Great. Let's try this again.
Hi. My name is Victoria Morton. I was an employee of WE Charity from November 2018 to June 2020. I began as a strategist on the business development team, and then joined the executive office in September 2019. As a strategist, I supported all revenue-generating teams—for example, corporate partnerships, donor engagement, retail and executive office. While in the executive office, I provided direct support for Craig Kielburger for major events and select meetings. Managing his social media became part of my role shortly before the pandemic hit, and became more of my responsibility afterwards, with a particular emphasis on building up his LinkedIn.
In a previous committee meeting, Craig referred to his EA sending LinkedIn connection requests from his account. My title at the time was manager of executive projects, but the tasks he referred to on March 15, 2021 were under my portfolio. While I don't specifically remember Ben Chin, I did draft and send about 100 LinkedIn connection requests from Craig's account with custom messages using information I gathered from several internal and external sources.
Please note that I was laid off in March 2020, at the same time most staff were, and then rehired about two weeks later on a two-month contract. During those two weeks, I applied to grad school, so I requested that the contract be made part-time. I was accepted into the grad program. From May until my departure, I was attending school full time and working part time at WE, still primarily supporting Craig. As the two-month contract came to an end, I was offered a renewal but decided to respectfully decline, to focus on my education. I returned my company laptop, which contained any contact lists and confidential documents, shortly after.
Long before becoming a staff member, I was involved with WE as a youth from about grade 8 to mid-high school. I credit this organization with helping first ignite what has become a lifelong passion for civic engagement. I've volunteered with many organizations unrelated to WE, including some that are partisan. I'd like to proactively disclose that I have been a volunteer for both the Ontario Liberal Party and the Liberal Party of Canada. Some of this overlapped with my time at WE, but it was always undertaken as a private individual outside of work hours. Neither WE nor anybody within the organization has ever pressured me into any partisan activities.
I was happy to accept the committee's invitation to answer any questions that I can, but please note that I did not work on the Canada student service grant program, WE Day talent contracts or WE Villages, nor did I have any insight into the organization's finances. Additionally, I won't be providing the names of any other staff members. I'm grateful for Craig's previous refusal to give my name to the committee out of respect for my privacy. This allowed me to voluntarily identify myself using my personal Twitter account. I extend the same courtesy to all past and present staff members.
I'm grateful for the role WE has played in my life as both a student and staff member. I continue to deeply respect the work they've done to advance service learning in classrooms and social entrepreneurship, which are two fields I remain particularly passionate about. Regardless of what the future of WE is, I hope that support for service learning and social entrepreneurship continues to grow within Canada and around the world.