UPOPOLIS

25+ years working as a Certified Child Life Specialist in one of Canada's Children's Hospitals and 7+ years as the national program manager for Upopolis. Grateful to have six CCLS on our Upopolis team, two of whom have their BEd and experience working in the classroom, and another who teaches at the college level. Upopolis ( a program of the non profit Kids' Health Links Foundation based out of Ontario) has been connecting youth to peer support and reliable resources for fifteen years thanks to the support of TELUS and other community partners.

Krista Naugler is a Certified Child Life Specialist and joined the KHLF team as Upopolis Program Coordinator in October 2015. In June 2016, she took on the additional responsibilities of Upopolis Program Manager. For over 20 years, Krista worked in the child life department at IWK Health Centre in Halifax, Nova Scotia, serving in units including emergency, cardiology, orthopaedics, NICU, surgery, the paediatric medical unit and neurology. Over the course of her career, Krista has taken several opportunities to extend her expertise beyond the traditional child life specialist role. She spent three years developing the framework for and coordinating a Microsoft initiative at the IWK Health Centre called the Child Life Interactive Computers for Kids program (CLICK). Krista has also worked with a team of researchers and augmentative reality developers to create an application allowing medical professionals to determine if a patient would be a candidate to undergo a procedure without sedation. She is an advocate for youth grief peer support opportunities and co- facilitates grief support groups for youth 10-17 years of age. In 2014, Krista founded Camp Kedooopse at Brigadoon Village, a grief support camp for children and youth ages 8-17 years. When asked why she is passionate about her work for KHLF, Krista shares that she recognizes the need to meet teens where they are at. Today, that means accepting their use of technology as of means of connection and expression. She is also aware of the importance of independence and peer relationships during adolescence. It is these things that fuel her passion for her work with KHLF.