tag:theconversation.com,2011:/africa/topics/ontario-41177/articlesOntario – The Conversation2024-03-25T21:15:49Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2246032024-03-25T21:15:49Z2024-03-25T21:15:49ZHow caste discrimination impacts communities in Canada<p>Many perceive caste to be a phenomenon that only exists in India. Yet, it is a part of Canadian society, and an issue that many in South Asian diasporas are contending with. </p>
<p>The late British Columbia-based poet and activist <a href="https://youtu.be/nDn-JBR0YMI">Mohan Lal Karimpuri</a> described caste as a system of high and low, a form of “social, economic, political, religious inequality” that takes away the power of the many and puts it in the hands of the few. It is the hierarchical ranking of people in accordance with an ascriptive identity, associated with family, lineage and hereditary occupation. </p>
<p>Those who are Dalit, like Karimpuri, are among the most marginalized by dominant castes, and historically systematically excluded in social, economic and cultural terms. Dalits are most vulnerable in India where violence and exclusion remain pervasive. In 2022, Amnesty International stated that “<a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/location/asia-and-the-pacific/south-asia/india/report-india/">hate crimes including violence against Dalits and Adivasis [Indigenous Peoples] were committed with impunity</a>.” </p>
<p>But caste does not only exist in South Asia. In recent years, it has been formally recognized as a potential grounds for discrimination in the United States and Canada in diverse contexts in places like <a href="https://www.npr.org/2023/02/22/1158687243/seattle-becomes-the-first-u-s-city-to-ban-caste-discrimination">Seattle, Wash.</a> and <a href="https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/burnaby-council-votes-unanimously-to-include-caste-as-a-protected-category">Burnaby, B.C.</a>. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/2180604995628">Toronto District School Board</a>, the <a href="https://www.ohrc.on.ca/en/news_centre/ohrc%E2%80%99s-policy-position-caste-based-discrimination#:%7E:text=The%20OHRC%20takes%20the%20position,other%20grounds%2C%20under%20Ontario's%20Code">Ontario Human Rights Commission</a>, <a href="https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2022/10/13/caste-union-contract-activism/">Harvard University</a> and the <a href="https://apnews.com/article/business-asia-education-california-discrimination-82963d9c6acdc6862173ab2959fd2a97">University of California, Davis</a> have recognized casteism as a form of discrimination. </p>
<p>In 2023, California lawmakers passed a bill that would explicitly ban caste discrimination in the state. However, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/10/09/us/california-caste-discrimination-bill-veto/index.html">it was vetoed by Gov. Gavin Newsom</a> who said it was “unnecessary,” arguing that caste discrimination was already banned under existing laws.</p>
<p>To truly understand what caste means and its impact, the stories of those who experience caste discrimination must be heard. All too often, the experiences of those marginalized within the caste system are treated as an addendum or aside to dominant caste narratives, and casteist perspectives persist in the public domain and remain unquestioned. </p>
<h2>Lack of visibility</h2>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Caste in Canada project interview with Rashpal Bharwaj.</span></figcaption>
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<p>In 2020, we initiated the <a href="https://blogs.ubc.ca/annemurphy/research/caste-in-canada/">Caste in Canada project</a> in partnership with Dalit civil society leaders in B.C. The project documented the lives of Canadians of Dalit ancestry through in-depth oral history interviews. We interviewed 19 people from an array of backgrounds impacted by caste. Fourteen of these interviews are now available on the project website.</p>
<p>One recurrent theme in the interviews was the issue of visibility. University student Vipasna Nangal, for example, expressed concern about how many Dalits mask their caste identity in Canada as a way of avoiding stigma. </p>
<p>As she notes, “<a href="https://youtu.be/0agL2hwZyCQ">in order to resist something you have to acknowledge it… and so you can’t have resistance without having visibility</a>.” Caste, therefore, is something that needs to be talked about and not hidden. The limitations of masking caste identity are eloquently addressed in the interview with journalist Meera Estrada. She poignantly describes the pain involved in pretending not to be Dalit and her own personal journey towards <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VNzahJ90Uw">publicly acknowledging her identity</a>. </p>
<p>Participants in the project voiced this as a common concern: that only by making the stories of Dalits more visible and accessible can we create domains for the recognition, and then obliteration, of caste and casteism, and the possibility of moving past caste divisions, for all. </p>
<h2>Challenging the social acceptability of casteism</h2>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Caste in Canada project interview with Vipasna Nangal.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Another important theme was the need to challenge the social acceptability of casteist discourse. Several participants emphasized the pervasiveness of casteist discourses in popular contexts, such as in music, where dominant caste perspectives are celebrated. </p>
<p>Participant Rashpal Singh Bhardwaj, founder of the Ambedkar International Social Reform Organization (AISRO), <a href="https://youtu.be/jd6ZnFMoaLw">described the organization’s work with local radio stations</a> to discourage playing music that celebrates dominant caste identities on the radio. </p>
<p>Caste discrimination is a part of the life experiences of many in Canada, both as a result of experiences in India, but also here in Canada. Participants <a href="https://blogs.ubc.ca/annemurphy/research/caste-in-canada/gurpreet-singh/">Gurpreet Singh</a> and <a href="https://blogs.ubc.ca/annemurphy/research/caste-in-canada/kamaljit/">Kamaljit</a> described how people of South Asian heritage in Canada try to discover each other’s caste backgrounds — and the exclusion this entails.</p>
<p>It is, in short, a part of Canadian society, working on multiple levels and complicating our understanding of diversity in the Canadian context. </p>
<h2>Tackling caste</h2>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Caste in Canada project interview with Mohan Lal Karimpuri.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Given that caste is a continuing problem both in India and abroad, it is no surprise that Dalit Canadians have organized extensively to address discrimination. In B.C. there are several organizations, such as our project partner, the <a href="https://www.chetna.ca/">Chetna (“Awareness”) Association of Canada</a>, represented in our interviews by its executive director, <a href="https://blogs.ubc.ca/annemurphy/research/caste-in-canada/jai-birdi/">Jai Birdi</a> — who played a key role in the project, and speaks in his interview about how to respond to caste discrimination with <a href="https://youtu.be/0tmGGiok3_8">power and resilience</a> — and <a href="https://blogs.ubc.ca/annemurphy/research/caste-in-canada/surjit-manjit-bains/">Manjit and Surjit Bains</a>, Ambedkarite Buddhist activists.</p>
<p>Other important organizations include AISRO and its members <a href="https://blogs.ubc.ca/annemurphy/research/caste-in-canada/rashpal-bhardwaj/">Rashpal Singh Bhardwaj</a>, <a href="https://blogs.ubc.ca/annemurphy/research/caste-in-canada/jogender-banger/">Jogender Banger</a>, and <a href="https://blogs.ubc.ca/annemurphy/research/caste-in-canada/kamlesh-ahir/">Kamlesh Ahir</a> whom we interviewed for the project. There is also the <a href="https://www.aicscanada.ca/">Ambedkarite International Co-ordination Society</a>, represented in the project by <a href="https://blogs.ubc.ca/annemurphy/research/caste-in-canada/param-kainth/">Param Kainth</a>, who also speaks eloquently about the importance of the teachings of the Buddha for Dalits. </p>
<p>As the titles of these organizations make clear, they are inspired by India’s towering leader and architect of the Indian constitution, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Bhimrao-Ramji-Ambedkar">B.R. Ambedkar</a>, who campaigned for the rights of South Asia’s diverse Dalit communities. His life and activism provide the model for millions of Dalits around the world as they seek to remake the world without caste. With the Caste in Canada project, we work with our Dalit colleagues to do the same in Canada.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/224603/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anne Murphy and Suraj Yengde received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, with additional support from an anonymous donor to the Department of History at the University of British Columbia, in support of the "Caste in Canada" project.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>.</span></em></p>Casteism is commonly seen as a form of discrimination limited to South Asia. However, diaspora communities in Canada are also grappling with issues of caste.Anne Murphy, Associate Professor, Department of History, University of British ColumbiaSuraj Yengde, Postdoc, Harvard Kennedy School | Associate, Department of African and African American Studies, Harvard UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2257422024-03-20T15:40:03Z2024-03-20T15:40:03ZIndigenous consultation is key to the Ring of Fire becoming Canada’s economic superpower<p>Many of the 30,000 attendees of the March 2024 <a href="https://www.pdac.ca/convention">Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada convention</a> harbour a “wild desire” to extract the mineral riches of <a href="https://www.wsj.com/story/fight-heats-up-over-canadas-ring-of-fire-where-67-billion-of-rare-minerals-is-buried-07f56a23">Canada’s $67 billion Ring of Fire</a>, in the words of Johnny Cash’s well-known song of the <a href="https://www.songfacts.com/lyrics/johnny-cash/ring-of-fire">same name</a>.</p>
<p>While some might be attracted by the desire to <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/thunder-bay/ring-of-fire-trillion-dollar-claim-1.6778551">make money</a>, others could be driven by concern for our planet and the belief that the region’s minerals can help reduce carbon emissions and support a <a href="https://www.pentictonherald.ca/spare_news/article_58422893-2145-5a9d-a077-b2410dee4b4a.html">just energy transition</a>.</p>
<p>As some Indigenous groups have pointed out, however, the construction of roads and mining in the Ring of Fire represents a significant disruption to <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/ring-of-fire-mining-may-not-benefit-first-nations-as-hoped-1.1374849">traditional ways of life and fragile ecosystems</a>. </p>
<p>Some environmental groups have argued that mining activities in the region could result in a net increase of carbon emissions due to the removal or severe degradation of the vital <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2022/06/canada-mining-push-puts-major-carbon-sink-and-indigenous-lands-in-the-crosshairs/">carbon sinks sustained by peat lands and trees</a>. </p>
<p>Despite the significant economic and environmental impacts surrounding the development of the Ring of Fire, this focus overlooks another crucial issue: <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/14662043.2017.1422418">the potential for Indigenous/non-Indigenous conflict in northern Ontario</a>.</p>
<h2>The importance of Indigenous treaties</h2>
<p>Our <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/17449057.2022.2157105">recent study</a> on the prospects for Indigenous/non-Indigenous conflict in relation to Québec’s <a href="https://www.environnement.gouv.qc.ca/communiques_en/2012/c20120205-nord.htm">Plan Nord</a> has compelling parallels with Ontario’s <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/page/ontarios-ring-fire">Ring of Fire</a>. </p>
<p>Both regions are located in the mineral-rich and ecologically sensitive northern reaches of the provinces that are home to numerous Indigenous Peoples. </p>
<p>Like Ontario, Québec’s Indigenous groups have a <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/oka-crisis-timeline-summer-1990-1.5631229">fraught history with government interventions</a> and are often suspicious of plans to develop natural resources. </p>
<p>Our study reveals that if an Indigenous group has signed a modern treaty, there is a reduced risk of conflict related to proposed resource developments since there’s less uncertainty surrounding land tenure rights. Given the fundamental importance of land to Indigenous Peoples, threats to these rights — perceived or real — represent an understandable source of grievance that can spark conflict.</p>
<p>Although there will likely be procurement of services from local Indigenous communities and companies in the Ring of Fire region, the vast majority of its development activities will attract non-Indigenous workers and businesses to the area. </p>
<p>Our study also demonstrates that an influx of non-Indigenous workers can produce tensions with Indigenous groups that can rapidly escalate and lead to contentious interventions by the RCMP.</p>
<h2>Uncritical media coverage</h2>
<p>Given the potential economic windfalls associated with the development of the Ring of Fire, it’s easy to assume support among local residents. Politicians at all levels have called for the rapid development of the region as part of a <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trudeau-ev-battery-materials-plant-1.6519260">broader investment strategy</a> to cast Canada as a critical minerals leader.</p>
<p>These political leaders highlight the dangers of climate change to encourage companies and consumers to embrace energy sources that reduce carbon emissions. In 2020, the Canadian government announced its <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/treasury-board-secretariat/services/innovation/greening-government/strategy.html">Greening Government Strategy</a> aimed at achieving net-zero operations by 2050. </p>
<p>Reducing carbon emissions is also a key element of Canada’s <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/campaign/critical-minerals-in-canada/canadian-critical-minerals-strategy.html">Critical Minerals Strategy</a>.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, media coverage of political pronouncements regarding mineral supply chains is often uncritical.</p>
<p>Another <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/21565503.2021.2020663">recent study</a> of ours reveals that media coverage in Canada in both French and English rarely includes the perspectives of Indigenous people. Instead, reporters prefer to focus on the more sensational aspects of roadblocks and standoffs, which tend to marginalize the position of Indigenous Peoples.</p>
<p>Little consideration is given to assessing the complex impacts of natural resource development projects on Indigenous communities. </p>
<p>Take the case of the quip by Ontario Premier Doug Ford that “<a href="https://www.timminspress.com/news/local-news/you-will-see-me-on-that-bulldozer">you will see me on that bulldozer</a>” to underscore his government’s pledge to build road access to the Ring of Fire.</p>
<p>Although <a href="https://doi.org/10.1139/as-2021-0033">roads can certainly generate positive impacts for local communities</a> (for example, greater mobility and connectivity; better access to public services such as health care; lower prices for consumer goods), they can also lead to negative outcomes (for example, they can degrade the natural environment, they’re expensive to build and they can serve as a route for criminal networks). </p>
<p>Roads also lead to <a href="https://irpp.org/research-studies/affordable-safe-transportation-options-remote-communities/">greater inflows of people in these previously remote communities</a>. Federal and provincial environmental impact assessments of the proposed <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/page/northern-road-link-project">Northern Road Link</a> to the Ring of Fire are already underway, and there’s reason to believe that a regulatory green light could dramatically transform northern Ontario’s demographics — and thus increase probabilities for future conflict.</p>
<h2>Three recommendations</h2>
<p>What can be done to prevent conflict in the Ring of Fire? We propose three recommendations.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Respect existing treaties with Indigenous communities in the region. Where appropriate, negotiate side agreements that align with modern legal approaches to land use and property rights, thereby reducing uncertainty. Canadian governments could justify the investment in political capital to secure these agreements with Indigenous groups given the importance they’ve placed on promoting the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (<a href="https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/declaration/index.html#:%7E:text=The%20Action%20Plan-,The%20United%20Nations%20Declaration%20on%20the%20Rights%20of%20Indigenous%20Peoples,Assent%20and%20came%20into%20force">UNDRIP</a>) and <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/treasury-board-secretariat/services/innovation/greening-government/greening-gov-fund.html">reducing carbon emissions</a> to facilitate a just energy transition.</p></li>
<li><p>The Ontario government should begin a new round of consultations with Indigenous communities and stakeholders that are inclusive, transparent, extensive and responsive. The previous round of consultations were <a href="https://thenarwhal.ca/ring-of-fire-first-nations-queens-park/">criticized for being rushed and perfunctory</a>. Truly consultative engagement would reduce grievances and signal to the world that sub-national governments can be global leaders in forging positive relationships with Indigenous Peoples.</p></li>
<li><p>Although the environmental impact of road construction is already mediated by regulatory <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/page/preparing-environmental-assessments">impact assessment legislation</a>, the effects of an influx of workers must be addressed. Federal and provincial governments — together with input from relevant Indigenous groups and municipalities — should revise existing <a href="https://wcsringoffire.ca/regional-planning-new/">urban planning</a> and <a href="https://wcsringoffire.ca/communities/">zoning by-laws</a> so that hamlets and small towns that are sure to grow do so in an economically, socially, and politically sustainable fashion. Incorporating all levels of governments in producing thoughtful urban planning measures would go a long way toward mitigating the negative impacts associated with increased migration to the region. </p></li>
</ol>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/canadas-environment-minister-is-headed-for-trouble-if-ottawa-doesnt-correct-course-on-the-ring-of-fire-175616">Canada's environment minister is headed for trouble if Ottawa doesn't correct course on the Ring of Fire</a>
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<p>Critical minerals can serve as Canada’s <a href="https://utorontopress.com/9781487522452/corporate-social-responsibility-and-canada-and-x2019s-role-in-africa-and-x2019s-extractive-sectors/">superpower</a>, generating economic benefits domestically and boosting its <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/cag.12472">reputation as an environmental leader</a> in the just energy transition. </p>
<p>But if Canada fails <a href="https://opencanada.org/resources-and-canadas-first-nations/">in the governance</a> of the Ring of Fire, and ignores the real prospects for serious conflict around the projects, these critical minerals could become Canada’s kryptonite by jeopardizing reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples and tarnishing its <a href="https://opencanada.org/canadas-long-legacy-of-multilateral-sustainable-development/">reputation abroad</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/225742/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrew Grant has received grants from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Badriyya Yusuf has received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. She is a fellow for the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI) Digital Policy Hub.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dimitrios Panagos has received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Matthew I. Mitchell receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. </span></em></p>Ontario’s Ring of Fire could make Canada a minerals superpower, but Indigenous consultation is essential to ensure doing so does not harm reconciliation or Canada’s global reputation.Andrew Grant, Associate Professor of Political Studies, Queen's University, OntarioBadriyya Yusuf, PhD Candidate/Researcher in International Relations, Queen's University, OntarioDimitrios Panagos, Associate Professor, Political Philosophy, Memorial University of NewfoundlandMatthew I. Mitchell, Associate Professor, Political Studies, University of SaskatchewanLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2224652024-03-03T14:27:50Z2024-03-03T14:27:50ZNavigating special education labels is complex, and it matters for education equity<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578488/original/file-20240228-24-s7p4c5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=10%2C87%2C3631%2C2583&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Racialized immigrant parents in a study had to find ways to navigate the education system as newcomers, while also addressing intended and unintended effects of special education programs for their children.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Mche Lee/Unsplash)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Ontario Ministry of Education’s <a href="https://files.ontario.ca/edu-special-education-policy-resource-guide-en-2022-05-30.pdf">special education policy and resource guide</a> provides instructions <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/document/special-education-ontario-policy-and-resource-guide-kindergarten-grade-12">to school boards and schools</a> on administering special education programs. </p>
<p>It also emphasizes the importance of education equity, and involving parents in special education designations. </p>
<p>As researchers, we explored the rights of Latin American and Black Caribbean youth when it comes to special education in our project: the <a href="https://rcypartnership.org/en/">Rights for Children and Youth Partnership</a>. </p>
<p>To better understand newcomer experiences, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/13613324.2023.2255837">we interviewed</a> 32 parents, 12 of whom indicated having a first-hand experience with special education in Ontario schools.</p>
<p>We learned that despite the special education policy’s commitment to involving parents, many parents felt excluded from decision-making processes surrounding assessments for their child’s learning needs, and faced language barriers. </p>
<h2>Identifying need for special education</h2>
<p>In Ontario, students presenting learning needs may be identified as exceptional within one or more special education categories. These categories are intended to address conditions affecting their learning. </p>
<p>Special education can benefit students to ensure an equitable educational experience. However, <a href="https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1277996.pdf">researchers have also raised concerns</a> about the efficacy of special education programs for equitable learning because of how <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/13613324.2016.1248821">social factors such as racism and classism result in discriminatory framings of disability and the perception of special needs</a>.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/too-busy-for-the-pta-but-working-class-parents-care-104386">Too busy for the PTA, but working-class parents care</a>
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<p>In Ontario’s largest school boards, Black and Latin American youth have been disproportionately <a href="https://www.tdsb.on.ca/Portals/research/docs/reports/Intersection%20of%20Disability%20Achievement%20and%20Equity.pdf">placed in special education programs</a>, compared to students in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0895904818813303">other racial-ethnic groupings</a>. </p>
<p>Research from the Peel District School board, serving the western Greater Toronto Area, reports <a href="https://www.peelschools.org/documents/16.2b_Directive9-EquityAccountabilityReportCard-UnderstandingtheEquityGapinSpecialEducation.pdf/16.2b_Directive9-EquityAccountabilityReportCard-UnderstandingtheEquityGapinSpecialEducation.pdf">Black students are three times more likely to be identified with a behavioural exceptionality</a> and streamed into special education programming. </p>
<p>Similarly, <a href="https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/i-was-very-isolated-report-documents-hispanic-students-alienation-in-ontario/article_21d6d9fd-1b13-57c3-8f26-94d545a80556.html">Latin American youth have reported arbitrarily being placed in English as a Second Language courses</a> and labelled with communicational exceptionalities, despite proficiency in English. These labels carry <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0895904818812772">long-lasting impacts on their educational journey</a>.</p>
<h2>Complex special education processes</h2>
<p>In Ontario, the special education placement process is complex and can include many parties (like teachers, principals, special education staff, school board officers, parents or guardians and, if requested, interpreters).</p>
<p>These parties engage in consultations to evaluate the student’s learning needs. Assessments are then reviewed by a board’s <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/page/identifying-students-special-education-needs">Identification, Placement and Review Committee (IPRC)</a>, consisting of at least three members, one of whom must be a principal or supervisory officer of the school board.</p>
<p>According to the guide, educators should encourage and invite parents to participate throughout this evaluation process and the IPRC meeting, though their attendance isn’t required. </p>
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<img alt="A blurred person seen in a corridor of file folders and records on shelves." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574794/original/file-20240211-26-iklod6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574794/original/file-20240211-26-iklod6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574794/original/file-20240211-26-iklod6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574794/original/file-20240211-26-iklod6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574794/original/file-20240211-26-iklod6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574794/original/file-20240211-26-iklod6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574794/original/file-20240211-26-iklod6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Special education labels and categorizations are documented in student records.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Unsplash/Redd F)</span></span>
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<h2>Lack of required parental input</h2>
<p>Parents are, however, required to sign and agree to the IPRC’s statement of decision. They have a right to appeal the findings, and are given 30 days. If parents don’t appeal, the board instructs the principal to implement the committee’s decision, including <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/page/individual-education-plans">individual education plans (IEP)</a>. </p>
<p>The child’s provincial student record documents the outcomes of the decision, including the various labels, or “exceptionalities” identified, and the IEP. These records follow students throughout primary and secondary education.</p>
<p>Lack of required parental input throughout the process indicates that early on, educators alone can make decisions involving a child. </p>
<h2>Language barriers</h2>
<p>In our study, one parent, Mariela, described the challenges of learning a new educational system. This was compounded by the technical language educators used: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“The language that is used is very strategic. It’s language that doesn’t welcome parents’ feedback [and] parents don’t know they have the option to say no. […] It’s like, ‘This is what happens; this is what we do. We need you to sign this.’ And that’s the language; it isn’t welcoming for parents to ask [questions].”</p>
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<h2>Specialized language</h2>
<p>Parents also recognized that a sense of pressure to accept educators’ decisions was discriminatory based on their limited abilities to keep up with the discourse and to have input in decision-making. Scarlett described feeling intimidated:</p>
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<p>“It was always so traumatic and intimidating dealing with the school; it would be me and five school officials, you know? […] It’s like, you’re coming into this space, and decisions may already have been made.”</p>
