High Resolves

    Over the past 15 years, High Resolves has successfully designed and delivered deeply engaging, immersive learning experiences to youth throughout the world. We believe that education on human responsibility sits at the very foundation of the personal and collective transformations required in today’s world. High Resolves Canada brings that vision to young people across our vast and beautiful nation.

    woman wearing face mask

    The events of 2020 changed our lives. The global pandemic revealed to many of us, the limits of our own resilience and mental health, and in speaking with parents, educators and young people, we understand the shared concern for young people and their feelings of isolation and anxiety about the future.

    The sense of disconnect felt by young people as a result of the pandemic and the remote learning environment it created, means young Australians are increasingly searching for belonging in unregulated and often unsafe online spaces, which if left unchecked, provide fertile ground for division and manipulation.

    The need to activate human responsibility lies at the heart of this challenge.

    Canadian Vision

    Our Mission

    Our mission is to activate human responsibility by equipping young people with the knowledge, skills and confidence to become active, engaged and responsible citizens who desire to create a more just and inclusive society.

    Our Vision

    Our vision is a generation of young people resolving to make a positive difference to the world.

    Our history
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    Seeds of an idea

    In the 1980s, Toronto-born and High Resolves co-founder Mehrdad Baghai worked under the supervision of Nobel laureate Tom Schelling at the Harvard Kennedy School to study the emergence of cooperation using simulations. Mehrdad and a colleague developed a Climate Change negotiation simulation which became part of the negotiation courses offered at the Harvard Business School, Law School and Kennedy School.

    High Resolves is born

    In 2005, Mehrdad together with his wife and co-founder Roya Roya were looking to make a significant contribution to society. They recalled the simulation from the 80s and approached their son’s school, the International Grammar School in inner city Sydney, to pilot the approach for high school students. Students were engaged, and so work began to flesh out the activities into comprehensive curriculum.

    Expansion throughout Sydney

    The program grew quickly, with 20 schools across Sydney engaging High Resolves to deliver its high-quality learning experiences. We recruited educators and expert facilitators to deliver our programs and support Mehrdad in developing and refining curriculum. High Resolves was being recognised as a provider of high-quality learning experiences.

    New hubs are created

    During the next few years, High Resolves expanded across Australia as demand for services grew. With this scale, we made a strategic decision to introduce pricing for our services to ensure long term sustainability and the ability grow our impact. By 2017, Australia was a self-funded social enterprise. Given the immense response and impact, Mehrdad and Roya decided to expand outside Australia and launch pilots in other countries.

    A Covid Transformation

    In 2019, High Resolves Canada received charitable status and began working with schools in the Greater Toronto Area. During the COVID-19 lockdown of 2020 and move to online learning, High Resolves responded quickly and innovatively with the creation of engaging, high-quality online offerings for students and teacher. The pandemic activated a transformation within High Resolves to scale, expand and cultivate its programs to a fully online, highly accessible, state of the art educational ecosystem.

    Our global presence

    Since our start in Australia in 2005, we have continuously adapted our curriculum to the specific cultural contexts we work in. As part of our expansion into the U.S., Canada, China and Brazil, we are tailoring the language, examples and facilitation style to fit within the cultural context of each country.

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