ERIC WONG
July 11, 1952 – May 26, 2022
Eric was a fourth-generation Canadian who was born, attended school, worked and lived in the City of Vancouver.
From Simon Fraser Elementary School, to his years as a teacher and multicultural education consultant with the Vancouver School Board, and as a faculty associate with the University of British Columbia, much of Eric’s life was spent in British Columbia’s education system. He volunteered with many organizations, including the Asian Society for the Intervention of AIDS (ASIA); the B.C. Association for Community Living; the British Columbia Multicultural Education Society; the Law Foundation of British Columbia; SUCCESS (United Chinese Community Enrichment Services Society); the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre; and the Vancouver Recovery Club.
After leaving the Vancouver School Board in 1988, Eric taught at the Faculty of Education at U.B.C. before joining the City of Vancouver as a consultant/trainer with the Employment Equity Office in 1989. From 1990 to 1994 he was the manager of training and programs with the City of Vancouver’s Hastings Institute.
Later, self-employed as an anti-racism, diversity and human rights consultant, Eric worked for a wide variety of organizations, including: the B.C. Hospital Employees’ Union; the B.C. Human Rights Commission; the British Columbia Ministry of Children and Family Development; the B.C. Workers’ Compensation Board; the Canadian Department of Justice; and the Squamish Band Social Development Office. The founders of MISCELLANEOUS Productions Society met with Eric in January 2001 to enlist him as the company’s resident diversity consultant. They knew instantly that he was the man for the job – he had a deep understanding of the company’s community-engaged art, its quest to be used as a tool to empower and give a strong voice to culturally and socially representative youth, how crucial it was to craft clear messages against oppression in performances and films, and how creating compassionate relationships was key to the company’s work.
Eric was paid once for his early work with MISCELLANEOUS Productions’ board and staff, and then he donated back every fee for the following 21 years of this foundational work.
Working with the company’s youth and professionals on issues of diversity, racism, ableism, homophobia and accentism, Eric supported MISCELLANEOUS Productions in its development and growth and was an enormously positive influence on the youth, as he believed in bringing people together and widening the circle. He taught staff how to listen to youth, build relationships, and how to teach youth who deal with multi-barriers how to tear down those walls with sensitivity and humanity.