Lions alumna Levy reflects on 'pivotal moment' on one of the world's biggest stages

Burlington, Ont. (by David DiCenzo) - Sandra Levy always knew that reaching her goals would require incredible work. She never shied away from it. The Kingston, Jamaica native and proud Torontonian has lived a dream throughout her inspirational journey from aspiring young field hockey star to her current role as Chief People & Culture Officer with the Canadian Olympic Committee.

In between, there were times of joy, pain, and frustration. But no memory stands out more than an evening in Seoul, South Korea 35 years ago, when Levy walked into the Olympic Stadium with the Canadian team at the 1988 Opening Ceremony.

“It was emotional,” she says recalling her debut as an Olympian. “It was one of those pivotal moments in your life when you realize, ‘I made it.’ A little working-class kid from Scarborough. It made me think about all the hard work hours and challenges you overcome to get there. I had this massive sense of pride in being Canadian. I was always proud of that. I came to Canada at the age of four, it was the home I knew.

“I walked into the stadium alongside my Canadian teammates and got to play on the biggest stage.”

The Olympics have always mesmerized Levy. She made the trip again as a Canadian national team member four years later in Barcelona. Actually, between her participation as an athlete, being a fan, and as a mission member representing the COC, she’s never missed seeing an Opening Ceremony dating back to the 1976 Games in Montreal.

Watching the Olympics on home soil as a child was the spark that helped Levy fall in love with sports. And her Scarborough community provided plenty of opportunities for a young athlete to grow. She arrived in Canada in the early 1970s with her siblings, six months after her parents had emigrated to Toronto. That was the typical routine during that immigration boom, where adults came early, and the children followed.

Athletic competition was big in her community. Levy attended L’Amoreaux Collegiate Institute, a diverse school whose students spoke over 50 languages and dialects. It produced sporting stars, too, including other Olympic-level athletes. Levy, who would eventually become school president at L’Amoreaux, began playing field hockey in grade nine. She was a natural lefty in a sport where you can only shoot right, so she had to learn that skill. But Levy was a natural in terms of athletic ability, blending coordination, explosiveness, and stamina, all of which helped her become a dangerous forward. She also grew up playing soccer, a sport that had conceptual similarities, and gained strength and endurance from being a distance runner. Levy could move well with the ball and ultimately, put it in the back of the net.

“I had a friend from middle school, whose sister was on the field hockey team,” she recalls. “She said, ‘You should try out.’ They had so many players come and created two teams. I made the B team. I always share that with kids because you can make the B team and still end up being a high-performance athlete.

“In grade 10, I made the A team. I developed very quickly that year and also made the Under 16 provincial team. From there, it was a fast progression.”

Levy was taught by Australian coach Ken O’Connor, who helped L’Amoreaux become a dynasty in the sport. They won multiple city championships and Ontario Federation of School Athletic Association titles. Individually, she blossomed. Levy made the Under 16 Canadian team as a 14-year-old and became a regular in the national program.

Her next coach was equally influential – Marina van der Merwe at York University. Levy chose York because of van der Merwe, also head coach with the national program.

“Being with a national coach every morning really developed my skills,” says Levy. “We focused on specific expertise areas, like penalty corners. And I was able to work on the physiological part of the game. Running, plyometrics, we had access to York’s indoor facilities. It enhanced my ability to train properly and in a concentrated way. If you’re in Scarborough when it’s freezing outside, and you don’t have a place to train, you sometimes just didn’t get it done.”

Levy smiles when thinking about her experience at York. She cherished the camaraderie, the competition, and sharing laughs on a bus or in the training room, with people who became (and remain) her sisters. van der Merwe instilled the importance of a professional approach at all times, which has been useful both in sports and off the field. Levy was a perennial All-Star and All-Canadian at York. They fell agonizingly short of a couple of national titles but her passion to compete never wavered.

Representing Canada was always an honour. She almost made the Olympic team in 1984 at the Los Angeles Games four years before her big night in Seoul. Canada placed sixth in 1988 and seventh when Levy and her team competed in the 1992 Barcelona Games.

Field hockey has allowed her to see the world, though not every experience brought joy. There wasn’t a lot of diversity in the sport when she played and as a black athlete, she felt that division.

In 1993, the Canadian team was training in Durban, South Africa during a tumultuous political time in the country. The famous New Zealand All-Blacks rugby team came to play in front of 80,000 people. Levy and her teammates were invited to attend the match and an event following it. Sanctions against South Africa had been lifted, but Levy insisted on a general briefing with her teammates before going. She knew the country’s story. As a politically-minded teenager in Scarborough, Levy had always made her feelings about South Africa and apartheid known.

“I experienced what I expected to experience,” she says of the Durban trip. “We had to discuss it as a team because frankly, I was uncomfortable in some situations. At the post-match event, I felt unsafe as a Black person where only white people were seen as guests, Indians were tending the bar, and Blacks were picking up the garbage. I remember being very upset about it. There were blatant displays of racism, the way the white guests were treating the service people. We met on it the next day as a team, and we dealt with it.

“I wrote an article about it for a women’s journal. The gist of it was, ‘I went in with a chip on my shoulder – and came out with a lumberyard.’”

Levy spent 11 memorable years on the road as a national team member. The bond she formed with her various teammates, coaches, and staff members has remained strong. They have gathered to celebrate life’s best and worst occasions, weddings and births, or to mourn those lost. Levy says that when competing at a high level, the love for each other must be there to succeed – because it’s hard to pass a ball to someone you don’t like.

After her playing days, the energy and desire to make a difference fueled new challenges. Levy was a good student and always knew there would be more academic experiences after York. She applied to teacher’s colleges but opted for law school, eventually earning her degree from York’s famous Osgoode Hall. Levy kept a hand in politics, but devoted most of her time to a career in the corporate world, where she held VP of Human Resources roles at organizations like the Canadian National Institute for the Blind, Ply Gem Canada Inc, First Capital Realty, and RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust.

In October 2020, Levy was named Chief People Officer at the COC. She found her way back to sports, decades after those awe-inspiring Montreal Olympics of her childhood.

“This new role was developed, and I was recruited for it in the middle of COVID,” says Levy, who had occasionally worked on mission teams and on Olympic bids. “Like many people during this awful pandemic, I shifted what I was doing and began to think differently. My partner and I discussed it, and I made the move to join the COC.

“It’s been wonderful. Admittedly, it’s been in COVID. We weren’t able to send full staff to the Toyko and Beijing Games because of the limitations of the pandemic.

“So Paris (2024) will be super exciting.”