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<p>Scarlett’s son was identified as having behavioural issues as early as Grade 2. She insisted her son be tested for gifted learning, recognizing that he was experiencing behaviour difficulties because he was bored and not being academically challenged. </p>
<p>Her son was not placed in a gifted class until Grade 7. During what she called “lost time,” the school involved the police in instances when he was “acting out,” and recommended her son be sent to a treatment facility for high-risk youth.</p>
<h2>Pressure to accept decisions</h2>
<p>Special education meetings also illuminated imbalances we observed in our study between parents who understood they had the right to ask for an interpreter or bring a representative — and parents who were unaware of this. </p>
<p>Claudia voiced concern about a special education label for her son in elementary school, saying educators had mistaken his speech difficulties for low intelligence. She was told her son’s speech delay would impact his ability to go to college or university.</p>
<p>She later recalled learning about her right to bring someone with her to IPRC meetings. She detailed the impact of having her son’s daycare supervisor there with her, saying: </p>
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<p>“I wanted to bring that person to support [me], probably for emotional support, for the English support, for the systematic barrier that I knew that I could face.” </p>
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<p>With the support of someone who educators also considered an “expert,” Claudia withdrew her son from special education programs — and instead sought additional support outside the school system.</p>
<p>Notably, only a few parents mentioned knowing their right to bring someone to the meetings, and all said the information came from sources outside the education system.</p>
<h2>Lack of guidance</h2>
<p>The Toronto District School Board has made the effort to increase access to parents’ rights to special education, offering the <a href="https://www.tdsb.on.ca/Learning-Equity-and-Well-Being/Special-Education-and-Inclusion/Parent-Guides-to-Special-Education-and-Inclusion"><em>Guide to Special Education and Inclusion for Parents/Caregivers/Guardians</em></a> in various languages.</p>
<p>However, for immigrant parents in our study who had no prior experience in Ontario’s schooling system, the lack of concrete information about their rights was a barrier to them being true participants in decision-making. </p>
<p>System accountability is needed to ensure immigrant racialized students and families are effectively provided support and understand the special education process. This support must be tailored to better address the needs of parents, so that their children are equitably positioned for successful academic pathways.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/222465/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Henry Parada: This study received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC- 895-2015-1014). Toronto Metropolitan University Ethics Committee approved this study (2018-200).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Laura Perez Gonzalez and Veronica Escobar Olivo do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A study of newcomer Latin American and Black Caribbean parents in Ontario schools found many parents felt excluded from processes surrounding assessments for their child’s learning needs.Laura Perez Gonzalez, Research Assistant, School of Social Work, Toronto Metropolitan UniversityHenry Parada, Professor, Toronto Metropolitan University’s School of Social Work and the Immigration and Settlement (ISS) Graduate Program and Graduate Program Director, Toronto Metropolitan UniversityVeronica Escobar Olivo, Research Associate, School of Social Work, Toronto Metropolitan UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2243312024-03-03T14:27:31Z2024-03-03T14:27:31ZNo, overwintering turtles don’t breathe through their butts: Getting to the bottom of a popular misconception<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/579265/original/file-20240301-22-9mghi4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C10%2C1000%2C544&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Northern map turtles hibernate underwater during the winter.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(G. Bulté)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>On a crisp February day, a filmmaker and I were walking across the 45-centimetre-thick ice covering Opinicon Lake, a small lake in eastern Ontario. We were heading for a very special spot where hundreds of <a href="https://ontarionature.org/programs/community-science/reptile-amphibian-atlas/northern-map-turtle/">northern map turtles</a> coalesce every year to spend the winter months. The filmmaker stuck a camera attached to a long pole in holes drilled through the ice to capture turtles for a nature documentary.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/northern-map-turtles-survive-cold-winter-conditions-by-staying-active-under-ice-195050">Northern map turtles survive cold winter conditions by staying active under ice</a>
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<p>As we spotted our first turtles on the monitor, the filmmaker confided that he would like to get a shot of a turtle’s rear end. Strange as it sounds, this request didn’t surprise me. The filmmaker wanted to show overwintering turtles breathing with their butts. I had disappointing news for him.</p>
<p>I can’t blame the filmmaker for expecting to observe this bizarre form of respiration in our overwintering turtles. A quick Google search turns up several stories about butt-breathing turtles, many from credible sources. </p>
<p>A handful of turtles <em>can</em> breathe through their butts — it’s called cloacal gas exchange — but they are distant relatives of the North American species often claimed to do so in winter. But as far as scientific evidence goes, North American turtles overwintering in ice-covered water bodies don’t survive by breathing through their butts.</p>
<h2>Mysterious cloacal sacs</h2>
<p>In turtles, as in other reptiles (<a href="https://evolution.berkeley.edu/what-are-evograms/the-origin-of-birds/">including birds</a>), the reproductive and digestive tracts merge into a single pipe called the cloaca. Some species of turtles have a pair of sacs sprouting from their cloacal passage. These sacs, called cloacal bursae, are different from the single urinary bladder. </p>
<p>The function of cloacal bursae has baffled anatomists and physiologists for more than two centuries. In 1998, C. Barker Jørgenson published a <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/biological-reviews/article/abs/role-of-urinary-and-cloacal-bladders-in-chelonian-water-economy-historical-and-comparative-perspectives/010D5928EF15B4A15C9589034B29EE14">historical overview</a> of the research on these structures since their discovery. </p>
<p>According to Jørgensen, the anatomist Hans Gadow was the first to invoke a respiratory function for the sacs in a <a href="https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/268756#page/9/mode/1up">1901 book called <em>Amphibia and Reptiles</em></a>. Gadow wrote that “these sacs, which have highly vascularised walls, are incessantly filled and emptied with water through the vent, and act as important respiratory organs.” </p>
<p>This suggestion of a respiratory function, Jørgenson pointed out, became widely accepted without any supporting evidence.</p>
<h2>Butt-breathing turtles</h2>
<p>Evidence of cloacal respiration did eventually come from research on Australian freshwater turtles, such as the <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/1447197">saw-shelled turtle</a> and the <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.7882/AZ.2010.016">white-throated snapping turtle</a>. The inner surface of the bursae in these species is densely lined with tiny finger-like projections called papillae which are themselves packed with tiny blood vessels. The papillae appear to function like gills. </p>
<p>A turtle pumps water into its cloaca and the oxygen dissolved in the water is absorbed by the blood vessels in the papillae while carbon dioxide diffuses from the blood to the water. The turtle then expels the stale water out of its cloaca and pumps fresh water back in. Even when the water is warm and the demand for oxygen high, some of these Australian turtles remain submerged for hours, relying on their cloacal bursae to get the oxygen they need.</p>
<p>These findings are remarkable, but North American turtles do not have the same cloacal superpowers.</p>
<h2>Distant cousins</h2>
<p>All living turtles fall in one of two groups: the <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/agricultural-and-biological-sciences/cryptodira">hidden-necked</a> and the <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/agricultural-and-biological-sciences/pleurodira">side-necked</a>. The groups are named after the way the necks of their members bends.</p>
<p>More importantly, these two groups represent two branches in the turtle family tree. The Australian cloacal breathers are on the side-necked branch. These turtles are only found in the southern hemisphere. </p>
<p>All turtles living in the cold northern hemisphere are on the hidden-necked branch. The hidden-necked and side-necked branches split around <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2012215118">200 million years ago</a>. </p>
<p>Lots of evolution can happen in 200 million years. For context, placental mammals like us parted ways from our egg-laying cousins like the duck-billed platypus about 166 million years ago. </p>
<p>Side-necked and hidden-necked turtles have amassed many differences during their 200-million-years-long journey apart, despite their physical similarities. Some of these differences appear to be in their cloaca. </p>
<p>To date, there is no evidence that hidden-necked turtles — like painted turtles, sliders, map turtles and snapping turtles — <a href="https://www.proquest.com/docview/1981235671">sport the gas exchange hardware of their distant side-necked cousins</a>.</p>
<p>It is worth noting that not all turtles have cloacal bursae. For instance, the <a href="https://ontarionature.org/programs/community-science/reptile-amphibian-atlas/spiny-softshell/">spiny softshell</a> and the <a href="https://ontarionature.org/programs/community-science/reptile-amphibian-atlas/eastern-musk-turtle/">common musk turtle</a> lack them. </p>
<p>Both species range as far north as southern Canada where they spend several months under the ice every year.</p>
<h2>Breathing through the winter</h2>
<p>The first published suggestion that overwintering turtles employ cloacal gas exchange appeared in 1958. Herpetologists Hobart Smith and Louis James published a review on cloacal bursae, where they wrote: “It is our opinion that the presence of bursae indicates a capacity to survive under water at low temperatures for long periods.” </p>
<p>In a followup study, <a href="https://archive.org/details/MiscellaneaN178/mode/2up">published in 1961</a>, Smith experimentally tested the gas exchange hypothesis and failed to convincingly demonstrate a respiratory function for the bursae in several North American species known to overwinter in water. Successive attempts have showed no, or a minute amount of, gas exchange within the cloaca. </p>
<p>The most recent test of cloacal gas exchange in a hidden-necked turtle was led by the late physiologist Donald C. Jackson, author of <a href="https://www.hup.harvard.edu/books/9780674072305"><em>Life in a Shell: A Physiologist’s View of a Turtle</em></a>. In this 2004 study, Jackson and his collaborators examined <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cbpb.2004.09.005">gas exchange in painted turtles</a> submerged in cold water.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/579269/original/file-20240301-48028-7ibytw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="two turtles on a rock" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/579269/original/file-20240301-48028-7ibytw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/579269/original/file-20240301-48028-7ibytw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/579269/original/file-20240301-48028-7ibytw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/579269/original/file-20240301-48028-7ibytw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/579269/original/file-20240301-48028-7ibytw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/579269/original/file-20240301-48028-7ibytw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/579269/original/file-20240301-48028-7ibytw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Painted turtles can survive for months without oxygen.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
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<p>Painted turtles, found throughout North America, have one of the longest overwintering periods of any aquatic turtles. Although they can survive for <a href="https://doi.org/10.1113/jphysiol.2002.024729">months without oxygen</a>, they can breathe underwater when oxygen is present. The physiologists experimentally manipulated the ability of painted turtles to breathe through their skin, mouth and cloaca to figure out which of these body parts are involved in gas exchange. </p>
<p>The researchers found no evidence that aquatic gas exchange took place in the cloaca, but showed that it was the turtles’ skin that performed this function.</p>
<h2>Hot air</h2>
<p>It is ironic that the one species in which cloacal gas exchange has been thoroughly rejected on morphological and physiological grounds is often used as the poster child for winter butt-breathing. The image of a turtle using its butt to breathe while locked under the ice for months is appealing, but as far as scientific evidence goes, it is nothing but hot air.</p>
<p>The notion that cloacal gas exchange helps North American turtles survive long winters trapped under the ice is pervasive in pop science, but to date, there is no solid evidence that hidden-necked turtles use cloacal gas exchange. The skin and mouth lining are where gas exchange happens during winter hibernation.</p>
<p>As for the cloacal bursae, their function in hidden-necked turtles remains unclear, but they may help control <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/science.166.3913.1649">buoyancy in some species</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/224331/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Grégory Bulté does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A phenomenon observed in a small group of organisms cannot always be generalized across a species — contrary to popular belief, overwintering turtles don’t breathe through their butts.Grégory Bulté, Instructor, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Carleton UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2240542024-02-29T21:22:20Z2024-02-29T21:22:20ZThermal networks: The missing infrastructure we need to help enable carbon-free heating<p>Most of us who live in the Northern Hemisphere have a fundamental problem: we want to reduce our carbon emissions, but we also need to heat our homes.</p>
<p>The good news is there is a way to do both by creating thermal networks. A thermal network is a system of insulated, underground pipes that directly distribute heat to homes and other buildings using heat generated from clean sources — including nuclear reactors.</p>
<p>Rather than using their own furnaces, boilers, fireplaces or electric baseboard heaters to heat buildings, consumers would receive heat directly from a utility. </p>
<p>It’s an opportunity that is set to grow as Canada expands its nuclear energy supply and creates more heat in the process, especially with <a href="https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/Canadian-government-launches-SMR-support-programme">small modular reactors</a> expected to start coming on-stream in the next decade.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/are-small-nuclear-reactors-the-solution-to-canadas-net-zero-ambitions-217354">Are small nuclear reactors the solution to Canada’s net-zero ambitions?</a>
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<h2>Scaling up</h2>
<p>Our research collaboration has produced — with the help of experts from McMaster University, The Boltzmann Institute and Canadian Nuclear Association — a <a href="https://www.eng.mcmaster.ca/mcmaster-institute-for-energy-studies/featured-publications/#thermal-networks-position-paper">position paper</a> presenting the case for large-scale thermal networks to be created across Canada, with nuclear power plants potentially providing up to half of the heat. </p>
<p>Similar technology using heat from non-nuclear sources is <a href="https://cieedacdb.rem.sfu.ca/district-energy-inventory">already a reality in Canada</a> in the form of <a href="https://toolkit.bc.ca/tool/district-energy-systems-2/">district energy systems</a>. </p>
<p>Many buildings in <a href="https://www.sfu.ca/content/dam/sfu/ceedc/publications/facilities/CEEDC%20-%20District%20Energy%20Report%202023.pdf">Toronto, Hamilton, Vancouver</a> and on university campuses, such as McMaster University, are served by hot water or steam-based central heating plants, using heat that is purpose-made and piped across campus. What’s more, Canada already <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-solutions/interactive/2021/toronto-deep-latke-water-cooling-raptors/">leads the world in district cooling networks</a>. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">An overview of the basic principle of Toronto’s Deep Lake Water Cooling System produced by the Canada Green Building Council. Thermal networks will move thermal energy similar to the way networked water pipes do, except they will move heat from producer to consumer across a shared system.</span></figcaption>
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<p><a href="https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/10/04/1080795/us-thermal-energy-networks/">Thirteen states in the United States</a> are implementing a thermal networks utility model. In <a href="https://www.euractiv.com/section/energy-environment/opinion/district-heating-and-cooling-is-one-of-europes-top-solution-to-reduce-fossil-imports-but-we-need-decisive-eu-action-to-tap-into-this-potential/">Europe</a>, 67 million people enjoy heating from thermal networks and district heating systems supplied by a variety of sources in a mix that is increasingly <a href="https://vbn.aau.dk/en/publications/heat-roadmap-europe-4-quantifying-the-impact-of-low-carbon-heatin">less reliant on carbon</a>.</p>
<p>The idea is catching on, and it’s time to scale up.</p>
<h2>Leftover heat</h2>
<p>As many as 70 per cent of Canadians live in communities that could be warmed by thermal networks. The networks would deliver heated water that warms buildings in the same way household radiators distribute heat — but on a much <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2009.12.001">larger public scale</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/science/zibi-waste-heat-recovery-1.7117832">Such systems</a> are capable of efficiently sending heat through buried pipelines to homes, schools, hospitals, office buildings, shopping malls and other structures, greatly reducing the demand for electricity and heating fuel and making space on the electrical grid to accommodate growing electricity demand from electric vehicle chargers and heat pumps. </p>
<p>One of the most appealing aspects of this opportunity is that most of the required heat is already available and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2023.121291">going unused</a>. Heat from major sources, such as <a href="https://www.powermag.com/district-heating-supply-from-nuclear-power-plants/">nuclear power plants</a>, can be transmitted as far as 100 km to where it is needed. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/quebec-nuclear-reactor-gentilly-2-1.6932355">Québec</a>, <a href="https://www.opg.com/releases/capital-power-and-opg-partner-to-advance-new-nuclear-in-alberta/">Alberta, Saskatchewan and New Brunswick</a> are all considering building new or re-starting existing reactors. Together with existing reactors, much of Canada’s population would fall within this range.</p>
<p>In the case of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.energy.2020.119546">reactors</a>, thermal networks could share their useful leftover heat instead of releasing it into the environment as is typically done today. This water, used in coiling, gathers heat but does not come into contact with nuclear material and is in no way contaminated. </p>
<p>The recent joint declaration at the <a href="https://www.oecd-nea.org/jcms/pl_88702/countries-launch-joint-declaration-to-triple-nuclear-energy-capacity-by-2050-at-cop28">UN climate conference COP28</a> to triple nuclear energy capacity by 2050 means there will be significantly more heat from large reactors, such as the <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ontario-darlington-nuclear-plant-1.6899969">new nuclear fleet proposed in Ontario</a>, which could supply warmth to homes in the Greater Toronto Area.</p>
<p><a href="https://smrroadmap.ca/">Small modular reactors</a>, which are expected to come on-stream widely as local alternatives to fuel-burning sources of electricity, could supply heat locally while also generating revenue from heat that would otherwise be wasted.</p>
<p>Alternatively, residual heat from <a href="https://www.ngif.ca/harvest-systems-successfully-demonstrates-waste-heat-recovery-from-pizza-pizza-ovens/">restaurants</a>, commercial and industrial processes, water heated by solar or geothermal energy, or the combustion of dried biomass can do exactly the same thing with <a href="https://www.irena.org/publications/2021/March/Integrating-low-temperature-renewables-in-district-energy-systems">little to no greenhouse gas emissions</a>.</p>
<h2>Funding the change</h2>
<p>Though our appetite for thermal networks is growing, apprehension over the cost of creating large-scale public systems has stifled enthusiasm for implementing them here.</p>
<p>Certainly, the challenge of laying new pipelines to every urban home is daunting, but that need not be a barrier. It’s not that long ago that water, electricity and natural gas were not delivered directly to homes and other buildings, either. </p>
<p>The managers of those utilities, both public and private, developed efficient methods for deployment, balanced the <a href="https://energy.utexas.edu/sites/default/files/UTAustin_FCe_History_2016.pdf">cost of their infrastructure</a> over decades and included the financing costs in customers’ bills. All of these techniques could help build thermal networks across Canada. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-we-need-to-reuse-waste-energy-to-achieve-net-zero-heating-systems-209416">Why we need to reuse waste energy to achieve net-zero heating systems</a>
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<p><a href="https://www.cga.ca/energy-magazine-post/when-was-canadas-natural-gas-distribution-system-built-and-what-is-it-made-of/">Natural gas only started to become commonly available in Canada</a> in the 1950s, with networks of buried pipes being extended to the most populated areas of the country through the 1980s. <a href="https://brilliantio.com/how-were-homes-heated-in-the-1960s/">Before then</a>, people had oil, coal or wood delivered, or used electricity from coal-fired plants — all of them significant sources of greenhouse gases. </p>
<p>The conversion made heating <a href="https://www.fortisbc.com/services/natural-gas-services/considering-upgrading-to-gas-up-to-2700-in-appliance-rebates-available-for-a-limited-time/annual-fuel-cost-comparison">cheaper and cleaner</a>. It <a href="https://www.cer-rec.gc.ca/en/data-analysis/energy-markets/canadas-energy-transition/canadas-energy-transition-historical-future-changes-energy-systems-update-energy-market-assessment-global-energy.html">halved our carbon emissions</a>. It required a huge effort, but it happened, and it can happen again.</p>
<p>Thermal networks present an opportunity to harvest heat from natural sources or <a href="https://futurium.ec.europa.eu/en/urban-agenda/energy-transition/library/action-2-recommendation-paper-maximising-use-waste-heat-cities">heat that would otherwise be wasted</a> and use it for a vital purpose of keeping Canadians warm while helping to reduce carbon emissions.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/224054/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jim Cotton is the founder and CEO of Harvest Systems Inc. He receives funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, Ontario Centre of Innovation and Boltzmann Institute. </span></em></p>Underground thermal networks have the potential to revolutionize how Canadians heat their homes while helping to reduce carbon emissions.James (Jim) S. Cotton, Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering, McMaster UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2245062024-02-28T00:00:10Z2024-02-28T00:00:10ZDoug Ford’s political judicial appointments: Good or bad for justice and democracy?<p>Ontario Premier Doug Ford <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ford-appointing-former-staffers-judge-selection-committee-1.7127050">has defended appointing two former senior political staffers to a committee that helps select provincial judges</a>, saying he would not appoint a Liberal or New Democrat.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.thestar.com/politics/provincial/doug-ford-defends-patronage-appointments-of-ex-staffers-says-he-wants-like-minded-people-selecting/article_85bcd434-d25b-11ee-b59c-bb5445f38856.html">The controversy</a> surrounds Ford’s intention to appoint “like-minded people” to <a href="https://www.ontariocourts.ca/ocj/jaac/">Ontario’s Judicial Appointments Advisory Committee (JAAC)</a>, which submits a shortlist of candidates to the Attorney General of Ontario for appointment as judges.</p>
<p>It is composed of seven lay members from the public (appointed by the government), three provincial court judges (appointed by the judiciary) and three lawyers from legal organizations (selected from lists submitted to the Attorney General).</p>
<p>Commentators expressed concern that patronage appointments to the JAAC could politicize the appointment system. Ford says he would seek to appoint “tough judges, tough JPs [Justices of the Peace] to keep guys in jail,” adding, “that’s part of democracy. You voted a party in.” </p>
<p>The Federation of Ontario Law Associations said Ford’s comments “<a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-doug-ford-says-its-his-right-to-appoint-like-minded-judges/">reflect a juvenile understanding of the role of an independent judiciary</a>.” Liberal Leader Bonnie Crombie warned of a “<a href="https://twitter.com/BonnieCrombie/status/1761056753767063774">U.S.-style politicization of our courts</a>” and NDP Leader Marit Stiles also warned of <a href="https://www.thestar.com/politics/provincial/i-am-going-to-make-sure-we-have-like-minded-judges-doug-ford-doubles-down/article_11957aa8-d4b7-11ee-a4e5-03b6529e6fd5.html">“politicization of the judiciary.”</a></p>
<p>Do these kinds of appointments add a welcome dose of democratic input into the judicial process (by the appointment of judges who reflect the elected government’s worldview)? Or do they signify unhealthy politicization of the judiciary? Both perspectives have some merit. </p>
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<h2>Judicial legitimacy</h2>
<p>The judiciary relies on public legitimacy to undergird its decisions. A number of those decisions involve a degree of discretion and are not simply mechanical applications of the law, particularly in criminal law.</p>
<p>If the judiciary strays too far from the general currents of public opinion when making such decisions, confidence in the judiciary could be eroded. Therefore, appointing individuals to the JAAC who may have links to the party in power and are sympathetic to their politics isn’t necessarily troublesome.</p>
<p>If a new government appoints judges with a somewhat different worldview than the previous government, that is acceptable and even healthy — so long as the process emphasizes legal knowledge and fairness, and not partisan considerations.</p>
<p>Part of my concern, though, is that Ford’s comments about having high-profile Conservatives on the JAAC and appointing <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/10318686/doug-ford-like-minded-judges/">“like-minded judges”</a> gives the impression that candidates affiliated with the provincial Progressive Conservatives may be favoured in the appointments process.</p>
<p>Injecting partisan considerations into the appointment process has a number of negative consequences. The appointment system can be viewed as unfair and high-quality candidates may be overlooked or even discouraged from applying. </p>
<p>While appointees linked to the party of appointment can be excellent judges, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0008423910000648">research suggests</a> that partisans tend to make up a higher portion of appointees perceived to be of lower quality. Making partisanship a priority <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0008423917000014">may reduce the potential to diversify the bench</a>. This, in turn, could reduce how representative of broader society the bench is, and limit the range of experiences that breathe life into the law. </p>
