Harnessing the Digital Community to Center Black Youth Wellbeing

Description

*À noter que ce webinaire sera sous-titré en direct en français

Introduction and welcome by DIVERT Mental Health’s Nominated Principal Investigator, Dr. Rebecca Pillai Riddell (CPsych, FCAHS) & Sean Wagner, PhD, Research Scientist,
IBM Canada Innovation Team

Members of the Youth Research and Evaluation Exchange (YouthREX) based at the School of Social Work at York University will lead DIVERT’s inaugural lecture on how they are leveraging digital/virtual technologies in their work with the Ontario youth sector. Their conversation will be framed by their experience from launching a comprehensive and multi-modal online certificate titled Centering Black Youth Wellbeing: A Certificate on Combatting Anti-Black Racism.

This certificate was designed to provide the youth sector with the foundational knowledge, resources, and tools to cultivate practices, policies and alliances that challenge, disrupt and combat systematic anti-Black racism. The certificate is grounded on five understandings including that the experiences of Black youth are multi-layered and class, gender, ethnicity, sexuality, and other social identities are intersectional and therefore cannot be separated from one another.

Since launching the certificate in February 2021, over 6000 participants have registered for the certificate. Findings from an evaluation model that provides a “panoramic view” by evaluating four levels of program effects (including participant reactions; learning and transfer of learning; as well as the organizational impact of the program), indicate that the certificate is effective in building the capacity of participants.

They will discuss pedagogical approaches of the certificate such as a virtual Community of Practice for participants to share reflections, questions, struggles and strategies and the weaving of artistic content into the curriculum. They will also reflect on the possibilities and limitations of anti-Black racism trainings (ABR) such as their certificate to contribute to organizational equity shifts and overall knowledge, awareness, and sense of safety in organizations as well as what impact ABR trainings have when the barriers faced by young Black people and their communities are systems-based.

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  Uzo is the Provincial Academic Director of YouthREX. She is the York Research Chair in Youth and Contexts of Inequity and an Associate Professor at the School of Social Work, York University. Her educational background includes a PhD in Social Work from the University of Toronto; and MSW and BSW from York University. Uzo’s community-engaged research is focused on critical youth work. She conceptualizes her research as a community dialogue that is centred on equitable collaborations with community stakeholders. Uzo is the co-editor of the first Canadian textbook on Working with Immigrants and Refugees published by the University of Oxford in 2017. She has served on a variety of community-based and professional boards, including being appointed by an Order in Council by the Government of Ontario to the Board of Directors of the Central Local Health Integrated Network for two terms of six years and has also served on the Board of Accreditation of the Canadian Association of Schools of Social Work.
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  Kamau is a Learning and Research Associate at YouthREX. He studied Criminology and Sociology at Douglas College in British Columbia. He also spent time as a research assistant with the Toronto Youth Forum, “Project Groundings: Youth and Community Development in Canada and Jamaica”. Kamau has interests in combatting racial and social inequities and exploring innovative methods of working with marginalized communities.
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  Dr Carol Wade has over 20 years of experience in the child welfare sector and in social work education. She is currently a Child Protection Supervisor at the Catholic Children’s Aid Society of Toronto and a sessional instructor at the Schools of Social Work at University of Windsor and York University. Her educational background includes a PhD from the University of Toronto and a Master of Social Work (MSW) and a Bachelor of Social Work (BSW) from York University. Her PhD dissertation focused on understanding the impact of historical trauma on current-day parenting. She draws on this work in using critical theories and pedagogies to deconstruct and challenge oppressive practices to families and young people. Carol has developed and facilitated workshops and other training opportunities for youth workers across Ontario as part of the Academic Network of the Youth Research and Evaluation Exchange at York University. Carol has served on a variety of boards and is currently on the Board of Directors of the Durham Family and Cultural Center.