Crisis Services

Award Recipients

Award Recipients

Award RecipientsBarb Baker2026-01-04T16:53:28-05:00

Dr. Dobijoki Emanuela Bringi, RSSWThe Barbara Baker Distinguished SSW Merit Recipient (2025)

Dr. Dobijoki Emanuela Bringi is a dedicated Registered Social Service Worker and educator with an earned Doctorate in Education. She is a community advocate committed to advancing equity, well-being, and culturally responsive support. With over 15 years of experience in the sector, she has worked to empower individuals, strengthen communities, and support organizations in creating meaningful change.

As the founder of BRINGI Consulting, Dr. Bringi is deeply committed to providing culturally relevant services that honour the lived experiences of diverse communities. Her work integrates African-centered approaches to counselling, career coaching, academic pathways support, and organizational change, ensuring that individuals and organizations receive holistic, impactful, and empowering guidance.

She is a firm believer in the transformative power of social services. Dr. Bringi has developed programs that address systemic barriers and foster sustainable change. She has also collaborated with organizations and communities across multiple regions globally, bringing her expertise in African-centered leadership, education, and community development to international projects; with a particular focus in Canada and South Africa. Her dedication to community, advocacy, and empowerment continues to drive her efforts to ensure that support services remain accessible, culturally affirming, and transformative for all.

Land Acknowledgement

The Association acknowledges that its work takes place on the transitional territories of Indigenous Peoples, including First Nations, Inuit, and Metis communities, across the land now known as Ontario. We recognize that Indigenous Peoples have stewarded these lands since time immemorial and remain subject to treaties and agreements that are often unfulfilled.

The Association is committed to understanding and addressing the historical and ongoing impacts of colonization, including the role social service work has played in causing harm to Indigenous communities. We will work to be accountable by embedding reconciliation, cultural humility, and decolonizing practices into our work, while actively supporting Indigenous sovereignty and self-determination.

African Ancestral Acknowledgement

The Association acknowledges all who have come to these lands as settlers, whether by choice or migrants in this generation or generations past, and those who were brought here involuntarily, including those of African descent who arrived through the violent legacy of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade and Slavery. The Association honours the enduring strength, resistance, and contributions of African ancestors and their descendants, and we pay tribute to their memory, resilience, and continued presence on these lands.

2SLGBTQIA+ Solidarity Statement

The Association is unreservedly committed to actively celebrating, amplifying and working alongside and in collaboration with 2-Spirit, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, Queer, Intersex, Asexual, Non-Binary and other communities publicly, without shame or restriction, and working actively against violent and discriminatory policy and rhetoric locally and globally. We are committed to honouring the lives lost to anti-Trans and 2SLGBTQIA+ violence.

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