<p>These problems have been pointed out in regard to patronage in judicial appointments by the <a href="https://nationalpost.com/feature/exclusive-data-analysis-reveals-liberals-appoint-judges-who-are-party-donors">federal Liberals</a> and <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/stephen-harpers-courts-how-the-judiciary-has-been-remade/article25661306/">Conservatives</a>, along with the fact that they rarely appoint individuals linked to opposition parties.</p>
<p>Even if the Ford government’s goal is not to appoint party affiliates, but simply individuals perceived to be “tough on crime,” his failure to emphasize that those judges would still be required to apply the law fairly and impartially can undermine faith in the judicial process.</p>
<h2>Assessing the impact</h2>
<p>Despite the serious reservations identified above, I remain less concerned than some others about how this will play out. Judges and lawyers compose nearly half of the JAAC, making it unlikely that unworthy candidates will be shortlisted for appointment. </p>
<p>Moreover, judicial independence does not require that the selection process be independent from government. Having a selection committee composed of members of the legal community and lay people is a positive development, as they can help emphasize quality and provide some buffer against a politicized appointment process. </p>
<p>However, the core of judicial independence requires governments not being able to punish or reward judges for their decisions once on the bench — something that is robustly protected in Ontario. Trial court decisions can also be appealed to a higher court and judges themselves are subject to an <a href="https://www.ontariocourts.ca/ocj/conduct/do-you-have-a-complaint/">independent complaints system</a>.</p>
<p>Finally, the Ford government will likely find that choosing judges who decide cases consistently in a certain direction is a difficult task. Not only do judges have guarantees of independence, but once appointed, professional norms tend to lead judges to impartially apply the law (as best they understand it) to the facts. </p>
<p>Often, the requirements of legislation or precedents will require a decision that governments (or even the judges) do not like. In cases where judges have some latitude (excluding evidence, bail, sentencing, etc.), <a href="https://digitalcommons.osgoode.yorku.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3711&context=ohlj">research on judicial behaviour below the Supreme Court-level</a> suggests that one cannot assume former prosecutors or Conservative appointees are going to be “tough on crime” as envisioned by Premier Ford. </p>
<p>Overall, if there is some incremental change in outcomes from newly-appointed judges in line with shifts in the electorate, that is a healthy feature of our liberal democratic system of government. This holds true provided the judges were recommended by a selection committee; there is a strong system of judicial independence and judicial decisions are constrained by fair and impartial application of the law. My guess is that progressives and conservatives would both agree with that, depending on who is in power at the time.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/224506/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Troy Riddell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Appointing individuals who may have links to the party in power is not necessarily troublesome, as long as the process emphasizes legal knowledge and fairness, and not partisan considerations.Troy Riddell, Associate Professor and Chair, Department of Political Science, University of GuelphLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2205982024-02-22T22:32:57Z2024-02-22T22:32:57ZDo pre-sentencing reports really help Black offenders in Canada’s justice system?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/577425/original/file-20240222-28-fnla2o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4898%2C3255&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Impact of race and culture assessment reports (IRCAs) are meant to give judges context with the aim of ultimately creating a more equitable and fair criminal justice system.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Canadian courts are increasingly applying <a href="https://www.legalaid.on.ca/irca/">Impact of Race and Culture Assessment reports (IRCAs)</a>, otherwise known as Enhanced Pre-Sentence Reports, when sentencing offenders. IRCA reports help sentencing judges better understand how systemic racism has influenced and even limited the offender’s life choices and trajectory. </p>
<p>Their use has been much debated among academics, lawyers, parole and probation officers, community workers, social workers, other clinicians and offenders. These reports are said to <a href="https://theconversation.com/equitable-sentencing-can-mitigate-anti-black-racism-in-canadas-justice-system-217515">address anti-Black racism in the justice system</a> by outlining for the courts <a href="https://ccla.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/Anti-Black-Racism-Fact-Sheet-2021.pdf">the myriad ways in which systemic anti-Black racism</a> has influenced the life of the offender. </p>
<p>They are meant to provide judges with context and insights with the aim of mitigating sentences and ultimately creating a more equitable and fair criminal justice system.</p>
<p>As an author of the <a href="https://www.canlii.org/en/on/onsc/doc/2018/2018onsc5186/2018onsc5186.html">IRCA report</a> that helped set a precedent in Ontario for their use, I present a critical perspective on the issue with IRCAs, their potency and their potential. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/fund-fina/gov-gouv/supporting-soutien.html">Given the relative novelty of IRCAs in Ontario and the investments made in them</a>, we need to ask whether they are in fact doing, systemically, what they were developed to do. Moreover, we should also question whether it is even possible for IRCAs to function in the transformative manner advocates have envisioned.</p>
<h2><em>R. v. Morris</em></h2>
<p>In 2017, through a series of interviews, document reviews and research, I conducted an assessment on Kevin Morris, then an inmate at Maplehurst Correctional Complex in Milton, Ont. awaiting his sentencing hearing. <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/r-v-morris-anti-black-racism-ontario-court-1.6205252">He was convicted</a> for possession of a restricted handgun and carrying a concealed weapon.</p>
<p>At the prison, I sat with Morris as he explained his family history, upbringing, traumas and values. Among other things, he described his experiences as a young boy in school, in his neighbourhood, with the Children’s Aid Society and his identity-shaping interactions with teachers and the police. </p>
<p>This guided tour through his life revealed how anti-Black racism shaped his life, his outlook and his self-concept. Systemic and economic inequities characterized the poverty his parents faced. In addition, his father’s death left him fatherless at a very young age. As a single parent and sole provider, his mother was also often absent from the home, working long hours for minimum wages, which in turn impacted how Morris was parented. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.ohrc.on.ca/en/interrupted-childhoods#4.2.Black%20children">Black families are more likely to be reported to and investigated</a> by the Children’s Aid Society, and so it was no surprise that Morris experienced several child welfare interruptions throughout his childhood.</p>
<p>These were initiated by the school he attended where, Morris shared, he came to see himself as not smart, not worthy, not civilized, not wanted and not destined for success by any measure.</p>
<p>Morris’s social history was consistent with the experiences of many Black Canadians in the following ways:</p>
<p>▪ <a href="https://www.povertyinstitute.ca/bhm2023">According to the 2021 Census</a>, 12.4 per cent of Black Canadians were living in poor households, compared to just 8.1 per cent of the total population. In Toronto, Black people have long been over-represented in neighbourhoods <a href="http://3cities.neighbourhoodchange.ca/wp-content/themes/3-Cities/pdfs/three-cities-in-toronto.pdf">most plagued by poverty</a> and the associated violence, heightened surveillance and other forms of disadvantage.</p>
<p>▪ Black students are <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-crisis-of-anti-black-racism-in-schools-persists-across-generations-120856">largely disengaged by the Canadian curriculum</a> which does not reflect their identities or affirm their presence in an integrated, positive or substantial manner.</p>
<p>▪ Black students are <a href="https://theconversation.com/to-resolve-youth-violence-canada-must-move-beyond-policing-and-prison-190825">significantly more likely to be expelled</a> than their white counterparts or other racialized students. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-crisis-of-anti-black-racism-in-schools-persists-across-generations-120856">The crisis of anti-Black racism in schools persists across generations</a>
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<h2>Response to the decision</h2>
<p>The case set a legal precedent when Superior Court Justice Shaun Nakatsuru made the groundbreaking decision to use the IRCA to significantly reduce Morris’s sentence. The Crown had sought a prison sentence of four years. However, after considering the IRCA, Justice Nakatsuru sentenced Morris to 15 months. This was then reduced to 12 months because the police breached his Charter rights. At the time of his sentencing, Morris had already served all but one day in pretrial detention and was released the next day. </p>
<p>The Crown <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/black-indigenous-offenders-gladue-enhanced-pre-sentence-reports-1.5951638">appealed the decision</a>, and in 2021, the Ontario Court of Appeal <a href="https://www.canlii.org/en/on/onca/doc/2021/2021onca680/2021onca680.html?resultIndex=1">doubled Morris’ sentence</a>. Although the sentence was eventually stayed, it sent a clear message: decisions like Justice Nakatsuru’s, that actually attempt to factor in the consequences of anti-Black racism, would not be tolerated. </p>
<p>As part of its decision, <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-ontarios-top-court-says-anti-black-racism-should-be-considered-in-the/">the Court of Appeal declared</a>: </p>
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<p>“Frank acknowledgement of the existence of, and harm caused by, systemic anti-Black racism, combined with a careful consideration of the kind of evidence adduced in this case, will go some distance toward disassociating the sentencing process from society’s complicity in anti-Black racism.” </p>
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<p>But how does mere acknowledgement without corresponding action bring about change?</p>
<h2>Systemic anti-Blackness</h2>
<p>In the words of anti-Black racism scholar, Michael J. Dumas, “<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00405841.2016.1116852">in all the theorizing on anti-Blackness, there is a concern with what it means to have one’s very existence as Black constructed as problem — for white people, for the public (good), for the nation-state</a>.”</p>
<p>In the public imaginary, Blackness is synonymous with public threat, deviance and moral deficiency. Unfortunately, <a href="https://www.thecourt.ca/r-v-morris-systemic-racism-and-the-sentencing-of-black-offenders/">the courts are not yet at a place where they can conceive of a version of justice</a> that <a href="https://www.uwindsor.ca/law/2909/morris-modest-step-forward-and-call-action">abandons its focus on Black offender’s moral blameworthiness and the administration of punishment</a>, and instead, centres restoration and the elimination of systemic factors that create criminality. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/young-black-men-in-canada-face-racism-ageism-and-classism-when-looking-for-work-220537">Young Black men in Canada face racism, ageism and classism when looking for work</a>
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<p>Morris’s case illustrates <a href="https://www.blacklegalactioncentre.ca/r-v-morris/">IRCAs are not the liberatory device they were intended to be</a> because there is no institutional buy-in. The courts are happy to listen to Black offenders’ stories of hardship and appear benevolent, but far less eager to institute system-wide change or reframe practices to account for the state’s role in contributing to criminality.</p>
<p>Until the justice system reckons with its systemic racism, IRCAs will fail to shift the way the courts see Black offenders. Indeed, IRCAs will continue to be a voyeuristic exercise that reinforces popular deficit narratives about Black people and obscures the system’s failures.</p>
<p>Achieving racial equity in criminal justice requires the mitigation of sentencing as a reflective, conscientious undertaking rather than an act of pity or benevolence that wilfully disregards the culpability of the system itself. In fact, a true reckoning for the impact of Canada’s racism would make IRCA’s obsolete.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/220598/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Camisha Sibblis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Until the justice system reckons with its systemic racism, pre-sentencing reports will fail to shift the way the courts see Black offenders.Camisha Sibblis, Assistant Professor of Sociology and Criminology/Director of the Black Studies Institute, University of WindsorLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2223292024-02-20T22:35:26Z2024-02-20T22:35:26ZHow global warming is reshaping winter life in Canada<p>As we begin to emerge out of yet another mild winter, Canadians are once again being reminded of just how acutely global warming has changed Canada’s winter climate. </p>
<p>The impacts of this mild winter were felt across the country and touched all aspects of winter culture. From <a href="https://montreal.ctvnews.ca/quebec-winter-carnival-closes-palais-de-bonhomme-due-to-warm-weather-1.6764453">melting ice castles at Québec’s winter carnival</a>, to a dismal lack of snow at <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/british-columbia/article-bc-ski-resorts-struggle-with-lack-of-snow-as-warm-weather-persists/">many Western Canada ski resorts</a>, seemingly no part of Canada was unaffected. But the change that will likely be felt most keenly by many Canadians is the <a href="https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/7/1/014028">loss of a reliable outdoor skating season</a>.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/cop28-why-we-need-to-break-our-addiction-to-combustion-218019">COP28: Why we need to break our addiction to combustion</a>
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<p>For the second year running, <a href="https://ncc-ccn.gc.ca/places/rideau-canal-skateway">Ottawa’s Rideau Canal Skateway</a> was closed for what should be the peak of the skating season. In 2022-2023, the Skateway did not open at all for the first time ever. This winter, a portion of the Skateway opened briefly in January, but continuing mild temperatures forced a closure again after only four days of skating. In Montréal, <a href="https://www.patinermontreal.ca/f/paysagee/patin-libre/sports-dequipe">fewer than 40 per cent of the city’s outdoor rinks were open</a> in the middle of February.</p>
<p>There is no obvious upside to this story. Outdoor skating in Canada is fast becoming the latest casualty of our failure to confront the reality of the climate crisis.</p>
<h2>On thin ice</h2>
<p>More than a decade ago, our research group published <a href="https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/7/1/014028">our first analysis</a> of how outdoor skating was being affected by warming winter temperatures in Canada. We showed that even as of 2005, there was already evidence of later start dates, and shorter skating seasons across most of the country. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">A report on the management of the Rideau Canal Skateway in 2023, produced by the CBC.</span></figcaption>
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<p>These conclusions were echoed by <a href="https://www.rinkwatch.org">subsequent publications from the RinkWatch project</a>, which has reported <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/cag.12878">consistent declines in skating season length and quality</a> in many Canadian cities.</p>
<p>Meanwhile in Ottawa, skating days on the <a href="https://rideaucanalskateway.com/">Rideau Canal Skateway</a> have been trending downwards over the last 20 years. In this time, the typical skating season has decreased by almost 40 per cent, a trend that is clearly correlated with increasing winter temperatures over the same period. </p>
<h2>Moving in the wrong direction</h2>
<p>Climate mitigation progress continues to be far too slow. </p>
<p>Global CO2 emissions reached their <a href="https://globalcarbonbudget.org/fossil-co2-emissions-at-record-high-in-2023/">highest level ever recorded in 2023</a>, and average global temperatures have now reached <a href="https://berkeleyearth.org">1.3 C above pre-industrial temperatures</a>. If these trends continue, we are on track to reach 1.5 C — the lower threshold of the Paris Agreement temperature target — in <a href="https://climateclock.net">less than seven years</a>.</p>
<p>In our <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/cag.12878">2012 paper</a>, we estimated that suitable rink flooding days could disappear across most of southern Canada by mid-century. In <a href="https://doi.org/10.1088/2515-7620/ab8ca8">a more recent analysis of Montréal’s outdoor rinks</a>, we estimated that the number of viable skating days in Montréal could decrease to zero by as early as 2070. </p>
<p>In hindsight, these and other similar projections may have been far too optimistic. In a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate2465">study of Rideau canal skating days published in 2015</a>, the authors projected declining but sustained skating conditions throughout this century, even in a high future emissions scenario. The reality of the past two seasons shows that skating conditions have deteriorated far more quickly than predicted. </p>
<p>Global temperatures in 2023 were the highest ever recorded, as were winter temperatures in December 2023 and January 2024. Since 1950, winter temperatures in Canada have increased by more than 3 C, <a href="https://theconversation.com/2023-was-the-hottest-year-in-history-and-canada-is-warming-faster-than-anywhere-else-on-earth-220997">which is about three times the rate of global warming over this same period</a>. </p>
<p>Outdoor rinks require at least three consecutive very cold days to establish a foundation of ice, followed by enough cold days to maintain a good ice surface. Temperatures above freezing are poorly tolerated by outdoor rinks, and rain is often disastrous. </p>
<p>A few degrees of warming in January and February temperatures can be the difference between a rink that is skatable and one that is not. As winters continue to warm, the case for building and maintaining outdoor municipal rinks will become harder to justify.</p>
<h2>A stark and still changing new reality</h2>
<p>As years go by without any real progress on climate mitigation, it is becoming increasingly difficult to imagine a future in which outdoor rinks will be widely available without artificial refrigeration. Other winter activities will also be affected by changing snow conditions, but outdoor skating will likely be hit first in direct response to warming winter temperatures.</p>
<p>Wayne Gretzky famously <a href="https://gretzky.com/bio.php">learned to skate and play hockey in Branford, Ont. in the 1960s on an outdoor rink built by his father</a>. Reliable winter skating conditions in southern Ontario are already mostly a thing of the past, and are becoming more and more scarce as global warming progresses. It is increasingly unlikely that current and future generations will be able to follow Gretzky’s path. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/could-the-good-news-story-about-the-ecological-crisis-be-the-collective-grief-we-are-feeling-215658">Could the good news story about the ecological crisis be the collective grief we are feeling?</a>
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<p>This reality is both a tragic injustice for many young Canadians and an existential threat to a core aspect of the Canadian winter identity.</p>
<p>Preserving what remains of Canada’s winter skating culture will require that we rapidly step up our efforts to drive down CO2 emissions and stabilize global temperatures. Otherwise, Joni Mitchell’s “<a href="https://genius.com/Joni-mitchell-river-lyrics">river I could skate away on</a>” will become an increasingly wishful dream that soon will exist only in the lyrics of old songs.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/222329/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>H. Damon Matthews receives funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mitchell Dickau receives funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. </span></em></p>Global warming is melting away an iconic cornerstone of Canadian culture — outdoor skating.H. Damon Matthews, Professor and Climate Scientist, Department of Geography, Planning and Environment, Concordia UniversityMitchell Dickau, PhD Candidate, Geography, Planning, and Environment Department, Concordia UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2228462024-02-12T19:04:31Z2024-02-12T19:04:31ZChanges are coming to Ontario’s kindergarten program — what parents and caregivers need to know<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574435/original/file-20240208-24-5pusnq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=14%2C592%2C4927%2C2697&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">'Back to basics' language used by the government distracts from the importance of continuously updating and revising curriculum. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Allison Shelley/The Verbatim Agency for EDUimages)</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Ontario Education Minister Stephen Lecce recently announced Ontario’s full-day kindergarten program is undergoing an <a href="https://www.cp24.com/news/ontario-announces-overhaul-of-kindergarten-curriculum-1.6738400">“overhaul” which will help “to create more systemic approaches to reading instruction and the introduction, in a very basic way, of mathematical skills and numeracy skills</a>.”</p>
<p>What do these proposed changes mean for educators, parents and children? </p>
<p>The proposed revisions must be considered and understood in the context of 1) <a href="https://www.dcp.edu.gov.on.ca/en/curriculum/kindergarten">the current full-day play-based kindergarten curriculum</a>, and 2) <a href="https://www.ohrc.on.ca/en/right-to-read-inquiry-report">recommendations and research that emerged from Ontario’s Right to Read report</a>, released in February 2022, stemming from an inquiry of the Ontario Human Rights Commission (OHRC). </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.ohrc.on.ca/sites/default/files/Right%20to%20Read%20Executive%20Summary_OHRC%20English_0.pdf">Right to Read inquiry</a> revealed Ontario’s public education system was not using evidence-based approaches to teach children with reading disabilities (and others) how to read. The education minister also said curricular updates are in keeping with <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/right-to-read-inquiry-report-literacy-ontario-1.6378408">the Right to Read report’s recommendations</a>.</p>
<p>While the province says kindergarten updates will be <a href="https://news.ontario.ca/en/release/1004097/ontario-unveils-a-back-to-basics-kindergarten-curriculum">combined with “hands-on and play-based learning</a>” there are concerns that play-based aspects of the curriculum — also grounded in <a href="https://theconversation.com/full-day-kindergarten-the-best-of-what-we-imagined-is-happening-in-classrooms-112602">evidence-based approaches to child development</a> — could be impacted by curricular revisions.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A child seen holding a book." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574439/original/file-20240208-18-9w9ojl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574439/original/file-20240208-18-9w9ojl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574439/original/file-20240208-18-9w9ojl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574439/original/file-20240208-18-9w9ojl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574439/original/file-20240208-18-9w9ojl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574439/original/file-20240208-18-9w9ojl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574439/original/file-20240208-18-9w9ojl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Curricular updates are in keeping with the Ontario Human Rights Commission’s Right to Read report recommendations.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Piqsels)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Teaching reading isn’t basic</h2>
<p>The “back to basics” language used in the province’s kindergarten announcement is intentionally and strategically tied to Premier Doug Ford’s promise in his <a href="https://ontariopc.ca/">election campaign</a> and is a slogan that Ford (and his team) have <a href="https://www.thestar.com/politics/provincial/premier-doug-ford-says-education-is-going-back-to-the-basics/article_50d11e2c-871b-5818-9c8d-c4aa33b6bc47.html">continued to use since becoming premier</a>. </p>
<p>It is not surprising that this political strategy is being used to market updates to the kindergarten program. </p>
<p>However, this language distracts from the importance of continuously updating and revising curriculum across the kindergarten to Grade 12 education sector. </p>
<p>It’s also important to note that the phrase “basics” is contradictory to what we know about the science of reading: teaching reading is anything but basic and <a href="https://www.aft.org/ae/summer2020/moats">involves understanding reading psychology and development, understanding language structure, applying evidence-based practices and using validated and reliable assessments to inform teaching</a>. </p>
<h2>Ontario’s full-day play-based kindergarten</h2>
<p>The current kindergarten curriculum has been in effect following a 2010 public policy shift. <a href="https://childcarecanada.org/resources/issue-files/resources/issue-files/resources/issue-files/resources/issue-files/resources">Based on recommendations from Ontario’s special advisor on early learning</a>, <a href="https://www.hdsb.ca/Documents/FDK-Parent-Fact-Sheet.pdf">in 2010 Ontario</a> began phasing in full-day play-based kindergarten for all four- and five-year old children. </p>
<p>This shift was also informed by <a href="https://www.oise.utoronto.ca/home/sites/default/files/2023-10/6-2014_-_ontario_s_full-day_kindergarten_a_bold_public_policy_initiative.pdf">interviews, focus groups and published scientific research on early learning</a>.</p>
<p>Essential to the <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/document/kindergarten-program-2016">revised kindergarten program</a> was the play-based structure of the full-day program. So was the delivery of the model by a <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-team-approach-makes-full-day-kindergarten-a-success-113339">teaching team</a> of an Ontario certified teacher and a registered early childhood educator. </p>
<p>Decisions to revise the earlier half-day kindergarten program acknowledged and leveraged research on the <a href="https://theconversation.com/kindergarten-scrapbooks-arent-just-your-childs-keepsake-theyre-central-to-learning-117066">value of play</a> and its role in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/rev3.3097">supporting academic, social and emotional development</a>. </p>
<p>It is important to note that <a href="https://files.ontario.ca/books/edu_the_kindergarten_program_english_aoda_web_oct7.pdf">misconceptions exist about play-based learning</a>, including the belief that play-based learning means letting children do whatever they want. Evidence-based play-based learning <a href="https://files.ontario.ca/books/edu_the_kindergarten_program_english_aoda_web_oct7.pdf">“…involves educators being deliberate and purposeful in creating play-based learning environments</a>.” </p>
<p>Furthermore, play is a basic human right of all children as recognized in the <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/instruments-mechanisms/instruments/convention-rights-child">United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child</a>. The revised play-based model in Ontario had (and continues to have) both empirical and philosophical grounds.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="An educator seen at a table with children with musical instruments." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574443/original/file-20240208-22-4mox38.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574443/original/file-20240208-22-4mox38.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574443/original/file-20240208-22-4mox38.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574443/original/file-20240208-22-4mox38.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574443/original/file-20240208-22-4mox38.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574443/original/file-20240208-22-4mox38.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574443/original/file-20240208-22-4mox38.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Educators are involved in the purposeful creation of play-based learning environments.‘</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The OHRC Right to Read report</h2>
