS) for her contribution in social sciences. She holds a PhD in sociology from Brown University and a master’s degree in demography from Université de Montréal.

David Chaundy

CSAC Member

President and CEO, APEC

David Chaundy was appointed President and CEO of the Atlantic Provinces Economic Council (APEC) in November 2018 after many years of overseeing research at APEC. Mr. Chaundy has directed research projects on a wide variety of topics, including international trade and global value chains, international investment, immigration and labour market issues, interprovincial regulatory trade barriers, and policies to promote clean growth and the expansion of clean technology firms in Atlantic Canada.

Mr. Chaundy is a member of the Canadian Statistics Advisory Council and the National Stakeholder Advisory Panel for the Labour Market Information Council. He is Vice-President of the Canadian Association for Business Economics, a Director and Past President of the Atlantic Association of Applied Economists and a Director of the Atlantic Canada Economics Association. He holds a B.A. in economics from the University of Cambridge and a M.Sc. in economics from the University of York (England).

Jan Kestle

CSAC Member

President and CEO, Environics Analytics

President and CEO of Environics Analytics (EA), Jan Kestle is a leader in the marketing information industry. Over the years, she's helped hundreds of customers—in areas ranging from finance and retail to the not-for-profit sector—turn data and analytics into insight, strategy and engagement. Prior to founding EA in 2003, Ms. Kestle was president of Compusearch, a pioneer private sector distributor of Statistics Canada data.

Ms. Kestle's past experience includes being the statistical focal point for Ontario at the Ontario Statistical Centre and a member of the Federal-Provincial Statistics Council. She was a member of the National Statistics Council and is currently a member of the Board of Directors of the Canadian Marketing Association, the Dean's Advisory Council of the Ted Rogers School of Management, the Canadian Council of Innovators and the Advisory Board of Ryerson University School of Geography. A frequent conference speaker, she is the recipient of a Bachelor of Science degree in applied mathematics from the University of Western Ontario.