We are guided by our Theory of Change which assumes that when the Connected Community Approach is adopted, we can expect to see:

  • Mindsets shift towards collective, community-centred solutions

  • Practices adopted to increase social infrastructure investments

  • Power dynamics adjusted towards more equitable decision making processes

  • Policies and resource flows focused on creative and effective community-centred solutions


Our Vision

To create connected communities for an equitable and healthy society.


Our Mission

Making transformative change in communities possible.


Guiding Principles

We approach our work by:

  • Grounding everything in relationships

  • Putting people and process before product

  • Starting with why, then invest in how and the what will emerge


We believe that:

  • People and communities are agents of their own change

  • Context matters

  • Issues plaguing society can only be addressed through being in right relations with people, cultures and the land

  • Everyone deserves autonomy, dignity and self-determination

  • Meaningful equity-based impact requires explicit commitments to anti-racist principles and actions


Our Team

We work in emergence and are driven by purpose. Led by our core staff team, Catalysts' Circle works with an extensive network of partners and collaborators, forming teams on a project-by-project basis.

Executive Director Sherry Lin

Sherry believes that art, culture and creativity are the tools to catalyze change, growth and transformation. She engages people in conversations about various issues using creativity and design as communication vehicles. Working with organizations to develop internal and external strategies, Sherry focuses on collaborating with various stakeholders, from the board of directors to city officials to youth and community members. Sherry's expertise includes community engagement, public engagement with creativity and design, , infrastructure design, corporate governance and financial management

Strategy Director Anne Gloger

Anne Gloger has spent her career delving deeply into the whys and hows of effective community development and engagement. She believes that it is intentional, meaningful and authentic investment in communities, relationships and equitable processes that will create the kinds of transformational change that our world so desperately needs. Anne supports a wide variety of change catalysts from communities, organizations, institutions and governments to design and implement strategies that truly centre communities. She does this by leveraging more than 3 decades of work with and in communities, and especially from her roles as founding Director at the East Scarborough Storefront and Centre for Connected Communities.

Our History

Catalysts' Circle is grounded in the pioneering efforts of one organization in a marginalized inner suburban community in the eastern most part of Toronto, Ontario. This organization, the East Scarborough Storefront (The Storefront) was created by the community for the community. The approach that evolved over time was one that involves intentionally facilitating a connected community and later became the Connected Community Approach. The Storefront continues to thrive and live into its role and purpose as a community backbone organization within the Kingston Galloway/Orton Park (KGO) neighbourhood is intentionally connecting people, ideas, strategies, resources, programs and initiatives in order to create community social fabric that supports people, organizations and initiatives to thrive. The results continue to be inspiring. 

The Storefront has worked with a diversity of players to co-create multiple successful initiatives and has received multiple awards. Their success rests on a spirit of inclusion, collaboration, optimism and intention. In a funding and sector environment that often encourages a focus on individual needs and programmatic responses rather than the creation of strong social fabric, establishing this approach, which they call the Connected Community Approach, has not been easy, and has not yet reached its full potential. The Storefront's example, however, provides a glimpse into what might be possible if we focused on the interaction and connections between and among people and organizations engaged in the important work of community building.