<p>Changes to the above model are now being made in response to recommendations from the Right to Read inquiry. </p>
<p>The inquiry’s report includes 157 recommendations directly tied to addressing systemic issues affecting children’s right to read. These <a href="https://www.ohrc.on.ca/en/right-to-read-inquiry-report/appendix-1-list-recommendations">involve changes to curriculum, instruction and interventions and screening and assessments</a> related to reading. The recommendations for curriculum and instruction focus on the need for evidence-based direct and explicit instruction. </p>
<p>These recommendations were made based on the <a href="https://www.ohrc.on.ca/en/right-to-read-inquiry-report/executive-summary">most up-to-date research on reading, lived experiences of students, families and educators and informed by expertise in the area of human rights</a>. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/reading-disabilities-are-a-human-rights-issue-saskatchewan-joins-calls-to-address-barriers-214129">Reading disabilities are a human rights issue — Saskatchewan joins calls to address barriers</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The Right to Read report states: “Implementing the OHRC’s recommendations will ensure more equitable opportunities and outcomes for students in Ontario’s public education system.”</p>
<p>In keeping with prior revisions to the Ontario Kindergarten program, current plans to update kindergarten curriculum are being made based on empirical and philosophical grounds.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/iney0cEpx24?wmode=transparent&start=13" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Video from the Right to Read inquiry.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Not an either/or conversation</h2>
<p>As revisions to Ontario’s kindergarten curriculum unfold, stakeholders need to ensure the best scientific research in both play-based learning and early reading are leveraged to ensure the success of all young children. </p>
<p>The beauty is that play-based learning is not an all-or-nothing approach. Drawing on the benefits of playful learning and using these strategies in combination with evidence-based direct instructional practices in kindergarten will be essential to successfully integrating proposed revisions. </p>
<p>There are many educators in Ontario who already offer meaningful play-based learning opportunities and direct and systematic instruction in their classrooms. </p>
<p>This is evidenced in research published in 2016 <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/10409289.2016.1220771">by early childhood researchers Angela Pyle and Erica Danniels</a> and also in follow-up research by Pyle and colleagues in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10643-017-0852-Z">2018</a> which focused on how play and literacy interface in full-day kindergarten classrooms. </p>
<p>My current research in kindergarten classrooms, to be published later this year, examines how educators use a range of approaches (including teacher-directed play) to support children’s literacy and self-regulation outcomes. This research has, to date, also documented kindergarten educators using systematic instruction in combination with play-based learning.</p>
<h2>Educators need development, resources</h2>
<p>What’s needed is to ensure kindergarten educators are being provided with training and professional development to effectively lead classrooms utilizing both play-based learning and systematic instruction in reading, writing and math. This task is anything from basic — but is 100 per cent possible and necessary. </p>
<p>As curricular revisions are made, we must ask: </p>
<ul>
<li><p>Who are the stakeholders that are being invited to make the revisions to the curriculum? </p></li>
<li><p>Who is missing from the conversations? </p></li>
<li><p>What research is being used? </p></li>
<li><p>What type of training will be provided to educators? </p></li>
<li><p>Will this training include a focus on what it means to teach in evidence-based ways — and how to do so? </p></li>
<li><p>Will policymakers consider class size and sufficient resourcing for teachers so all students have the classroom supports required to ensure these changes will have real impact?</p></li>
</ul>
<p>In updating a curriculum, we cannot merely add additional content for educators to cover each day. </p>
<p>Instead, we need to consider what these changes mean and how we can best support educators in successfully supporting children’s learning — through both play-based learning and direct instruction.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/222846/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kristy Timmons received funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. She is an Associate Professor of Early Childhood Education at Queen's University, an Ontario Certified Teacher, and a Registered Early Childhood Educator. </span></em></p>We need to ensure the best scientific research in play-based learning and early reading is leveraged, and teachers receive supports to meet children’s developmental and academic needs.Kristy Timmons, Associate Professor, Early Childhood Education, Queen's University, OntarioLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2207382024-02-11T13:51:40Z2024-02-11T13:51:40ZBlack Londoners of Canada: Digital mapping reveals Ontario’s Black history and challenges myths<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/573874/original/file-20240206-20-tawyco.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=285%2C457%2C1015%2C514&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Reproduction of a landscape drawing of London, Ont. (Canada West) in 1855. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Map & Data Centre/Western Libraries at Western University) </span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Aurelia Jones was a prominent member of the Black community in mid-19th century London, Ontario, Canada, and the spouse of Abel Bedford Jones, a Black entrepreneur and religious and political leader. </p>
<p>After A.B.’s death, Aurelia moved to Halifax, Nova Scotia. The archival traces of her life tell the story of a migration from one Black community with British and American affiliations to another with strong Caribbean influences.</p>
<p>As research associates on the <a href="https://news.westernu.ca/2023/02/formerly-enslaved-black-londoners-digital-archive">Black Londoners Project</a> at Western University, we are finding historical clues about people like Aurelia Jones and exploring the Black history of London, Ont., by using a digital mapping approach. This methodology helps to understand the movements of individual people and how these movements, in turn, reveal connections within communities and to other places. </p>
<p>Black migration to and from Canada is an ongoing process dating back to the <a href="https://ugapress.org/book/9780820329406/the-hanging-of-angelique/">17th century</a>. The migrations of Black individuals often reflect the geographic and cultural connections of Black communities across borders and further into the <a href="https://boydellandbrewer.com/9781580464536/the-african-diaspora/">African diaspora</a>. </p>
<h2>Black geographies, Canadian myths</h2>
<p>Scholars such as <a href="https://btlbooks.com/book/black-geographies-and-the-politics-of-place">Katherine McKittrick</a>, <a href="https://www.queensu.ca/gnds/people/katherine-mckittrick">professor and Canada research chair in Black Studies</a>, have highlighted how understanding Black history means being attentive to how <a href="https://guides.lib.berkeley.edu/blackgeographies/gettingstarted">geography, culture and race intersect</a> in the formation of Black communities.</p>
<p>Such considerations challenge persistent myths of Canada’s past. For example, Black Canadian historian <a href="https://www.barringtonwalker.com/">Barrington Walker</a> has argued there is a <a href="https://www.osgoodesociety.ca/book/the-african-canadian-legal-odyssey-historical-essays/">“deep psychic and emotional attachment to the idea of Canada as a refuge and a haven from U.S. slavery and racial injustice.</a>” </p>
<p>The promise of freedom on British soil <a>creates a moral binary between the United States and Canada</a> that obscures <a href="https://theconversation.com/ancestry-ad-gets-it-wrong-canada-was-never-slave-free-116051">the history of slavery in Canada</a>.</p>
<p>Further, the idea that African American refugees uniformly would become loyal British subjects misrepresents the enduring connections between Black Canadians and other parts of the <a href="https://libguides.northwestern.edu/AfricanDiaspora">African diaspora</a>. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/meet-the-black-snowshoers-who-walked-1-000-kilometres-across-canada-in-1813-126977">Meet the Black snowshoers who walked 1,000 kilometres across Canada in 1813</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Shifting the focus from nationalist discourse to migrations among Black communities helps us better understand everyday Black life. </p>
<h2>Digital Black history projects</h2>
<p>The Black Londoners Project approaches Black history geographically by supplementing the narratives of 16 Black refugees from slavery and racial oppression in the U.S. with archival evidence (among others, personal narratives, census information and newspaper articles) of their lives in London, Ont. </p>
<p>The project aims to form a map of Black spaces in London, and to trace the connection diverse African diasporas have to the city. Digital tools then visualize how Black communities shaped each other and Canadian society at large. </p>
<p>Users of our online site will be able to read biographical entries with digitized archival materials and to browse digital maps of Black historical sites in London. The website will also connect with other digital Black Canadian History projects: </p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.blackpeopleshistory.ca/">A Black People’s History of Canada</a> aims to address and rectify the absences of Black Canadian history in school curricula. The project is headed by <a href="https://afuacooper.com/">Afua Cooper</a>, professor in the department of sociology and social anthropology at Dalhousie University; </li>
</ul>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ZBDvF9DCq9c?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Afua Cooper speaks about ‘A Black People’s History of Canada.’</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://www.blackpress.huronresearch.ca/">The Black Press in 19th-century Canada and Beyond</a> explores the history of journalism as intellectual activism in Black Canadian and international history. It is led by <a href="https://ccie.educ.ubc.ca/boulou-ebanda-de-bberi/">Boulou Ebanda de B'béri</a>, research director and professor in the department of communication at University of Ottawa, and <a href="https://huronatwestern.ca/profiles/faculty/nina-reid-maroney-phd/">Nina Reid-Maroney</a>, history professor at Huron University College; </p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://mobaprojects.ca/">Mapping Ontario’s Black Archives</a> presents a map of museums and archives that house records of Black-centred histories and is led by <a href="https://www.drcherylthompson.com/">Cheryl Thompson</a>, associate professor of performance studies and director for the Laboratory for Black Creativity at Toronto Metropolitan University.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2>Black oral history, digital mapping</h2>
<p>Digital mapping of Black migrations allows us to centre Black historical presence in public memory and examine Black oral narratives outside of their abolitionist framing. The teacher and white abolitionist, Benjamin Drew, published narratives of Black refugees in Ontario in his 1856 anti-slavery report, <a href="https://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/drew/drew.html"><em>The Refugee; or, A North-Side View of Slavery</em></a>. A primary narrative of A.B. Jones comes from Drew’s report. </p>
<p>A.B. Jones told Drew about his desires for liberty in Canada, stating: “I wished then to emigrate to some place where I could be really a FREE MAN … therefore, I came here, and am only sorry to say that I did not come years before I did.” The passing of the <a href="https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/fugitive-slave-act-of-1850#:%7E:text=The%20Fugitive%20Slave%20Act%20of,in%20the%20South%20once%20captured.">Fugitive Slave Act in 1850</a> in the U.S. led to much Black migration across the border. </p>
<p>However, the attitude of many Black Canadians toward the potential of equality in Canada <a href="https://www.mqup.ca/black-american-missionary-in-canada--a-products-9780228014478.php">would change after the 1850s</a> as, for example, <a href="https://theconversation.com/black-history-how-racism-in-ontario-schools-today-is-connected-to-a-history-of-segregation-147633">access to education became increasingly segregated</a>.</p>
<p>Many would move <a href="https://utorontopress.com/9781487529178/unsettling-the-great-white-north/">within Canada, to the U.S. and other places</a> in search of support from and community with the African diaspora.</p>
<h2>Aurelia Jones</h2>
<p>Through A. B. Jones’s account, we learned of his spouse, Aurelia Jones (née Bonsor), in the marriage register of Upper Canada/Canada West. Following A. B.’s death around 1860, there are few records of Aurelia living in London. </p>
<p>Aurelia’s case shows how peripheral Black women are in the archive. In the words of African American Studies professor Ula Taylor, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1353/JOWH.2008.0010">“the clues to their experiences are limited, heavily tainted, or virtually nonexistent</a>.” A public record of Aurelia exists because of her husband: after she inherited his property, she appears as “Mrs. A.B. Jones” in tax records. </p>
<p>However, Aurelia reappears in <a href="https://www.canadiana.ca/view/oocihm.8_01136_2/212">Hutchinson’s Nova Scotia Directory of 1867</a> and in the <a href="https://www.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/census/1881/Pages/item.aspx?itemid=617606">1881 Canada census for Nova Scotia</a>, living in Halifax. There, Aurelia lived on Creighton Street with a Black couple from Antigua and Jamaica. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Drawing showing a waterfront with boats and what appears to be log-constructed cabins." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=291&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=291&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=291&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=365&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=365&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=365&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">View of the city of Halifax, N.S., 1860, from Harper’s Weekly, Aug. 11, 1860.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015006963360">(HathiTrust)</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Nova Scotia’s Black communities emerged from layers of migration; for example, <a href="https://broadviewpress.com/product/black-slavery-in-the-maritimes/#tab-description">Black Loyalists</a> arrived during the American Revolutionary War (1775-83), and African Caribbean peoples came looking for work in the 19th and 20th centuries. Creighton Street was a centre of Black Haligonian life well into the 20th century.</p>
<h2>Migrations, diasporic connections</h2>
<p>As researchers, we explore circumstances behind Aurelia’s migration to Halifax. </p>
<p>What potential factors led her to leave London? How did she meet her Halifax roommates? Had she established a social network with Black peoples from inside and outside Canada? These questions have remained unanswered because of her erasure and the lack of historical documentation on the lives of Black Canadian women from the 19th century. </p>
<p>Tracing out these intersections of Black communities leads us to visualize history in a way that acknowledges, in the words of <a href="https://arts-sciences.buffalo.edu/africana-and-american-studies/faculty/faculty-directory/walcott-rinaldo.html">Africana and American studies professor</a> Rinaldo Walcott, how Black people <a href="https://www.indigo.ca/en-ca/black-like-who-20th-anniversary-edition/9781554832071.html">“redraw and rechart the places/spaces that they occupy</a>.” </p>
<p>The Black documentary filmmaker Dawn Porter <a href="https://www.rd.com/article/why-black-history-month-shouldnt-be-a-single-month/">recently called for the need to expand public awareness of Black history beyond the shortest month of the year</a>. We recognize the irony in writing this piece during Black History Month. </p>
<p>For Black communities as well as activists and scholars, remembering Black history happens every day of the year. Visualizing Black geography asks us to think of more permanent, transnational ways of commemorating Black history and honouring lives like that of Aurelia Jones.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/220738/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Elizabeth Hinds-Hueglin works for Dr. Miranda Green-Barteet and Dr. Alyssa MacLean's Black Londoners Project at Western University. The Black Londoners Project receives funding from Western's Strategic Priorities Fund. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Mitterauer works for Dr. Miranda Green-Barteet and Dr. Alyssa MacLean's Black Londoners Project at Western University. The Black Londoners Project receives funding from Western's Strategic Priorities Fund.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Patrick Kinghan works for Dr. Miranda Green-Barteet and Dr. Alyssa MacLean's Black Londoners Project at Western University. The Black Londoners Project receives funding from Western's Strategic Priorities Fund.</span></em></p>The Black Londoners Project approaches Black history geographically by supplementing narratives of 16 Black individuals with archival evidence about their lives.Elizabeth Hinds-Hueglin, Research Associate in English and Writing Studies, Western UniversityDavid Mitterauer, PhD Candidate, English, and Research Assistant, Western UniversityPatrick Kinghan, PhD Candidate, Faculty of Education and Research Assistant, Western UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2220462024-01-31T20:12:59Z2024-01-31T20:12:59ZSammy Yatim inquest: Speaking for the dead, or a Toronto police marketing campaign?<iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/sammy-yatim-inquest-speaking-for-the-dead-or-a-toronto-police-marketing-campaign" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>Coroner’s inquests into deaths that involved police often focus on the police force’s perspective and experiences. The inquest into the death of Toronto teenager <a href="https://www.cp24.com/news/sammy-yatim-s-mother-continues-fight-for-justice-10-years-after-son-s-death-1.6496869?cache=%2F7.336614">Sammy Yatim, who was fatally shot by Toronto police Const. James Forcillo in July 2013</a>, is no exception.</p>
<p>Because Yatim’s death involved police, the inquest was mandatory under Ontario’s <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/laws/statute/90c37">Coroners Act</a>. It draws to a close this week.</p>
<p>Reflecting on the inquest’s focus on <a href="https://www.thestar.com/opinion/star-columnists/convicted-cop-james-forcillo-is-back-and-the-sammy-yatim-inquest-is-cut-off-at/article_3f513ab0-ba48-11ee-9d87-fbb65ef8abc6.html?utm_medium=social&utm_source=email&utm_campaign=user-share">officer wellness</a>, it’s appropriate to revisit what coroner’s inquests do, what they don’t do, and to question why these proceedings are often dominated by police perspectives rather than the community’s or the victim’s.</p>
<h2>What is a coroner’s inquest?</h2>
<p>A coroner’s inquest is a public hearing conducted by a coroner before a jury of community members.</p>
<p>Inquests are designed, as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0964663919874111">Oxford University police researcher Ian Loader pointed out in a 2020 research paper</a>, to draw out how deaths in police custody are the result of the interaction of factors within society and the police force rather than as the singular act of an individual officer. </p>
<p>Inquests aren’t trials. They’re not designed to linger over the cause of the death. Instead, inquests concentrate on the systems that had an impact on the circumstances of death.</p>
<p>That means that by their very nature, inquests often shut down discussions about the specific acts of murder or neglect that caused the death. </p>
<p>In fact, Sherene Razack, a Canadian critical race scholar at the University of California, Los Angeles, argues in her 2015 book <a href="https://utorontopress.com/9781442637375/dying-from-improvement/"><em>Dying from Improvement: Inquests and Inquiries into Indigenous Deaths in Custody</em></a> that while coroner’s inquests typically provide the opportunity to discuss police officer wellness and access to resources, it’s often at the expense of the victims of a police officer’s actions. </p>
<p>In her book, Razack contends that inquests are often a means for police forces to communicate that they have a legitimate right to use force. In the process, coroner’s inquests tend to portray their victims as the authors of their own demise, and police officers as the “victims of a hard-to-police population.”</p>
<h2>Purpose, scope of the Yatim inquest</h2>
<p>In keeping with Razack’s criticisms, the purpose of the Yatim inquest wasn’t to revisit Forcillo’s conduct on the night of the shooting, his record as a police officer or to revisit the facts. <a href="https://www.comoxvalleyrecord.com/news/toronto-cop-convicted-in-death-of-teen-seeks-to-appeal-case-to-supreme-court-1583702">Forcillo has already been convicted of attempted murder in relation to the death</a>.</p>
<p>Its purpose was simply to explore <a href="https://falconers.ca/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Yatim-motion-decision-final-Cameron-Mar.-29-2023.pdf">“police officer recruitment, monitoring of police officers’ execution of their duties, police officer decision-making and available supports for those decision-making skills.”</a></p>
<p>This scope included “wellness, how to monitor a police officer’s job performance and what to do when relevant and material worrisome behaviour is noted.”</p>
<p>The presiding coroner, Dr. David Cameron, arrived at this scope after <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/sammy-yatim-coroners-inquest-1.6796133">rejecting Forcillo’s request to use the inquest to examine the possibility Yatim died by “suicide by cop.”</a> </p>
<p>Cameron described the inquest as a “unique opportunity to explore what to do when a police officer doesn’t follow their training” in reference <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/sammy-yatim-inquest-forcillo-1.7092406">to statements Forcillo had made to the parole board about failing to adhere to his training</a>.</p>
<p>Forcillo said he rushed his decision-making and went against his training while under the stress of the situation. He admitted he should have used communication to de-escalate the situation with Yatim, and should have waited for a higher-ranking officer who was able to use alternative methods.</p>
<p>Given these previous concessions, Cameron instructed the court that one of the inquest’s aims is to determine “how we can help officers make better decisions when under stress.”</p>
<h2>Forcillo’s testimony takes centre stage</h2>
<p>When Forcillo took the stand during the inquest, he made several statements about what might have changed the outcome the night he killed Yatim on a Toronto streetcar. </p>
<p>He suggested that access to a taser <a href="https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/forcillo-tells-coroner-s-inquest-having-a-stun-gun-would-have-changed-everything-1.6737292">“would have changed everything”</a> and that <a href="https://torontosun.com/news/local-news/mandel-would-police-martial-arts-training-have-saved-sammy-yatim">martial arts training would have empowered him to take different action</a>. He testified:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“After I was charged, I learned some jiu jitsu. I tell you if I had that kind of confidence when I was working on the road and I would have had those techniques, I would have been more apt to handle it without resorting to a use-of-force option.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Forcillo also suggested a lack of support for officer wellness was a contributing factor in Yatim’s death.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/sammy-yatim-inquest-forcillo-1.7092406">It was “not the culture” to discuss mental health</a>, he said.</p>
<h2>Wellness strategies</h2>
<p>Related to this testimony, the Toronto Police Service presented its revamped officer <a href="https://falconers.ca/inquest-into-the-death-of-sammy-yatim-continues-today-next-week/">“wellness strategy”</a> to the inquest jury. </p>
<p>As former deputy chief Mike Federico explained at the hearing, <a href="https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/forcillo-pointed-his-gun-at-someone-six-times-in-15-months-before-killing-yatim-leading/article_1fcf6660-bc57-11ee-a603-8775d1a54e19.html#tncms-source=login">the police force has already changed its intervention policy to lower the threshold for when an officer’s use of a firearm is worthy of an intervention</a>.</p>
<p>The lowered threshold <a href="https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/forcillo-pointed-his-gun-at-someone-six-times-in-15-months-before-killing-yatim-leading/article_1fcf6660-bc57-11ee-a603-8775d1a54e19.html">is seemingly meant to identify officers like Forcillo, who had pointed his gun at someone six times in the 15 months leading up to Yatim’s death</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.tps.ca/files/download/1655295454/43179/">The program</a>, part of Toronto Police Services’ use-of-force reporting system, flags certain officers for a mandatory, non-disciplinary intervention through the police force’s employee wellness unit.</p>
<p>During the hearing, Supt. Lisa Crooker with Toronto police’s hiring and recruiting division was questioned by Ed Upenieks, the lawyer for some of Yatim’s family members, about whether the 2013 version of the early-intervention program was sufficient to stop problem officers.</p>
<p>“So the police were not doing a good job policing the police in July of 2013; do you agree with me?” Upenieks asked.</p>
<p>“There were certainly significant gaps and challenges in that intervention opportunity,” Crooker replied.</p>
<h2>Preventing future deaths</h2>
<p>After the jury compiles its recommendations at the conclusion of the inquest, it’s up to the police force to decide whether it will make further changes.</p>
<p>But judging by testimony, it appears as though Toronto police are already making efforts on officer wellness. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://ontca.ca/">motto of the Office of the Chief Coroner of Ontario</a> is: “We speak for the dead to protect the living.”</p>
<p>The question is whether the Yatim inquest has done enough to speak for the dead. Or has it just been a marketing exercise for Toronto police?</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/222046/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Monika Lemke receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). </span></em></p>What do coroner’s inquests do, what don’t they do, and why are they often dominated by police perspectives rather than the community’s or the victim’s?Monika Lemke, PhD Candidate, Socio-Legal Studies, York University, CanadaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2063602024-01-30T20:15:08Z2024-01-30T20:15:08ZSchools have a long way to go to offer equitable learning opportunities, especially in French immersion<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537617/original/file-20230716-25-rv538b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C89%2C6000%2C3538&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In a research study on the accessibility of French immersion, one parent was told she faced a three-year wait to access reading supports for her child. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Andrew Ebrahim/Unsplash)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/schools-have-a-long-way-to-go-to-offer-equitable-learning-opportunities-especially-in-french-immersion" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>The Ontario Human Rights Commission’s <a href="https://www.ohrc.on.ca/en/right-to-read-inquiry-report">Right to Read report</a>, published last February, called for changes in the province’s educational system. The commission found shortcomings in how schools support students with special education needs. </p>
<p>We found similar trends in our <a href="https://uottawa.scholarsportal.info/ottawa/index.php/ILOB-OLBI/article/view/6618/5553">interview-based study</a> on the accessibility of French immersion for students with special education needs from low-income communities in Toronto. We interviewed eight mothers with diverse socio-economic status, home language and immigration backgrounds on their experiences with the French immersion program. </p>
