Outward Bound’s Rob Wallis Joins CHFI Board of Advisors

(Toronto, August 30, 2023).

The Canadian Health and Fitness Institute (“CHFI”) is delighted to announce the addition of Dr. Robert Wallis to its Board of Advisors. Education Manager and Principal for Outward Bound Canada (OBC),

Wallis brings enormous practical and academic experience in the world of outdoor recreation. With an Oxford Ph.D. and a Bachelor of Education from Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto, Rob adds to CHFI’s well established stable of experts in areas relating to health and fitness.

“I’m drawn to CHFI due to its commitment to use the outdoors as a classroom, to help people establish healthier trends of living,” said Wallis, who builds OBC’s curriculum around Social and Emotional Learning and the Environment, and works to improve the perception and reach of outdoor education within schools and at the government policy level.

“My goal is to democratize outdoor education so that it is accessible to all school--aged youth in Canada,” Wallis added. “Outdoor Experiential Education has the potential to create a society that is healthy, resilient, and prosperous. Being involved with the Canadian Health and Fitness Institute would create a valuable avenue to achieve this goal, and work with like-minded, passionate individuals targeting a similar, complementary vision.

“Rob brings to the Institute not only experience in education, program evaluation and impact assessment, but also academic medical research from earlier in his career studying diabetes and metabolic diseases,” said Monica Jako, Social Enterprise Incubator, Youth Educator and another Toronto-based CHFI Advisor. “As a member of Outward Bound International and on its Research Advisory Group, he also brings expertise and advice from an international Outward Bound community spanning 80 years, and 38 countries."