<p>According to the Right to Read report’s <a href="https://www.ohrc.on.ca/en/right-to-read-inquiry-report/appendix-1-list-recommendations">recommendations</a>, children need accessible, effective learning assessments, as well as evidence-based interventions that occur in a timely manner. </p>
<p>These interventions include explicit, systematic programs that focus on <a href="https://www.readingrockets.org/reading-101/reading-and-writing-basics/phonics-and-decoding">phonics (teaching the relationships between letters and the sounds of spoken language) and decoding (applying knowledge of letter-sound relationships to written words, or “sounding out”)</a>, <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/social-sciences/metalinguistic-awareness">metalinguistic awareness</a> (a larger awareness of language, including an ability to reflect on it) and other skills <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/rrq.99">that support reading accuracy and fluency</a>). </p>
<p>Research has highlighted difficulties accessing support for students with special education needs <a href="https://doi.org/10.1075/jicb.20012.kay">in French immersion programs</a>. As we also heard in our study, parents of children with students with special education needs from low-income communities in Toronto faced barriers accessing resources for their children.</p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/reading-struggles-dont-wait-to-advocate-for-your-child-130986">Reading struggles? Don't wait to advocate for your child</a>
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<img alt="A school building." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/571939/original/file-20240129-21-apeyf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/571939/original/file-20240129-21-apeyf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/571939/original/file-20240129-21-apeyf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/571939/original/file-20240129-21-apeyf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/571939/original/file-20240129-21-apeyf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/571939/original/file-20240129-21-apeyf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/571939/original/file-20240129-21-apeyf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A report published by the TDSB found students without special needs represent 90 per cent of students in French immersion and 78 per cent of students in the board overall.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Marginalized students underrepresented</h2>
<p>French immersion programs have become increasingly popular <a href="https://journalhosting.ucalgary.ca/index.php/cjnse/article/view/74139">across Canada</a>, since students who learn both English and French in school may <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/228709/pdf">benefit from increased intercultural awareness</a>, easier travel throughout Canada, better access to bilingual jobs as well as potential <a href="https://doi.org/10.3138/cmlr.63.5.605">developmental and social benefits</a>.</p>
<p>There is a <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/4922887/french-immersion-school-canada-demand-teachers/">high demand</a> for French immersion in Canada, and the program is often perceived as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/01434632.2020.1865988">an elitist system</a>.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/french-immersion-and-other-regional-learning-programs-smart-choice-for-your-kids-or-do-they-fuel-inequity-195184">French immersion and other regional learning programs: Smart choice for your kids, or do they fuel inequity?</a>
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</em>
</p>
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<p>In the <a href="https://www.tdsb.on.ca/Portals/0/docs/TDSB%20French%20Programs%20Review%20Mar082019.pdf">Toronto District School board (TDSB) French immersion report released in 2019</a>, marginalized students are underrepresented in its immersion programs. For example, the report — based on registration and census information — noted that in grades 7-8:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>49 per cent of students identify as white in French immersion and 30 per cent in the board overall;</p></li>
<li><p>students without special needs represent 90 per cent of students in French immersion and 78 per cent of students in the board overall;</p></li>
<li><p>Students whose family income is $100,000 and over represent 66 per cent of students in French immersion and 47 per cent of students in the board overall;</p></li>
<li><p>Children from families who speak English at home represent 63 per cent of French immersion classes and 35 per cent of the board overall.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2>Reading struggles</h2>
<p>Emily (not her real name) is one of the mothers who participated in our study. She has seen the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77cz9iUeDaY&t=82s">high cost of disability in our school systems</a>. With her permission, we have shared her story below to illustrate her family’s experience in a French immersion program.</p>
<p>Emily enrolled all of her three children in a French immersion program. Emily’s eldest child excelled in immersion, and continued to study French into university. However, Emily’s two youngest were struggling to read in French. The teachers assured her that her children would catch up in time and there was no need to worry. </p>
<p>Shockingly for Emily, once her middle child reached Grade 3, she was suddenly informed that her child was reading at a kindergarten level. </p>
<p>However, the wait to be assessed was approximately three years — meaning this child might be in Grade 6 before they received any formal assessment and intervention support. </p>
<p>At the suggestion of the school’s administration, Emily agreed to pay $3,500 for an external evaluation. She said about the experience:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“I’ll never forget it, having that SST (school support team) meeting. I’m in front of the psychologist and all these different people and I literally lost control. The head of special education, she said, ‘It’s okay.’ I’m like, ‘I’m not crying because my daughter has a learning disability. I’ve come to terms with that.’ I said, ‘I’m crying because I had to pay $3,500 dollars …’… How many kids are falling through the cracks?’ That was very disconcerting for me. I was heartbroken.”</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A hand writing on French homework." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/540522/original/file-20230801-17-ko6dda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/540522/original/file-20230801-17-ko6dda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540522/original/file-20230801-17-ko6dda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540522/original/file-20230801-17-ko6dda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540522/original/file-20230801-17-ko6dda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540522/original/file-20230801-17-ko6dda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540522/original/file-20230801-17-ko6dda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Schools have a long way to go to offer equitable learning opportunities for all students.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
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<h2>Insufficient special education support</h2>
<p>Even after spending an exorbitant amount of money, Emily found out the hard way that there wasn’t sufficient special education support in French immersion for her child. She ended up removing her middle child from the immersion program the next year. Emily’s middle child did get the support she needed in the English program.</p>
<p>This is just one example of the stories we heard in our research study on the accessibility of French immersion. </p>
<p>Emily’s question stayed with us throughout our work: How many students are falling through the cracks? </p>
<p>The truth is, we don’t really know. Based on the attrition rates in French immersion from the TDSB, it must be high. According to a <a href="https://www.tdsb.on.ca/Portals/0/docs/TDSB%20French%20Programs%20Review%20Mar082019.pdf">2019 report published by the TDSB,</a> from the early French immersion cohort where students start in senior kindergarten, approximately 70 per cent of the students have left the program by Grade 9.</p>
<h2>Need for early intervention</h2>
<p>In our study, one parent was told that her child couldn’t be assessed until Grade 3, which contradicts <a href="https://www.readingrockets.org/article/importance-early-intervention">evidence-based best practices</a> that call for early assessment and intervention. </p>
<p>Parents also said they often feel pressure to pay for expensive tutors, French summer camps and other language immersion opportunities so their children don’t fall behind. </p>
<p>They reported spending a lot of time supporting their children’s studies despite not speaking the language of instruction, and this ends up becoming an emotional and financial burden.</p>
<h2>Ensuring changes are implemented equitably</h2>
<p>Following the Right to Read inquiry, the Government of Ontario committed to sweeping change such as <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/right-to-read-inquiry-report-literacy-ontario-1.6378408">mandating early literacy screening</a>. We have also seen a huge amount of <a href="https://www.idaontario.com/effective-reading-instruction/">professional learning</a> for teachers. Ensuring that positive change yielded by these approaches are effective in French immersion programs is critical. </p>
<p>We know that individual resilience and community support networks aren’t enough to combat systemic barriers. </p>
<p>We still have a long way to go if we want our school system to be an equitable learning opportunity for all students — particularly in immersion.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/206360/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Diana Burchell receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Becky Xi Chen receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Elizabeth Kay-Raining Bird has received funding from SSHRC. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Roksana Dobrin-De Grace receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC).</span></em></p>Parents in a study about the accessibility of French immersion programs discussed inadequate support for learning to read and feeling pressured to pay for expensive tutors.Diana Burchell, PhD Candidate in Developmental Psychology and Education, University of TorontoBecky Xi Chen, Professor, Department of Applied Psychology and Human Development, University of TorontoElizabeth Kay-Raining Bird, Professor Emeritus, School of Communication Sciences and Disorders, Dalhousie UniversityRoksana Dobrin-De Grace, PhD Student in Developmental Psychology, Toronto Metropolitan UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2184952024-01-22T20:42:47Z2024-01-22T20:42:47ZDespite legislative progress, accessible cities remain elusive<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566380/original/file-20231218-29-jo501r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C5755%2C3833&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Textured surfaces on city pavements can help make public space more accessible to disabled persons.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/despite-legislative-progress-accessible-cities-remain-elusive" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>Amid a complex web of disability civil rights legislation in Canada and the <a href="https://www.ada.gov/">United States</a>, one could easily be lulled into thinking that the work is done. Some of this legislation is now <a href="http://www.ccdonline.ca/en/humanrights/promoting/20years">several decades old</a>; more recent additions include <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/laws/regulation/110191">accessible design standards and guidelines</a> and barrier-free elements of <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/laws/regulation/120332">building codes</a>.</p>
<p>But <a href="https://accessnow.com/moca/">if only this were true</a>. Watching Toronto and other cities in North America work on accessibility feels a bit like watching a snail moving through molasses: the best route is unclear, progress is slow and they often become stuck.</p>
<h2>Paratransit</h2>
<p>Access to safe and reliable public transit is one such problem. For example, many of the issues <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1524839919888484">plaguing paratransit (ideally on-demand, door-to-door service for disabled persons) today</a> — unacceptably long wait times, having to plan and schedule days in advance, service costs, convoluted trip regulations, failing to pick people up — are often as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1524839919888484">old as the services themselves</a>. </p>
<p>It’s perhaps hard to imagine, but it could get worse. Data from the <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/89-654-x/89-654-x2021002-eng.htm">2017 Canadian Survey on Disability</a> indicate that nearly 18 per cent of <em>housebound</em> disabled persons report the absence of transport service as the cause — they have somewhere to go, but no way to get there.</p>
<p>New York City, Toronto and Montréal have underground public transit. These systems share a checkered past where disability is concerned. Time and time again, each system has been the site of disability activism, litigation, accessibility retrofit, cycles of investment progress and delay, and what I call last-millimetre problems.</p>
<p>In New York City, it took multiple <a href="https://new.mta.info/accessibility/ada-settlement-notice">class-action lawsuits</a> filed by disabled persons to get the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) to launch a multi-decade accessibility plan. This included a promise to stop renovating stations in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), the <a href="https://www.eeoc.gov/rehabilitation-act-1973-original-text">Rehabilitation Act of 1973</a> and <a href="https://www.nyc.gov/site/cchr/law/the-law.page">New York City Human Rights Law</a>. </p>
<p>Seven years on, an August 2017 article in the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/31/nyregion/nyc-subway-accessible-disabled.html"><em>New York Times</em></a> reported on the MTA’s stalled progress and justifiable skepticism on the part of disabled passengers.</p>
<p>The Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) is in the midst of a promising multi-year <a href="https://www.ttc.ca/accessibility/Accessible-Transit-Services-Plan">Accessible Transit Services Plan</a>. The plan includes accessibility retrofit of many stations built before the <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/laws/statute/05a11">2005 Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA)</a> became law. These are massive infrastructure projects with hefty price tags.</p>
<p>Symptomatic of a much broader failure across the province to meet AODA’s 2025 deadline, implementation of the TTC’s accessibility plan is behind schedule. In the most recent <a href="https://files.ontario.ca/msaa-fourth-review-of-aoda-final-report-en-2023-06-30.pdf">AODA progress review</a>, Rich Donovan, CEO of The Return on Disability Group, declared a state of crisis following “17 years of missed opportunities,” “minimal change in accessibility” and reports of terrible accessibility experiences across the province.</p>
<p>Looking back reveals a deep history of transit <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/montreal-metro-50-years-criticism-1.3804756">criticism and activism in Montréal</a>. In 1988, members of the American Disabled for Accessible Public Transit (ADAPT) protested poor transit accessibility during the <a href="https://adaptmuseum.net/gallery/index.php?/category/24">American Public Transit Association (APTA) meetings held in Montréal</a>. This occurred two years before the iconic “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/22/us/ada-disabilities-act-history.html">Capitol Crawl</a>” in Washington, D.C. where, tired of congressional inertia, disabled protesters climbed the steps of the Capitol to push for the immediate passing of the Americans with Disabilities Act. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/stSkqzI9mKY?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">A 2009 documentary about disabled persons’ experiences with Montréal transit.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Montréal’s Société de transport de Montréal (STM) now has a long-range accessibility plan with an <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/stm-metro-accessibility-plan-will-mean-more-elevators-ramps-1.4013361">aspirational end date of 2038</a>. The <a href="https://cutaactu.ca/stm-wins-equity-diversity-and-inclusion-award/">Canadian Urban Transit Association</a>) recently announced STM as the winner of an equity, diversity and inclusion award, noting it has “taken significant steps in enhancing customer accessibility since 2023.”</p>
<h2>The last millimetre problem</h2>
<p>Beyond a now seemingly normalized requirement for disabled persons to hold transit authorities to account, much of the progress underground has focused on elevators.</p>
<p>What I find astounding is the “last millimetre problem” — a wide gap or vertical misalignment between platforms and transit vehicles making it impossible or hazardous for some disabled persons, like my daughter, to get on or off the system. The problem seems to occur most often when newly acquired trains meet up with old stations. </p>
<p>In New York City, a vertical misalignment of up to six inches was reported in at least one MTA station. Gaps across the system have led to <a href="https://amsterdamnews.com/news/2022/10/26/riders-with-disabilities-sue-mta-to-close-the-gap-between-subway-train-and-platform/">more class-action litigation</a>. </p>
<p>As of 2019, the TTC has a subway platform gap retrofit program. Consultation
with its Accessibility Advisory Committee produced tolerances of <a href="https://pw.ttc.ca/-/media/Project/TTC/DevProto/Documents/Home/Public-Meetings/Board/2019/September_24/Reports/8_Subway_Platform_Gap_Retrofit_Program.pdf">89 mm or less and 38 mm or less respectively for horizontal and vertical misalignments</a>. Misalignment problems have also been reported <a href="https://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/how-some-universally-accessible-montreal-metro-stations-are-not">across multiple Montréal Metro stations</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0739456X231175595">Disability as an afterthought</a> makes platform and vehicle retrofit an inconvenient, costly necessity. The technical part of this problem can likely be solved with existing technology, like platform gap fillers and bridge plates. Waiting around for disabled passengers to engage in class-action litigation is not an effective strategy.</p>
<h2>Cycling infrastructure</h2>
<p>The voices of disabled persons have been relegated to the edges of the conversation about active transportation (cycling, walking) and healthy, climate-resilient urban futures.</p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.18061/dsq.v42i1.8276">Disabled persons ride bikes</a> on and <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/2059170883639">off-road</a>. The literature on cycling and disability focuses on <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jth.2017.01.013">planning for the inclusion of disabled cyclists</a>. Due consideration should also be given to interactions between <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.healthplace.2022.102896">disabled pedestrians</a> and transport infrastructure in general, including bike lanes. </p>
<p>Recently, a bike lane in Toronto was built level to an adjacent sidewalk, without sufficient aids to alert <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/blind-advocates-toronto-bike-lanes-1.7034433">blind pedestrians</a>. Design solutions exist — the Canadian National Institute for the Blind’s <a href="https://www.cnib.ca/en/sight-loss-info/clearing-our-path?region=on"><em>Clearing Our Path</em></a> suggests various types and applications of tactile walking surface indicators.</p>
<p>Curbside bike lanes can produce other <a href="https://www.toronto.ca/legdocs/mmis/2018/di/comm/communicationfile-79642.pdf">problems for disabled pedestrians</a>. For example, parking spaces adjacent to bike lanes with a step up to the sidewalk can force wheelchair users into the path of bicycles or vehicles.</p>
<p>Cycling infrastructure needs to be inclusive and safe infrastructure.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570542/original/file-20240122-17-emsqmn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="a bidirectional bike lane" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570542/original/file-20240122-17-emsqmn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570542/original/file-20240122-17-emsqmn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570542/original/file-20240122-17-emsqmn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570542/original/file-20240122-17-emsqmn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570542/original/file-20240122-17-emsqmn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570542/original/file-20240122-17-emsqmn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570542/original/file-20240122-17-emsqmn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A bike lane in downtown Toronto.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Consulting the community</h2>
<p>Research, policy, legislation, design and technologies exist to improve urban accessibility. Despite real progress on both the legislative and infrastructure fronts, the lived experiences of disabled persons continue to highlight serious incongruity between legislation, policies and outcomes.</p>
<p>Accessibility advisory committees are often a requirement of provincial legislation, and enacted at the <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/page/municipal-accessibility-advisory-committees">provincial or municipal levels of government</a>. Transit agencies often have separate committees comprised of community volunteers and agency staff — the <a href="https://www.ttc.ca/about-the-ttc/the-advisory-committee-on-accessible-transit">TTC</a>, <a href="https://new.mta.info/accessibility/ACTA">New York MTA</a> and <a href="https://www.stm.info/en/about/corporate-governance/board-committees/customer-service-and-universal-accessibility-committee">Montréal STM</a> all have committees. </p>
<p>Committee membership criteria should ensure adequate representation from within and across disability communities. Disabled community members should be compensated for sharing their specialized knowledge. </p>
<p>Real accountability, rather than performative empty consultation, should be the order of the day. Accessible cities can only happen when governments and their various agencies deeply listen to and act upon what disabled citizens have to say.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/218495/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ron Buliung does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Decades of activism have resulted in legislation and infrastructure to make cities more accessible, but the lived experiences of disabled residents shows there’s still a long way to go.Ron Buliung, Professor, University of TorontoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2180172024-01-21T12:59:10Z2024-01-21T12:59:10ZAnti-racist, culturally responsive French immersion: Listening to racialized students is an important step towards equitable education<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/562480/original/file-20231129-19-xh48rb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C12%2C4256%2C2765&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A study saw racialized students in Ontario French immersion programs write monologues and stories about their experiences, and also invited immersion stakeholders like teachers and parents to give feedback on
race and racism in Ontario immersion programs. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(CDC)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/anti-racist-culturally-responsive-french-immersion-listening-to-racialized-students-is-an-important-step-towards-equitable-education" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p><a href="https://education.macleans.ca/feature/just-say-non-the-problem-with-french-immersion/">Debates among researchers, educators and parents</a> continue about the successes and challenges with French immersion programs across English-speaking parts of Canada.</p>
<p>Programs are criticized for being elitist by some and praised for being exceptional by others. </p>
<p>My master’s research <a href="https://doi.org/10.37213/cjal.2023.32817">showed how Ontario and Toronto French immersion policies exacerbate inequities</a>, finding that program locations favoured middle-class students, curricula demonstrated a Eurocentric focus and colonial lens and program entry-points favoured established residents over newcomers.</p>
<p>My PhD work research has relied upon a collective creation research method known <a href="https://learninglandscapes.ca/index.php/learnland/article/view/1024/1040">as “playbuilding”</a> to propose ways French immersion programs can be more culturally responsive and anti-racist.</p>
<h2>Issues in French immersion</h2>
<p><a href="https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781793612731/French-Immersion-Ideologies-in-Canada">Research about students in Alberta has shown</a> that language levels of French immersion graduates are low and many lack confidence in their French skills.</p>
<p>French immersion programs have been known to exclude many students, particularly those with <a href="https://www.tdsb.on.ca/Portals/0/docs/TDSB%20French%20Programs%20Review%20Mar082019.pdf">special education needs, multilingual learners, immigrants and lower-income students</a>. In the past, some immersion programs even <a href="https://www.peelschools.org/documents/Elementary-FI-Program-Review.pdf/Elementary-FI-Program-Review.pdf">required IQ testing for admission</a>. </p>
<p>With <a href="https://doi.org/10.37213/cjal.2023.32817">immersion programs in Toronto mainly found in white, middle-class areas</a>, it is unsurprising that white, middle-class students are the most present in Toronto programs.</p>
<p>In the Toronto District School Board, research about French immersion enrolment shows inequitable demographics have been <a href="https://www.tdsb.on.ca/Portals/0/docs/TDSB%20French%20Programs%20Review%20Mar082019.pdf">improving in terms of racial and multilingual representation of enrolled students</a>. However, it also shows programs remain dominated by white, middle-class, anglophone students with few learning exceptionalities. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A Black student seen sitting and reading between two white students." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566494/original/file-20231219-29-8mt8ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566494/original/file-20231219-29-8mt8ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=462&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566494/original/file-20231219-29-8mt8ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=462&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566494/original/file-20231219-29-8mt8ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=462&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566494/original/file-20231219-29-8mt8ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=581&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566494/original/file-20231219-29-8mt8ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=581&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566494/original/file-20231219-29-8mt8ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=581&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">French immersion programs in the Toronto District School Board are still dominated by white students with few learning exceptionalities.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Allison Shelley for EDUimages)</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Documenting student experiences</h2>
<p>French immersion is a heavily researched program; however, <a href="https://doi.org/10.4000/glottopol.4039">research has largely ignored racial identity and racism</a>. </p>
<p>I invited French immersion stakeholders (like teachers, parents, staff and professors in teacher education programs) to engage with stories of racial minority students in Ontario French immersion programs, and my own experiences as a racialized French immersion teacher.</p>
<p>Firstly, my online study recruited two Black and one South Asian French immersion students from Ontario, aged 16–20. Over the course of two weeks, participants created monologues and wrote stories about their experiences as racial minority students in French immersion programs. Stories and monologues are <a href="https://mkunnas.wixsite.com/race-in-fi">available on our website</a>.</p>
<p>In the second stage of research, 39 French immersion stakeholders (students, teachers, parents, staff and professors in teacher education programs) viewed our website and responded to an online survey reacting to stories and suggestions for improving immersion. The findings from stage two support the findings from stage one.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A brown girl teen seen in discussion." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566682/original/file-20231219-29-bpakcv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566682/original/file-20231219-29-bpakcv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566682/original/file-20231219-29-bpakcv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566682/original/file-20231219-29-bpakcv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566682/original/file-20231219-29-bpakcv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566682/original/file-20231219-29-bpakcv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566682/original/file-20231219-29-bpakcv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Students wrote stories about their experiences as racial minority students in French immersion programs.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Allison Shelley for EDU images)</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Cultural learning and representation</h2>
<p>Cultural learning is required by the <a href="https://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/curriculum/elementary/fsl18-2013curr.pdf">French as a second language (including French immersion) curriculum</a>. Each grade focuses on different local or global cultures to help develop students’ intercultural competence. </p>
<p>For example, Grade 1 French immersion focuses on local francophone communities, Grade 8 focuses on France and Grade 10 focuses on French-speaking Africa and Asia. No matter the cultural focus, the curriculum calls for the inclusion of “diverse French speaking communities” in every grade.</p>
<p>Students in my study recounted that they did not learn about diverse French cultures. In some cases, they were not discussing culture at all. Students’ own cultures and races were also absent from their learning. </p>
<p>The representation in students’ learning was overwhelmingly white and European or Québécois. The lack of diversity is not representative of the curriculum or the reality of the French speaking world, which is <a href="http://observatoire.francophonie.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/LFDM-Synthese-Anglais.pdf">over 50 per cent people of colour</a>. </p>
<h2>Unchecked racism</h2>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/why-does-critical-race-theory-make-people-so-uncomfortable-176125">In a racially structured and racist society</a>, the presence of racism in immersion programs is hardly shocking. However, the participants revealed many instances where racism could have been interrupted and was not.</p>
<p>In general, participants’ schools had a culture of racism where racist acts and speech (committed by students, teachers and administrators) were allowed to continue unchecked. </p>
<p>In many cases, teachers were not willing to intervene when racist incidents occurred in their French classes. In one case, a teacher even let a student use a racist French term repeatedly. </p>
<p>A few participants expressed that some teachers and administrators interrupt racism. However, even these teachers were not integrating anti-racist teaching (that is, integrating diverse racial representations and empowering students to combat racism and oppression).</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/black-youth-yearn-for-black-teachers-to-disrupt-the-daily-silencing-of-their-experiences-177279">Black youth yearn for Black teachers to disrupt the daily silencing of their experiences</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566505/original/file-20231219-27-w516e5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566505/original/file-20231219-27-w516e5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=321&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566505/original/file-20231219-27-w516e5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=321&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566505/original/file-20231219-27-w516e5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=321&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566505/original/file-20231219-27-w516e5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566505/original/file-20231219-27-w516e5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566505/original/file-20231219-27-w516e5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Educators have important roles in integrating diverse racial representations and empowering students to combat racism and oppression.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Allison Shelley for EDU Images)</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Call for change</h2>
<p>Students should not be subjected to racism and should be learning about the diverse realities of the French-speaking world so they can see themselves as legitimate French speakers. </p>
<p>Listening to the voices of racial minority students in French immersion programs in dialogue with research documenting program inequities is an important step towards creating more inclusive French immersion programs and schools. </p>
<p>The preliminary findings of my study, in conjunction with earlier research documenting a Eurocentric focus and colonial lens in Ontario and Toronto immersion programs, point to the need for <a href="https://omlta.org/how-to-be-an-anti-racist-educator-series">supporting anti-racist</a> and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FikFP9lnIcQ">culturally responsive teaching and intercultural awareness</a> to make programs more welcoming to all students.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/218017/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marika Kunnas receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. </span></em></p>Listening to voices of racialized students in French immersion matters for creating more inclusive schooling.Marika Kunnas, PhD Candidate, Faculty of Education, York University, CanadaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2208072024-01-18T22:34:05Z2024-01-18T22:34:05ZHamilton council passes a bylaw to end renovictions, helping to address housing affordability<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570181/original/file-20240118-29-lbden9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C32%2C5463%2C3606&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Landlords in Hamilton will soon need to apply for a permit for renovations, a move aimed at ending renovictions.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/hamilton-council-passes-a-bylaw-to-end-renovictions-helping-to-address-housing-affordability" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>The City of Hamilton took bold action to end <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/renoviction-bylaw-1.7086701">renovictions</a>, a practice where tenants are evicted from their homes due to renovations. The city’s <a href="https://pub-hamilton.escribemeetings.com/Meeting.aspx?Id=bfaf56c0-ab0a-4aa8-ae1a-487c82f0f38a&Agenda=Agenda&lang=English">General Issues Committee</a> (comprised of the mayor and all councillors) voted unanimously on Jan. 17 to adopt <a href="https://www.chch.com/hamilton-city-council-passes-anti-renoviction-by-law/">Ontario’s first anti-renoviction bylaw</a>. </p>
<p>Renovictions are one of the leading causes of the <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/real-estate/vancouver/article-even-as-housing-plans-progress-truly-affordable-housing-is-being-lost/">erosion of existing affordable housing</a>. In some cases, renovation work is so extensive that it requires a landlord to have vacant possession of the unit. </p>
<p>However, in many other instances, evictions are done in “<a href="https://renovictionsto.com/RenovictionsTO-RenovictionsReport-Final.pdf">bad faith</a>,” and modest improvements are used as a pretext to remove sitting tenants and dramatically raise the rent for new ones.</p>
<h2>Licenses and permits</h2>
<p>Hamilton City Council will need to ratify the Renovations Licence and Relocation Bylaw at its meeting on Jan. 24. When it comes into effect, it will require any landlord issuing an <a href="https://www.toolsfortenantrights.com/n13-2">N13 eviction notice</a> to obtain a licence from the city, which will cost $715. In order to get that licence, they will need to first obtain a building permit and provide proof from a qualified expert, such as an engineer, that vacant possession is required in order to carry out the renovation work. </p>
<p>In other words, evicting tenants for basic repairs, or to perform a few cosmetic upgrades will no longer be permitted.</p>
<p>If this is approved, the bylaw clearly stipulates that landlords either provide alternative accommodation in another unit, or financial compensation to the tenant for the duration of the renovation. This compensation is a top up between what the tenant was paying in rent and the average market rent of a similar unit.</p>
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<h2>Addressing an existing loophole</h2>
<p>I cannot stress enough how different this is from the current situation facing Ontario tenants. <a href="https://www.ola.org/en/legislative-business/bills/parliament-43/session-1/bill-97">Under existing rules</a>, while tenants have the right to return to their renovated unit once the work has been completed, this rarely happens in practice. </p>
<p>The overarching reason for this is that landlords have no responsibility to their former tenants once the eviction is done. The onus of responsibility to exercise the right to return is squarely and solely placed in the hands of tenants. The relationship between landlord and tenant is severed, and it’s up to the tenant to re-establish it if they want to return home.</p>
<p>That’s the major loophole in the current rules. Combined with a lack of rent control on <a href="https://www.acto.ca/vacancy-decontrol-what-is-it-and-why-does-it-matter/">vacant units</a> (meaning a landlord can charge whatever they want when a new tenant moves in), this creates a huge financial incentive to evict long-term tenants, placing a severe burden on them. Evicting long-term tenants in favour of higher-paying new tenants under the guise of renovictions <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/hamilton-tenants-affordable-units-1.6796324">erodes much of our existing housing stock that is affordable</a>.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/4-affordable-housing-strategies-that-are-working-in-canada-215137">4 affordable housing strategies that are working in Canada</a>
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<p>Hamilton’s bylaw aims at addressing this in two ways. First, if there are actual instances when the scale of renovations requires tenants to leave, it provides clear pathways and expectations to ensure that they can return once the work is completed. </p>
<p>Second, for those bad faith landlords who want to use renovation merely as a cover to force tenants out of their homes, these new rules provide enough of a disincentive and discouragement to severely curtail and possibly even eliminate the cruel and unjust practice of renovictions.</p>
<p>The bylaw achieves these objectives by binding landlord and tenant together throughout the entire process. It clearly stipulates that the onus of responsibility to exercise the right to return to their former unit is most definitely a shared one between the landlord who owns the home, and the tenant who lives in it and considers it their home.</p>
<p>This is what other successful anti-renoviction and tenant protection policies do, including in <a href="https://www.newwestcity.ca/housing/renovictions-tenant-protection-and-resources">New Westminster, B.C.</a>, which was the first city in Canada to meaningfully address renovictions and <a href="https://www.burnaby.ca/our-city/programs-and-policies/housing/tenant-assistance">Burnaby, B.C.</a>, which arguably has the best tenant protection rules in Canada.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570221/original/file-20240118-21-5geuz6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="an overhead shot of a row of suburban homes and a playground" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570221/original/file-20240118-21-5geuz6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570221/original/file-20240118-21-5geuz6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570221/original/file-20240118-21-5geuz6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570221/original/file-20240118-21-5geuz6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570221/original/file-20240118-21-5geuz6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570221/original/file-20240118-21-5geuz6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570221/original/file-20240118-21-5geuz6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">New Westminster repealed its anti-renoviction municipal bylaw because it became redundant after the provincial government amended the Residential Tenancy Act.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Action for change</h2>
<p>It is important to stress that these bylaws don’t emerge out of thin air. They develop through a combination of council members and mayors who champion these causes, staff who conduct research and draft out bylaws as well as advocates, tenants and activists who campaign and organize for a better, fairer and more equitable city. </p>
<p>Several Hamilton councillors have long supported cracking down on renovictions; however, much of the credit for this new bylaw needs to go to <a href="https://acorncanada.org/locations/hamilton-acorn/">ACORN Hamilton</a>, a tenant advocacy and organizing group that has campaigned for years. At their request, I was a delegate at the General Issues Committee meeting in my capacity as a housing expert.</p>
<p>At several council and <a href="https://theconversation.com/cities-must-take-immediate-action-against-renovictions-to-address-housing-crisis-204170">committee meetings</a> over the <a href="https://www.thespec.com/news/hamilton-region/hamilton-city-staff-sorry-about-botched-renovictions-report/article_33aaef91-930b-581f-aa28-62ffa5e7de04.html">past year</a>, tenants and ACORN members shared their own personal experiences of renoviction and its impacts.</p>
<h2>Actual impacts</h2>
<p>Lived experiences often do not show up in statistics. Because of this, it is often <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2021.06.013">hidden from mainstream planning, policy and political debates</a>. And when it’s invisible, it is easy to conclude that renovictions are not a big problem. </p>
<p>My own research, conducted with the <a href="https://www.spno.ca/">Social Planning Network of Ontario</a>, has shown that formal evictions enforced by the courts (and therefore visible within conventional statistics) constitute a <a href="https://www.spno.ca/news/media-releases/144-new-research-report-on-tenant-displacement-across-ontario">tiny fraction of displacement experienced by tenants</a>. </p>
<p>Some <a href="https://www.therecord.com/news/waterloo-region/displaced-renovictions-harassment-pushing-more-vulnerable-tenants-out-of-kitchener-s-inner-suburbs/article_51e68be8-154d-5056-bd74-7d5e74ec5064.html">common tactics used by landlords</a> to force tenants out include offering tenants a few thousand dollars to leave, coercion, intimidation, harassment or ignoring repair requests.</p>
<p>Tenant organizing and advocacy not only fights back against unfair landlords, it provides the necessary push to compel councils to act. Without ACORN’s tireless efforts, Hamilton councillors may not have unanimously adopted Ontario’s first anti-renoviction bylaw.</p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/wSbjX9NwCHs?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">CTV News looks at how the province of Ontario is attempting to address renovictions.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>Future housing needs</h2>
<p>In Ontario, this is just the start of action to end renovictions. <a href="https://www.therecord.com/opinion/columnists/waterloo-region-should-consider-legal-protection-for-tenants-against-renovicting-landlords/article_ba8eb223-3b2a-572c-accd-7315e8708dc4.html">Communities across the province</a> are watching closely and developing their own bylaws. </p>
<p>British Columbia provides further inspiration. New Westminster repealed its municipal bylaw in 2021, not because it wasn’t effective (it basically ended renoviction), but because it became redundant after the provincial government <a href="https://www.bclaws.gov.bc.ca/civix/document/id/complete/statreg/00_02078_01#section49.2">amended the Residential Tenancy Act</a>.</p>
<p>This is the kind of future tenants need in Ontario. There is a growing realization that <a href="https://www.thestar.com/opinion/contributors/the-province-is-setting-a-housing-affordability-trap-for-toronto/article_823f8447-250a-53a4-8b02-2cff8aac11bc.html">we cannot simply build our way out of a housing crisis</a>. We need to build the right kind of supply and proactively work to protect tenants and existing affordable housing. Cracking down on cruel and unjust evictions is an essential way to achieve that.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/220807/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brian Doucet receives funding from SSHRC and the Canada Research Chairs program. Some of his research is conducted in partnership with the Hamilton Community Foundation, Social Development Centre Waterloo Region and Social Planning Network of Ontario. He has co-written reports on housing and mobility for local governments in Ontario. On Jan. 17, 2024 he delegated in support of Hamilton's renoviction bylaw at the city's General Issues Committee.</span></em></p>Hamilton city council’s vote to pass an anti-renoviction bylaw is an important step in addressing housing affordability in Ontario.Brian Doucet, Canada Research Chair in Urban Change and Social Inclusion, School of Planning, University of WaterlooLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2194742024-01-07T12:34:38Z2024-01-07T12:34:38ZNeighbourhood amenities may have helped youth mental health and stress early in the pandemic<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/567975/original/file-20240105-25-yskfll.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=245%2C1003%2C3621%2C1984&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Researchers investigated how the availability of neighbourhood amenities may have contributed to changes in youth mental health and stress levels during the first six months of the pandemic.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Unsplash/Paul Hanaoka)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/neighbourhood-amenities-may-have-helped-youth-mental-health-and-stress-early-in-the-pandemic" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>During the COVID-19 pandemic, youth as a population group <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/210201/dq210201b-eng.htm">reported some of the largest declines in their mental health</a> compared to other age groups in Canada. </p>
<p>Research on youth mental health during the pandemic has focused on <a href="https://www.facetsjournal.com/doi/full/10.1139/facets-2021-0096">poor academic engagement</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1139/facets-2021-0080">loss of peer networks</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/S2352-4642(20)30109-7">missed milestone events</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1186/s13034-023-00653-4">challenging summer employment experiences</a>. Yet little is known about how the places where young people lived played a role in changes to their mental health during the pandemic.</p>
<p>From walking in a park to ordering takeout food, there was not much to do out in public during the early months of the pandemic. Youth were attending school remotely and no longer participating in organized sports and indoor recreation. </p>
<p>For many, that meant their daily activities outside the home often consisted of what could be reached within walking distance of where they lived. Parks and food-related retail became the main places for physically distanced social interactions. They became a break in the routines of remote school, activities and virtual social networks available at home.</p>
<h2>Neighbourhood amenities</h2>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/23748834.2023.2282850">Our study</a> included Canadian youth between the ages of 13 and 19 in London, Ont. We investigated how the availability of neighbourhood amenities may have contributed to positive or negative changes in mental health — interpreted as their own perception of their mood and outlook on life — and stress levels during the first six months of the pandemic.</p>
<p>Amenities included parks, food outlets and convenience stores in close proximity to home.</p>
<p>We investigated whether these amenities could have protected against declines in mental health and increases in stress levels, and also if youth living in suburban neighbourhoods had different perceptions of mental health and stress levels than those living in urban ones.</p>
<h2>The missing role of parks</h2>
<p>Surprisingly, the availability of parks near the home had no significant impact on mental health and stress levels of youth. This finding runs counter to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-022-13148-2">evidence that suggests these places were crucial to supporting well-being</a> during the pandemic. </p>
<p>Given the pre-pandemic challenges of <a href="https://doi.org/10.24095/hpcdp.40.4.02">engaging young people in using their local parks</a>, these places may have not played as substantial a role in supporting better mental health and lowering stress levels for youth compared to other neighbourhood amenities.</p>
<h2>Youth experiences in urban neighbourhoods</h2>
<p>For youth in urban neighbourhoods, having more fast-food outlets available near young people’s homes resulted in lower levels of stress, but worse declines in mental health. When coupled with the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/23748834.2023.2282850">observed decline in eating habits</a>, urban youth were almost seven times more likely to report worse mental health. </p>
<p>While the places near young people’s homes can make a difference to their mental health, we found that the impact is greater on their stress levels. </p>
<p>It may be that food-based amenities in urban neighbourhoods provided places for young people to relieve their stress and try to cope with declines in their mental health by eating fast-food and convenience-store snacks and socializing.</p>
<h2>Youth experiences in suburban neighbourhoods</h2>
<p>Youth in suburban neighbourhoods were more likely to report changes (both improvements and declines) to their mental health and stress levels. They also had a greater availability of food outlets near them compared to urban youth. In particular, having more convenience stores near the home was associated with more drastic changes to mental health and higher stress levels. </p>
<p>In addition, youth residing in suburban neighbourhoods who reported a decline in their physical activity levels were also at nearly three times the risk of having worsened mental health than their peers who reported their physical activity levels had not changed since the pandemic. </p>
<p>Overall, boys were substantially less likely than girls to have improved mental health during the study period, and this was especially true for those residing in suburban areas.</p>
<p>One possible reason for this trend could be that boys are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssresearch.2019.03.015">more likely to play organized sports</a> than girls, which are often delivered by schools as extracurricular activities. In addition, boys tend to have less <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/14742837.2021.2011189">extensive social networks</a> on digital platforms outside of their school than girls. </p>
<p>The loss of opportunities for physical activity and transition away from in-person social networks at schools may have created feelings of isolation and loneliness for boys.</p>
<h2>The role of neighbourhood amenities</h2>
<p>The first six months of the pandemic revealed the importance of neighbourhood amenities in protecting against declines in mental health and reducing stress levels. </p>
<p>Parks may have been a helpful feature for other population groups, but we found their role was limited for youth in terms of mental health and stress. Planners and landscape architects can reflect on how these places could be changed to be more attractive to youth, thereby ensuring they receive the same benefits from them as younger and older groups. </p>
<p>In addition, it is important to consider that the experiences of youth living in suburban and urban neighbourhoods may differ. This highlights the need to include youth perspectives in the planning of public spaces that contribute to healthy and thriving communities. </p>
<p>The pandemic exposed long-standing issues in how youth can access amenities in their community, and how to best meet their needs in Canadian communities.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/219474/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alexander Wray receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and Sport Canada. He is President of the Town and Gown Association of Ontario. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kendra Nelson Ferguson was provided with funding through a trainee award from the Children’s Health
Research Institute, funded by the Children’s Health Foundation.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gina Martin, Jamie Seabrook, Jason Gilliland, and Stephanie Coen do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Neighbourhood features may have helped youth cope with the mental health impact of pandemic restrictions. Parks didn’t play much of a role but food amenities and the suburbs did.Alexander Wray, PhD Candidate in Geography, Western UniversityGina Martin, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Health Disciplines, Athabasca UniversityJamie Seabrook, Chair and Professor, School of Food and Nutritional Sciences, Brescia University College, Adjunct Research Professor, Paediatrics, Adjunct Professor, Epidemiology & Biostatistics, Western UniversityJason Gilliland, Professor, Director, Urban Development Program, Western UniversityKendra Nelson Ferguson, Postdoctoral Research Associate, Faculty of Social Sciences, Western UniversityStephanie Coen, Associate professor, School of Geography, University of NottinghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2185082023-12-12T23:58:25Z2023-12-12T23:58:25ZProgram at Hamilton Public Library shows how libraries can expand the social services they provide<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/565206/original/file-20231212-29-g6jmfe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C44%2C2500%2C1613&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A new program at the Hamilton Public Library is making on-site social workers available to the public.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Hamilton Public Library)</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/program-at-hamilton-public-library-shows-how-libraries-can-expand-the-social-services-they-provide" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>When we need help or advice, it’s not always clear where to go, what resources are available to us, or who to turn to when we need support. Public libraries are often easily accessible and free to the public. That means the <a href="https://thewalrus.ca/future-of-libraries/">local public library is often the first port of call</a> for people looking for help or advice.</p>
<p>This is changing how community members engage with their library and how staff engage with community members entering their doors. While libraries often act as an informational resource for folks looking to access community and social services, the public’s intensifying needs necessitate an expansion of the library’s role in our communities.</p>
<p>Staff at <a href="https://hpl.ca/">Hamilton Public Library</a>’s (HPL) 23 branches and two bookmobiles increasingly encounter people with a range of complex health and social issues in their library spaces. They include individuals with housing and food insecurity, newcomers to Canada, those dealing with mental-health challenges, substance use and addiction, and individuals who struggle with technology, face language barriers, and income pressures, among other challenges. </p>
<p>Given these growing and varied needs, having social workers in libraries is vital. Library staff often do not have the knowledge or expertise to effectively offer crisis and mental-health support people need. </p>
<h2>What’s happening at Hamilton Public Library</h2>
<p>In November 2022, HPL responded to this challenge. In partnership with Hamilton Public Health Services’ <a href="https://www.hamilton.ca/people-programs/public-health/mental-health-services/mental-health-street-outreach-program">Mental Health and Street Outreach Program</a>, HPL developed a program to provide <a href="https://www.thespec.com/news/hamilton-region/hamilton-public-library-to-hire-a-social-worker-at-its-downtown-branch/article_ec6348b6-22bb-5b31-8911-a98ab38bf12b.html">on-site social work services</a> at its downtown central library, with two part-time social workers being present, visible and accessible on the first floor. </p>
<p>In partnership with Hamilton Public Health Services, HPL staff and social workers working at HPL voiced a need to document and study their social work program. the aim is to identify short- and long-term outcomes, engage with different library members to explore how the social work program is understood and to make these findings available to other public libraries who may be considering their own social work program. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564559/original/file-20231208-23-8jod9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man gives advice to a woman in a library." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564559/original/file-20231208-23-8jod9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564559/original/file-20231208-23-8jod9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564559/original/file-20231208-23-8jod9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564559/original/file-20231208-23-8jod9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564559/original/file-20231208-23-8jod9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564559/original/file-20231208-23-8jod9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564559/original/file-20231208-23-8jod9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The public library is increasingly the first place people go when they need support or advice.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>With colleagues, I partnered with HPL and Hamilton Public Health Services to take a deeper look at the program from multiple stakeholders’ perspectives. Over the next year, interviews with different community stakeholders (library members, library workers, and social workers) will help make visible how these different stakeholders understand and use social work activities and services at HPL. </p>
<p>Social workers working in public libraries is a recent but growing partnership practice across North America. <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/library-social-worker-helps-homeless-seeking-quiet-refuge">The first social worker in a public library</a> was in San Francisco in 2009. <a href="https://publiclibrariesonline.org/2019/01/providing-social-service-resources-in-a-library-setting/#.XDtQqGtmscY.wordpress">In that case</a>, library members experiencing homelessness were accessing the library to seek refuge and meet their basic needs.</p>
<p>Since this first program, there have been many variations of social services offered in public libraries across North America. Taken together, this is signalling a shift in how we think about and use public libraries — from book repositories to community anchors and social infrastructures. </p>
<h2>Expanding the library’s role</h2>
<p>Social workers in libraries take on multiple roles, including helping people access resources, offering supportive listening and brief counselling and providing training to library staff on how best to deal with crises when they arise.</p>
<p>Social workers also support access to services like housing, harm reduction, employment counselling and food security, and they provide crisis intervention and the de-escalation of disruptive behaviours on-site. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564562/original/file-20231208-27-wxkgs2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="The glass entrance of a library building." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564562/original/file-20231208-27-wxkgs2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564562/original/file-20231208-27-wxkgs2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564562/original/file-20231208-27-wxkgs2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564562/original/file-20231208-27-wxkgs2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564562/original/file-20231208-27-wxkgs2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564562/original/file-20231208-27-wxkgs2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564562/original/file-20231208-27-wxkgs2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">More public libraries are hiring in-house social workers to provide the kinds of help and advice members of the public are searching for.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>Library social workers aim to remove systemic barriers to make their services more accessible. They can do this by offering preventative support in their role as community collaborators and advocates, and by helping people access services that offer longer-term solutions to their problems. </p>
<p>Social workers in the library are also crucial; they are trained and able to support trauma, mental-health issues, challenges and complex needs in a way that meets the person where they are at emotionally, physically and/or cognitively.</p>
<p>Ultimately, this project at HPL will help ensure the social work program meets its intended outcomes and will inform decision-making about the program’s future design and sustainability. This work is especially important as HPL is piloting a <a href="https://www.thespec.com/news/hamilton-region/library-expands-use-of-social-workers-to-barton-branch/article_47e845d3-9267-5e45-a0e2-ca09c18333ee.html">second social work program at its Barton branch</a>.</p>
<p><em>Sarah Gauthier, a Manager of Central Information Services with HPL, and Kianosh Keyvani, a Clinical Resource Co-ordinator with the City of Hamilton’s Mental Health and Street Outreach Program, co-authored this article.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/218508/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nicole Dalmer receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bridget Marsdin and Leora Sas van der Linden do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The public’s intensifying needs necessitate an expansion of the library’s role in our communities.Nicole Dalmer, Assistant Professor in the Department of Health, Aging and Society, McMaster UniversityBridget Marsdin, PhD student, School of Social Work, McMaster UniversityLeora Sas van der Linden, Program Manager, Community Research Platform, McMaster UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2188212023-12-09T00:30:10Z2023-12-09T00:30:10ZInquest into Soleiman Faqiri’s death at an Ontario ‘super jail’ reignites calls for reform<iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/inquest-into-soleiman-faqiris-death-at-an-ontario-super-jail-reignites-calls-for-reform" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>Imagine your family member is experiencing a mental health crisis, but instead of being treated at a mental health facility, they are locked inside a <a href="https://www.kawartha411.ca/2019/10/24/eight-inmates-have-died-at-central-east-correctional-centre-in-less-than-two-years/">notorious provincial jail</a>. You go to help by bringing their medication and medical records but are turned away again and again. Days later, a knock at the door brings the devastating news that your loved one is dead.</p>
<p>The Faqiri family has been living this nightmare for the last seven years. They had come to Canada as <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-after-my-brothers-death-in-prison-my-family-has-lost-faith-in-the/">refugees from Afghanistan</a> in the early 1990s hoping for a better life. </p>
<p>On Dec. 15, 2016, 30-year-old Soleiman Faqiri died at the Central East Correctional Centre, a “<a href="https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/why-wasn-t-soleiman-faqiri-sent-to-hospital-inquest-reveals-jailhouse-dysfunction-ahead-of-mentally/article_e0c8b78c-b381-535c-b798-346839d42aab.html">super jail</a>” in Lindsay, Ont. </p>
<p>He had been repeatedly struck by guards, pepper sprayed twice, his face covered in a “spit hood” and forced onto his stomach in a prone restraint position. He had earlier been arrested for allegedly stabbing a neighbour during a mental health episode. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/soleiman-faqiri-inquest-day-15-homicide-1.7053159">coroner’s inquest</a> into Faqiri’s death is concluding with Ontario coroner’s counsel calling his death a homicide and making 55 recommendations for jurors to consider to prevent further deaths. The inquest saw <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/soleiman-faqiri-video-inquest-1.7033938">graphic and disturbing</a> video evidence and <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/soleiman-faqiri-inquest-day-12-thibeault-1.7049636">witness testimony</a> of the final days and moments of his life, and the brutal force used against him by corrections officers. </p>
<p>Coroner’s counsel Prabhu Rajan told jurors at the inquest that Faqiri’s death was a “preventable tragedy” and that evidence points in the direction of homicide.</p>
<p>In 2022, the Ontario Provincial Police told Faqiri’s family they would not be laying any charges against the guards involved in his death, saying there was “<a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/soleiman-faqiri-no-charges-1.6558485">insufficient evidence</a>” to do so.</p>
<p>The inquest has reignited concerns surrounding the use of force and deaths in custody of people experiencing mental health distress. This tragic case serves as a poignant reminder that our current approach to dealing with mental health issues within the prison system is deeply flawed, and demands immediate attention and reform from federal, provincial and territorial governments.</p>
<h2>Elevated risk of death in custody for people with mental health issues</h2>
<p>Faqiri’s death in custody is not an isolated incident. Studies have shown that a significant number of deaths in custody involve mental health issues. Tragically, federally incarcerated individuals are <a href="https://www.criminallegalnews.org/media/publications/canadian_deaths_in_custody_report_2007.pdf">eight times</a> more likely to die from homicide and suicide than the general population. </p>
<p>In one study, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jflm.2017.03.002">researchers examined 478 deaths</a> in custody in Ontario between 1996 and 2010. They found that around “half of all deaths in custody occurred among those with a history of mental illness or substance use and those deaths disproportionately occurred in local police or provincial custody.” </p>
<p>Canada has formally abolished the death penalty as a legal sanction, yet it effectively remains in place for many people with mental illness who are incarcerated.</p>
<p>Individuals with mental health issues face elevated risks in correctional facilities, where force is often used to control inmates. From restraint equipment to pepper spray, the arsenal of tools employed by corrections officers can exacerbate the trauma and distress of those already struggling with mental health disorders. </p>
<p>Moreover, the conditions of incarceration, including overcrowding and double-bunking, contribute to heightened stress, anxiety and incidents of self-harm and suicidal behaviour.</p>
<p>The 2020-21 annual report by the federal correctional investigator, Ivan Zinger, revealed that a staggering <a href="https://oci-bec.gc.ca/en/content/office-correctional-investigator-annual-report-2020-2021">41 per cent</a> of use-of-force incidents in federal prisons involve individuals with documented mental health conditions. However, this likely underestimates the true extent of the problem, as reliable data from the Correctional Service of Canada on mental health indicators is lacking.</p>
<p>Another disturbing aspect highlighted by Zinger is the overuse of pepper spray, a practice particularly cruel and traumatic for individuals with serious mental health conditions. He recounted a case where a certified individual undergoing a health procedure was subjected to two bursts of pepper spray, handcuffs and “physical handling.”</p>
<p><a href="https://johnhoward.on.ca/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Broken-Record.pdf">A report</a> from the John Howard Society found that common behaviour and symptoms of severe mental health disorders (like bipolar or schizoaffective disorder) can be misinterpreted by corrections staff, leading to increased disciplinary sanctions and use of segregation. </p>
<h2>Independent investigators</h2>
<p>While we have an independent corrections investigator for federal institutions, there is no comparably empowered independent watchdog for provincial jails. This must change. </p>
<p>Additionally, Canada has so far refused to join 90 other countries that have ratified the <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/instruments-mechanisms/instruments/optional-protocol-convention-against-torture-and-other-cruel">United Nations Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment</a>. The protocol requires countries to open up all places of detention to independent national and international inspections. We need greater transparency and accountability, and to fundamentally change how incarcerated people are treated.</p>
<p>Faqiri’s death is a haunting example of the fatal consequences of the criminal justice system being used to address mental health issues. Despite the <a href="https://www.thestar.com/opinion/contributors/canada-s-prisons-are-failing-the-mentally-ill/article_a98ee7cb-22fb-583b-9bc6-558394d217a3.html">coroner’s report</a> detailing the severe mistreatment leading to his death, the lack of accountability so far is deeply troubling.</p>
<p>The systemic issues plaguing our correctional facilities need to be addressed and the mental well-being of those in custody must be prioritized. Reform should focus on providing medically and culturally-appropriate trauma-informed treatment, medication and therapies in a supportive environment, rather than in prisons that exacerbate the challenges faced by individuals with mental health issues.</p>
<p>Evidence-based community mental health services are also vital to better meet the needs of people with mental health issues while protecting society. Where such services are not provided, there is an elevated risk of harm. Prevention is key.</p>
<p>“People who have a psychotic illness who are treated have the same or lower rates of violence than the general population,” Sandy Simpson, chair in forensic psychiatry at the University of Toronto’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, explained in an interview for my book <em><a href="https://utorontopress.com/9781487506278/indictment/">Indictment: The Criminal Justice System on Trial</a></em>. “So, it’s treatable if care is available and acceptable and delivered in the right way to people in need.”</p>
<p>The tragic stories of those like Faqiri demand that we reevaluate our approach to mental health in the community and in prisons as we strive for a system that promotes healing rather than perpetuating harm. Faqiri’s death must not be in vain. His family deserves answers, justice and accountability.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/218821/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Benjamin Perrin receives funding from the Law Foundation of British Columbia.</span></em></p>People with mental health challenges are more likely to die in custody. The coroner’s inquest into the death of Soleiman Faqiri in an Ontario jail is one such tragedy that calls out for reform.Benjamin Perrin, Professor of Law, University of British ColumbiaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2191672023-12-05T17:24:38Z2023-12-05T17:24:38ZLow PISA math scores post-pandemic: Policies need to consider both academic excellence and equity<iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/low-pisa-math-scores-post-pandemic-policies-need-to-consider-both-academic-excellence-and-equity" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>There will be a collective gasp as governments and policymakers <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-math-scores-of-canadian-students-are-declining-raising-concern-about/?login=true">reckon with drops in 15 year olds’ math skills</a> in the wake of the pandemic, as captured by <a href="https://www.oecd.org/pisa/">the OECD’s release</a> of the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2022 results.</p>
<p>The global results capture mathematics skills based on 2022 testing. PISA typically tests math (as well as science and literacy skills) every three years, but a <a href="https://www.oecd.org/publications/new-pisa-results-strengthening-education-systems-in-the-wake-of-the-pandemic-62fc50a3-en.htm#">2021 test was postponed</a> because of the pandemic. </p>
<p>Governments <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/education/2021/jan/28/primary-schools-pandemic-causing-significant-learning-loss-england">anticipated there would be</a> a drop in test scores due <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/new-supports-students-math-reading-writing-1.6812345">to COVID-19 disruption</a>. But few would have predicted such significant learning losses. </p>
<p>Canada was not immune from the learning challenges caused by the pandemic. Canada’s results indicate a significant drop of <a href="https://gpseducation.oecd.org/CountryProfile?primaryCountry=CAN&treshold=10&topic=PI#:%7E:text=In%20reading%20literacy%2C%20the%20main,30%20points%20higher%20for%20girls">15 score points</a> in mathematics — a score of 497, down from <a href="https://gpseducation.oecd.org/CountryProfile?primaryCountry=CAN&treshold=10&topic=PI#">512 in 2018</a>. Since PISA was first administered in 2000, Canada has <a href="https://gpseducation.oecd.org/CountryProfile?primaryCountry=CAN&treshold=10&topic=PI#:%7E:text=In%20reading%20literacy%2C%20the%20main,30%20points%20higher%20for%20girls">never experienced a drop of 15 score points in any area</a> as has happened this year.</p>
<p>As provinces across Canada take stock of test scores, and likely face weaponization of these scores by those seeking <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780197570685.013.9">to gain political points</a>, both policymakers and the public need to know there’s no quick fix. To address academic learning, a multi-dimensional approach is needed that promotes the success of the whole child: academic, physical and socio-emotional.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/student-achievement-depends-on-reducing-poverty-now-and-after-covid-19-153523">Student achievement depends on reducing poverty now and after COVID-19</a>
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<h2>Significant drop in mathematics scores</h2>
<p>Canada’s math scores on the <a href="https://www.oecd.org/pisa/publications/PISA2018_CN_CAN.pdf">last three administrations of PISA</a> have been fairly stable, <a href="https://oecdch.art/a40de1dbaf/C903">albeit showing</a> a slight <a href="https://www.oecd.org/publication/pisa-2022-results/country-notes/canada-901942bb#chapter-d1e11">downward performance trend</a>.</p>
<p>Still, Canadian students have consistently performed <a href="https://www.cmec.ca/Publications/Lists/Publications/Attachments/396/PISA2018_PublicReport_EN.pdf">above the OECD average as the top English speaking jurisdiction in mathematics, science and reading achievement</a>. While Canada is still a top-performing nation and these drops closely align with <a href="https://www.oecd.org/pisa/PISA%202022%20Insights%20and%20Interpretations.pdf">average OECD performance declines</a>, they are sure to provoke calls for system reform, given the trajectory of the decline.</p>
<p>What should governments do (and not do) to address significant performance declines?</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Students seated at desks writing tests." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/563470/original/file-20231204-21-n52i6y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/563470/original/file-20231204-21-n52i6y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/563470/original/file-20231204-21-n52i6y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/563470/original/file-20231204-21-n52i6y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/563470/original/file-20231204-21-n52i6y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/563470/original/file-20231204-21-n52i6y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/563470/original/file-20231204-21-n52i6y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Making up two years of lost learning is a daunting challenge.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
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<h2>Education policies and academic learning loss</h2>
<p><a href="https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8723-6774">My research with colleagues</a> suggests educational policymakers in Canadian provinces have taken a number of important steps to address challenges created by the pandemic. </p>
<p>No less than 62 policy documents and related supports were developed and issued across Canada’s 10 provinces from January 2020 to December 2021. Academic supports tended to focus on maintaining continuity of learning, synchronous learning during school closures and, finally, recovery catch-up strategies.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.edcan.ca/articles/covid-19-and-the-learning-loss-dilemma/">Catch-up policies</a> need to consider students’ mental and physical health — domains largely untested by large-scale assessment programs, but equally important.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/pause-pisa-international-standardized-student-testing-its-been-two-years-of-pandemic-schooling-stress-179945">Pause PISA international standardized student testing — it's been two years of pandemic schooling stress</a>
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<h2>Resist temptation to narrow curriculum</h2>
<p>Similarly, provincial policymakers must resist the temptation to narrow the curriculum to focus on the mathematics domain at the expense of other subjects. Narrowing the curriculum often accompanies significant test score drops, which unfortunately contribute to <a href="https://theconversation.com/high-school-dropouts-cost-countries-a-staggering-amount-of-money-115396">school failure</a> and negatively impact countries’ future economic prosperity.</p>
<p>Clearly, a generational challenge like COVID-19 requires a multi-year approach that takes a long-view based on the best available evidence. And yet, PISA results have routinely been <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780197570685.013.9">politicized by policymakers</a> globally, including in Canada. </p>
<p>Yes, it is early days, but if the past is a good predictor, a host of education reforms such as greater privatization and <a href="https://www.ourkids.net/blog/public-schools-fraser-institute-9075">school choice will likely be offered as a remedy for our “failing schools.</a>”</p>
<p>Collectively, these types of reforms, <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-exactly-is-neoliberalism-84755">modelled on notions that the state should promote markets and competition</a> to meet social needs, have consistently shown their negative effects around the world.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/school-choice-policies-are-associated-with-increased-separation-of-students-by-social-class-149902">'School choice' policies are associated with increased separation of students by social class</a>
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<h2>Moving forward in a post-COVID world</h2>
<p>Education is a social science concerned <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/social-science">with human behaviour in its social and cultural aspects</a>. What works in one context isn’t guaranteed to work in another. Looking to countries that perform high in PISA math performance like Singapore (and other Asian nations) to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10833-019-09367-x">borrow policies</a> and strategies in the hopes of emulating their success, is naïve. </p>
<p>Success in a post-COVID world will depend on local innovation and an ability to address the unique challenges of Canada’s <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/221026/dq221026b-eng.htm">ethnically and linguistically diverse population</a>. Indeed, the share of immigrant students in Canada increased <a href="https://gpseducation.oecd.org/CountryProfile?primaryCountry=CAN&treshold=10&topic=PI#:%7E:text=In%20reading%20literacy%2C%20the%20main,30%20points%20higher%20for%20girls">to 34 per cent in 2022</a>.</p>
<p>Although Canada can and should consider the efficacy of education policies in similar international education contexts, it also possesses unique educational governance structures. Provincial autonomy in administering education means provinces can learn from each other as much as from other countries. </p>
<p>In many instances, performance variations are larger <a href="https://www.cmec.ca/Publications/Lists/Publications/Attachments/396/PISA2018_PublicReport_EN.pdf">across Canadian provinces</a>, than between Canada and other high-performing nations.</p>
<p>For example, the difference between Saskachewan and Québec’s PISA math scores is 46 points, approximately one-and-a-half grade levels, with the former at <a href="https://a.storyblok.com/f/81332/x/ad9bf10292/oecd_pisa_2022_results-volume-i_53f23881-en.pdf">the lower and the latter at the higher end</a>. A range of education policy and other factors, including the <a href="https://policyalternatives.ca/sites/default/files/uploads/publications/Saskatchewan%20Office/2019/02/Failing%20Report%20Card%20on%20Child%20Care%20(01-23-19).pdf">availability of early childhood education</a>, have been and should continue to be explored to account for such differences.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/generation-c-why-investing-in-early-childhood-is-critical-after-covid-19-157095">'Generation C': Why investing in early childhood is critical after COVID-19</a>
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<h2>Push for online learning</h2>
<p>It would also be naive to expect technology to offer easy solutions to enhancing students’ access to quality education. </p>
<p>For example, in Ontario, a shift to online learning and less in-class hours, undoubtedly <a href="https://covid19-sciencetable.ca/sciencebrief/covid-19-and-education-disruption-in-ontario-emerging-evidence-on-impacts/">contributed to pandemic learning losses</a>. Yet online learning is now <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/document/education-ontario-policy-and-program-direction/policyprogram-memorandum-167">being offered as a strategy to improve education</a> — <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/high-school-students-mandatory-online-courses-graduation-1.5368305">as it was also prior</a> to the pandemic. </p>
<p>This is despite the fact <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/learning-curve-transitions-1.6482719">that students</a> and <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/fed-up-parents-call-for-boycott-of-online-classes-as-province-shifts-to-virtual-learning-to-fight-covid-19-1.6304352">parents have</a> both voiced their concerns with online education. </p>
<p>Equally important is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/10494820.2020.1789672">that research</a> highlights the social challenges associated with a reliance on online education.</p>
<h2>Two pillars of success: excellence and equity</h2>
<p>Ultimately, Canadian policymakers should be judged on their ability to promote academic resilience in a post-COVID world that is both <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/14782103211069002">multi-dimensional</a> and also attentive to marginalized student groups, particularly <a href="https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-981-13-9863-6">those from lower socio-economic backgrounds</a>. </p>
<p>Policies designed to promote high achievement must also carefully consider the success of students living in poverty. The <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Equity-and-Excellence-in-Education-Towards-Maximal-Learning-Opportunities/Branden-Avermaet-Houtte/p/book/9780415847452">best-performing education systems</a> embody both of these characteristics, and PISA scores represent only one piece of a complex puzzle to help spur system reform. </p>
<p>The countries that equally attend to these two pillars, excellence and equity, will be the leaders of the future.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/219167/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Louis Volante receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC).</span></em></p>To boost post-pandemic math learning, a multi-dimensional approach is needed that promotes the success of the whole child: academic, physical and socio-emotional.Louis Volante, Professor, Brock UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2189002023-12-03T13:27:29Z2023-12-03T13:27:29ZSilencing Sarah Jama diminishes Canadian democracy<iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/silencing-sarah-jama-diminishes-canadian-democracy" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>Sarah Jama, the MPP for Hamilton Centre, is <a href="https://www.tvo.org/article/sarah-jama-has-filed-suit-against-the-ontario-government-what-are-her-chances-of-success">suing the Ontario government and Legislative Assembly</a> after being censured in the legislature by members of the Progressive Conservative government.</p>
<p>On Oct. 23, the Ontario legislature <a href="https://www.tvo.org/article/hamilton-mpp-kicked-out-of-ndp-caucus-censured-by-legislature">passed a motion</a> introduced by the government house leader, Paul Calandra, to censure Jama for <a href="https://twitter.com/SarahJama_/status/1711808190889746854">remarks she made on social media</a> regarding the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas. Jama called for a ceasefire in Gaza and labelled Israel’s actions as “apartheid.” In its motion, the government said her statements are “<a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/sarah-jama-censor-1.6997689">antisemitic and discriminatory</a>.” </p>
<p>Ontario New Democratic Party Leader Marit Stiles also <a href="https://www.cp24.com/news/ontario-mpp-sarah-jama-censured-and-removed-from-ndp-caucus-over-israel-gaza-comments-1.6612602">removed Jama from caucus</a> on the same day. Jama now sits as an independent MPP.</p>
<p>Jama alleges that the censure contravenes her rights to freedom of expression and equality under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. She also argues that it is an improper exercise of parliamentary privilege and an <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/10120828/sarah-jamas-censure-an-abuse-of-power-ndp-tried-to-muzzle-her-legal-docs/">abuse of power</a>.</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/sarah-jamas-censure-making-people-feel-uncomfortable-is-part-of-the-job-216704">Sarah Jama's censure: Making people feel uncomfortable is part of the job</a>
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<p>Calandra’s motion took it one step further by also forbidding the Speaker of the legislature from recognizing Jama in debate until she retracts and apologizes for her remarks. </p>
<p>Calandra claimed the motion was necessary to protect the legitimacy of the legislature. He also argued that the parliamentary powers to discipline members <a href="https://www.ola.org/en/legislative-business/house-documents/parliament-43/session-1/2023-10-18/hansard#P220_12108">maintain institutional respect and dignity</a>. In other words, the motion to discipline Jama was presented to the legislature behind the shield of parliamentary privilege. </p>
<p>While legislators can and should hold elected members accountable for poor conduct, they must not let discipline turn into complete <a href="https://www.aclu.org/documents/what-censorship">censorship</a>.</p>
<p>The motion censures and silences Jama in the legislature. While censure might occasionally be necessary to preserve the integrity of a parliament, using it to punish members who express personal views outside of the legislature threatens the foundations of our democracy.</p>
<h2>Can the courts get involved?</h2>
<p>The Speaker’s authority to not recognize Jama must be based on statutory authority (i.e. legislation) or the constitutional principle of parliamentary privilege. </p>
<p>This potentially leaves two options for Jama. She could challenge the Speaker’s authority through <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/laws/statute/90l10">Ontario’s Legislative Assembly Act</a>, or she could challenge the authority of the Speaker as a matter of parliamentary privilege. </p>
<p>If the court accepts the statutory authority argument, then the Charter of Rights and Freedoms would likely apply to Jama’s case. This was articulated by the Supreme Court of Canada in <a href="https://scc-csc.lexum.com/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/item/1413/index.do"><em>Harvey v. New Brunswick</em></a>. </p>
<p>If Jama is correct on this point and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms applies, this would mean that the Speaker’s refusal to recognize her is a clear and, quite frankly, inarguable violation of her <a href="https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/csj-sjc/rfc-dlc/ccrf-ccdl/check/art3.html#:%7E:text=3.,be%20qualified%20for%20membership%20therein.">democratic rights</a>. </p>
<p>The only way the government of Ontario could justify violating the Charter would be to prove that the Speaker’s authorization to preclude Jama is <a href="https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/csj-sjc/rfc-dlc/ccrf-ccdl/check/art1.html">reasonably justifiable in a free and democratic society</a>. </p>
<h2>Courts and parliamentary privilege</h2>
<p>Parliamentary privilege is a constitutional principle that empowers legislators to fulfil their <a href="https://www.aspg.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/05-CoghillThe-functions-of-Parliament.pdf">roles and functions</a>. It also gives the legislature power to hold its elected members accountable for misconduct. And that is the basis of the Ontario government’s legal argument for justifying Jama’s exclusion. </p>
<p>The powers of parliamentary privilege are extremely complicated, especially when courts get involved. As legal expert Warren Newman explained: “<a href="https://www.canlii.org/en/commentary/doc/2008CanLIIDocs118#!fragment//BQCwhgziBcwMYgK4DsDWszIQewE4BUBTADwBdoByCgSgBpltTCIBFRQ3AT0otokLC4EbDtyp8BQkAGU8pAELcASgFEAMioBqAQQByAYRW1SYAEbRS2ONWpA">Courts in Canada have struggled with the role and place of these privileges in the constitutional system</a>.” Specifically, courts often struggle with determining their own role when reviewing matters that are inherently political — such as the exercise of parliamentary privilege.</p>
<p>Recent decisions by Canadian courts have reinforced the idea that courts should not interfere with the operations of legislative bodies. This was most recently articulated in the Supreme Court’s 2018 decision in <a href="https://decisions.scc-csc.ca/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/item/17287/index.do?q=%22parliamentary+privilege%22"><em>Chagnon v. SFPPQ</em></a>. </p>
<p>These judicial decisions, however, should not be interpreted to mean that legislatures can abuse their powers behind the shield of parliamentary privilege. It also does not mean that courts are completely prevented from reviewing how parliamentary privilege is used. </p>
<p>In fact, in Chagnon and <a href="https://scc-csc.lexum.com/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/item/2231/index.do">other decisions</a>, the Supreme Court confirmed courts can exercise their judicial review powers to determine whether or not legislative actions fall within the scope of parliamentary privileges. This will be an important determining factor for Jama’s case.</p>
<h2>Possible implications for Sarah Jama</h2>
<p>This case is significantly different from most of the published judicial decisions on parliamentary privilege. Previous judicial considerations of legislatures’ privilege powers have arisen within the context of excluding non-members of Parliament. For example, in <a href="https://scc-csc.lexum.com/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/item/957/index.do"><em>New Brunswick Broadcasting Co. v. Nova Scotia</em></a> the Supreme Court ruled that the legislature could exercise its parliamentary privilege to prevent an outside company from broadcasting the legislature’s proceedings. </p>
<p>In contrast, Jama’s case pits the parliamentary privilege of an individual member against that of the legislature as a whole. Another significant difference is that this case is about conduct that occurred outside of, and without any impact on, the legislative process. </p>
<p>It is hard to see how comments made outside of the legislature that do not comment on the legislature or <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/hillier-expelled-opc-caucus-1.5058281">other legislators</a> can impede the legislative process or bring the assembly into disrepute. </p>
<p>Jama’s actions should be distinguished from instances that clearly bring a legislature in disrepute, such as when <a href="https://theconversation.com/canadas-house-speaker-quits-what-the-hunka-scandal-reveals-about-second-world-war-complexities-214339">Anthony Rota invited a former Nazi soldier to Canada’s House of Commons</a>. </p>
<p>These important differences may also contribute to how Jama’s legal battle plays out. </p>
<h2>Threatening Canadian democracy</h2>
<p>While disciplining legislators is an established parliamentary privilege, the exact boundaries of what “discipline” means, or when it can be exercised, are also not clear. What is clear is that legislatures do not, as a general rule, prevent elected members from participating in their legislative functions for simply holding opposing views.</p>
<p>To silence a member for their political views — even if it was the wish of the majority — inexcusably violates the principles of parliamentary democracy. The motion to silence Jama and remove her rights to engage in political speech is a <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-we-should-still-be-reading-democracy-in-america-44174">drastic and dangerous step</a>.</p>
<p>Excluding Jama from the legislature prevents her from carrying out her duties and responsibilities as an elected member of the legislature. She is unable to participate in legislative debates, represent her constituents or attempt to hold the government accountable for any of its conduct. This is a violation of her parliamentary privilege.</p>
<p>If this exclusion is permitted to stand, it will set a dangerous precedent: that the legislature can silence democratically elected representatives because a majority of its members disagree with their political views. </p>
<p>This is not about whether we agree with Jama or not. The issue here is the potential for governments to undercut and diminish the principles of democracy. Especially when it comes to a government that has <a href="https://cfe.torontomu.ca/blog/2023/10/what-happened-your-commitment-freedom-expression-premier-ford">frequently defaulted</a> on its commitment to freedom of expression. </p>
<p>As freedom of speech is inevitably at the heart of this political and legal issue, it is useful to recall <a href="https://www.econlib.org/library/Mill/mlLbty.html?chapter_num=2#book-reader">John Stuart Mill’s</a> warning: </p>
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<p>“If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.”</p>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Censure might occasionally be necessary to preserve the integrity of a parliament, but using it to punish members for their personal views threatens the foundations of democracy.David Said, PhD Candidate/Researcher, Political Science, University of GuelphGreg Flynn, Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, McMaster UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2173092023-11-28T20:10:03Z2023-11-28T20:10:03ZStriving for transparency: Why Canada’s pesticide regulations need an overhaul<iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/striving-for-transparency-why-canadas-pesticide-regulations-need-an-overhaul" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p><a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/news/2021/08/government-of-canada-pauses-decision-on-glyphosate-as-it-strengthens-the-capacity-and-transparency-of-review-process-for-pesticides.html">In 2021, Health Canada announced a freeze on changing maximum residue limits (MRLs)</a> — the maximum allowable pesticide residues acceptable under Canadian law. This decision followed substantial public outcry following Canada’s most widely used weed killer <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/services/consumer-product-safety/pesticides-pest-management/public/consultations/proposed-maximum-residue-limit/2021/glyphosate/document.html">glyphosate’s proposed MRL increase.</a></p>
<p>This year, three ministries (including Health Canada) <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/news/2023/06/government-of-canada-moves-forward-on-federal-pesticide-commitments.html">unpaused</a> the comparatively less complex residue limit adjustments and <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/corporate/about-health-canada/branches-agencies/pest-management-regulatory-agency/transforming/how-we-are-transforming.html">sought to transform</a> the <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/corporate/about-health-canada/branches-agencies/pest-management-regulatory-agency.html">Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA)</a>. </p>
<p>The move was aimed to enhance transparency, modernize their business practices, improve access to information related to pesticide decision-making, and increase the use of real world data and independent advice. </p>
<p>However, trust in the agency remains an issue; only <a href="https://publications.gc.ca/collections/collection_2023/sc-hc/H114-39-2023-eng.pdf">60 per cent of Canadians believe the regulatory system is keeping pace with scientific advancements in pesticide assessment,</a> adding further pressure to Canadian’s eroding trust in science.</p>
<h2>Challenges and controversies</h2>
<p>In spite of ongoing concerns over risks to human and environmental health, global pesticide use has been <a href="https://www.fao.org/faostat/en/#data/RP/visualize">increasing over the past 30 years</a>. </p>
<p>In Canada, increased reliance on pesticides has been largely tied to the intensity of agricultural use in the main crop growing regions of <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fenvs.2020.556452">the Canadian Prairies, Southern Ontario and Québec.</a></p>
<p>Advancing pesticide regulation to meet the needs of Canada’s agricultural sector, while protecting human and environmental health, is a growing challenge. </p>
<p>There are <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/services/consumer-product-safety/reports-publications/pesticides-pest-management/corporate-plans-reports/annual-report-2020-2021.html">more than 600 registered active ingredients in more than 7,600 registered pesticide products</a> — a staggering number that continues to rise. </p>
<p>From 2011 to 2021, the PMRA registered between seven and 27 new active pesticide ingredients each year. Meanwhile, it has only <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics11020121">banned 32 of 531 prohibited active pesticide ingredients regulated in 168 other countries</a>.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-there-are-fewer-insects-on-uk-farms-than-there-were-a-century-ago-and-how-to-restore-them-207656">Why there are fewer insects on UK farms than there were a century ago -- and how to restore them</a>
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<p>This influx puts added pressure on the agency to review volumes of scientific data produced by both the registrant and independent scientists, while continuously assessing the growing list of existing products for their safety to humans and risks to environmental health. </p>
<p>Some chemical registration decisions, including <a href="https://beyondpesticides.org/dailynewsblog/2016/01/canada-discontinues-conditional-registrations-for-new-pesticides/">conditional registrations</a>, have been highly controversial, highlighting the lack of transparency or perceived industry bias. </p>
<p>In the case of glyphosate, sales in Canada have topped nearly 470 million kilograms from 2007 to 2018. Public concerns over human health risks and regulated uses have led to <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/advocates-thrilled-as-court-orders-health-canada-to-reassess-glyphosate-decision-1.5772134">legal challenges</a>. </p>
<p>Similarly, the proposed 2018 decision to phase out three of the most widely used, environmentally persistent and toxic neuro-active <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/services/consumer-product-safety/pesticides-pest-management/growers-commercial-users/neonicotinoid-insecticides.html">neonicotinoid insecticides</a> was later <a href="https://www.nationalobserver.com/2021/04/08/news/feds-wont-ban-pesticides-deadly-bees-bugs-ecosystems">reversed in 2021</a>. Citizens and scientists were left seeking answers on whether industry influence caused the <a href="https://www.wildernesscommittee.org/news/federal-pesticide-regulator-flip-flops-proposed-neonics-ban-after-years-delay">flip-flop</a>.</p>
<h2>Evolving roles</h2>
<p>Last year, as part of the transformation agenda, Health Canada aimed to fortify its pesticide review processes by establishing an <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/corporate/about-health-canada/public-engagement/external-advisory-bodies/science-advisory-committee-pest-control-products.html">independent Science Advisory Committee</a>. </p>
<p>Currently comprising eight academic experts, whose backgrounds were screened for conflict of interest, the committee has been tasked to provide objective, science-based advice to inform regulatory decisions on pest control products. We are four of them.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">An exploration into the connections between pesticide use and disease in humans, produced by Deutsche Welle documentaries.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Since its creation in July 2022, the committee has met five times with Health Canada’s PMRA in a <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/corporate/about-health-canada/public-engagement/external-advisory-bodies/science-advisory-committee-pest-control-products/meetings.html">public forum</a>.</p>
<p>The committee has been tasked with providing input on diverse issues such as communication of MRLs, use of independent data sources, creation of open source toxicity databases, and access to registrant data used in decision-making. </p>
<p>As a positive early sign, the PMRA has been responsive to the <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/corporate/about-health-canada/public-engagement/external-advisory-bodies/science-advisory-committee-pest-control-products/advisory-reports.html">committee’s advice and recommendations</a>, which is anticipated to reinforce public trust and ensure science-based decision-making is at the core of its processes. </p>
<h2>Informing new policies</h2>
<p>Canada is long overdue in establishing a <a href="https://canadacommons.ca/artifacts/1191021/a-canada-wide-framework-for-water-quality-monitoring/1744148/">co-ordinated water monitoring program</a> to systematically measure pesticide levels nationally. </p>
<p>The committee is providing external scientific advice on the new pilot <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/services/consumer-product-safety/pesticides-pest-management/public/protecting-your-health-environment/programs-initiatives/water-monitoring-pesticides/pilot-program.html">Water Monitoring Framework Initiative</a>. </p>
<p>Committee experts are giving input on guidance for site selection, monitoring frequency in different types of surface waters and analytical measurement of current use compounds and their degradation products. </p>
<p>The goal is to ensure this much-needed water quality data is rigorous and usable for future risk assessment and independent scientific research.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/pesticides-are-harming-nigeria-its-time-to-update-the-law-207050">Pesticides are harming Nigeria: it’s time to update the law</a>
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<p>Recently, the PMRA has an added responsibility to enhance broader Canadian biodiversity goals and environmental protections by aligning its regulatory work with the <a href="https://www.cbd.int/article/cop15-final-text-kunming-montreal-gbf-221222">2022 Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework — aiming to reduce pesticide risk by at least 50 per cent by 2030</a> — alongside the enactment of <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/environment-climate-change/news/2023/06/bill-s-5-strengthening-environmental-protection-for-a-healthier-canada-act.html">Bill S-5, updating the Canadian Environmental Protection Act of 1999</a>, to consider cumulative pesticide exposure in risk assessments. The committee is currently developing recommendations to inform approaches to best address these significant policy initiatives.</p>
<h2>Towards a pesticide-safe Canada</h2>
<p>The journey to more transparent and scientifically robust pesticide regulation in Canada is long overdue, yet essential. </p>
<p>A greater emphasis on transparency and communication of the science that underpins regulatory decision-making is urgently needed. A lack of access to data and information used in risk assessment undermines the public trust. </p>
<p>An over-reliance on industry supplied confidential studies, limited application of data from independent scientists, a lack of publicly available data on active ingredient pesticide sales, use and environmental monitoring, are all contributing to scepticism. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-green-revolution-is-a-warning-not-a-blueprint-for-feeding-a-hungry-planet-182269">The Green Revolution is a warning, not a blueprint for feeding a hungry planet</a>
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<p>As the PMRA transitions to more transparency and reaffirms its evidence-based decision-making for pesticide regulation, insight from independent scientific researchers as part of the committee will play a critical role.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217309/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Valérie S. Langlois is receiving funding from the Canada Research Chair (CRC) program, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC), the Ministère de l'environnement et de la lutte contre les changements climatiques, Faune et Parcs du Québec (MELCCFP), among others. Dr. Langlois is the co-chair of the Science Advisory Committee (SAC).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christy Morrissey currently receives funding from Canada's Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, Canada Foundation for Innovation, Environment and Climate Change Canada, Mitacs, Saskatchewan Ministry of Agriculture, and the Molson Foundation. She is a member of the PMRA's Science Advisory Committee (SAC).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr. Eric Liberda receives funding from CIHR and Indigenous Services Canada to conduct research related to pesticides and metal/metalloid exposures. He is a member of the Society of Toxicology and the Society of Toxicology Canada. Dr. Liberda is a co-chair of the Science Advisory Committee (SAC).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sean Prager receives funding from NSERC, Canadian Foundation for Innovation, Genome Canada, The Saskatchewan Ministry of Agriculture, several commodity boards and NGOs. He is affiliated with the PMRA Science Advisory Committee (SAC). </span></em></p>Canada is long-overdue for scientifically-driven, robust and transparent pesticide regulation. A newly created Science Advisory Committee aims to address this.Valérie S. Langlois, Professor/Professeure titulaire, Institut national de la recherche scientifique (INRS)Christy Morrissey, Professor in Biology and Ecotoxicology, Toxicology Centre, University of SaskatchewanEric Liberda, Professor, School of Occupational and Public Health, Toronto Metropolitan UniversitySean Prager, Associate Professor and Entomologist, University of SaskatchewanLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2150462023-11-26T19:58:10Z2023-11-26T19:58:10ZGender-based violence: Teaching about its root causes is necessary to address it<iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/gender-based-violence-teaching-about-its-root-causes-is-necessary-to-address-it" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>In 2022, <a href="https://femicideincanada.ca/callitfemicide2018-2022.pdf">184 women and girls were killed by violence in Canada</a>. This number has steadily increased in each of the past three years; 148 women and girls were killed in 2019, 172 in 2020 and 177 in 2021.</p>
<p>There were <a href="https://egale.ca/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/Egale_Pride_Unravelled_Government_Package_May23.pdf">6,423 incidences of anti-2SLGBTQIA+ protests and online hate</a> in Canada in the first three months of 2023 alone. Expressions of hate toward trans and non-binary people and 2SLGBTQIA+ people more broadly have been rising.</p>
<p>Transphobia and femicide are both forms of gender-based violence, <a href="https://women-gender-equality.canada.ca/en/gender-based-violence/about-gender-based-violence.html">defined as any form of violence directed toward somebody because of their gender, gender identity, gender expression or perceived gender</a>. </p>
<p>My team of researchers, <a href="https://www.gbvteaching.com">The Gender-Based Violence Teaching Network</a>, created resources, professional development and <a href="https://www.gbvteaching.com/about-6">a teaching toolkit</a> to support more teachers to effectively teach students about the root causes and consequences of different forms of gender-based violence. </p>
<h2>Devastating effects</h2>
<p>Gender-based violence has devastating effects for those who experience it. In addition to immediate physical, psychological and/or sexual harm, it leads to <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3837386">increased economic insecurity</a> and <a href="https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/violence-against-women">has detrimental impacts on mental health</a>. </p>
<p>Gender-based violence is prevalent in our society. A <a href="https://canadianwomen.org/blog/new-survey-few-well-prepared-to-support-someone-facing-gender-based-violence/">2021 survey by the Canadian Women’s Foundation</a> showed that two-thirds of 1,515 Canadian respondents know a woman who has experienced physical, sexual or emotional abuse. Despite this high prevalence, it is often not examined in schools as a social issue.</p>
<p><a href="https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/educationpub/75/">My analysis</a> of Ontario secondary school curricula showed that some form of gender-based violence is mentioned at all grade levels. It is most frequently mentioned in upper-level optional <a href="https://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/curriculum/secondary/ssciences9to122013.pdf">social sciences and humanities</a> courses (such as Grade 11 Gender Studies or Grade 12 Challenge and Change in Society). </p>
<p>These elective courses are also more likely to help students examine how gender-based violence is <a href="https://bmcwomenshealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12905-015-0256-4">influenced by systems of power, discrimination and social constructs</a>, including through the intersections of gender and racialization, disability and socioeconomic status.</p>
<h2>Need to learn how violence is normalized</h2>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/09540253.2021.1884193">Teachers told me</a> that, unfortunately, these elective courses are not always offered and, when they are, they are most often taken by students already familiar with these ideas. </p>
<p>This means most Ontario students never learn about the connection between acts of violence and broader structures that normalize gender-based violence by discriminating against girls, women and 2SLGBTQIA+ people. </p>
<p>For example, <a href="https://www.mmiwg-ffada.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Final_Report_Vol_1a-1.pdf">Indigenous women and girls are 12 times more likely to be murdered or missing than</a> other women in Canada. This disproportionate violence results from centuries of colonization, which continues to manifest through multigenerational and intergenerational trauma, social and economic marginalization, and institutional practices and social behaviours that maintain the status quo and ignore the agency and expertise of Indigenous women, girls and 2SLGBTQIA+ people. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/missing-and-murdered-indigenous-women-and-girls-an-epidemic-on-both-sides-of-the-medicine-line-118261">Missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls: An epidemic on both sides of the Medicine Line</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Overlooking power discrepancies</h2>
<p>There are required courses that mention some forms of gender-based violence,
most notably Grade 9 <a href="https://www.dcp.edu.gov.on.ca/en/curriculum/secondary-hpe">Health and Physical Education</a>. However, my analysis of this curriculum found it frames gender-based violence <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/09540253.2021.1884193">as an issue of individual responsibility</a>, overlooking the ways power discrepancies can influence the situation and impact a person’s ability to provide consent or respond to violence. </p>
<p>There are also brief mentions of several gender-based violence issues in the Grade 10 Canadian History and Civics and Citizenship courses, including missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls. My examination of the curriculum and teachers’ experience teaching it, however, demonstrates these curricula do not prompt critical analysis of the social causes that led to these acts of violence.</p>
<h2>What effective teaching looks like</h2>
<p>My research demonstrated that some teachers are teaching about gender-based violence issues. They explain that effective teaching about gender-based violence involves grappling with the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2022.103755">power and privilege of both students and teachers</a>, intentionally <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/14681366.2021.2007987">cultivating relationships with and between students</a> and <a href="https://digitalcommons.uri.edu/jfs/vol22/iss22/2/">with community resources</a> and considering the root causes of gender-based violence as connected to patriarchy, colonialism, heteronormativity and cisnormativity. </p>
<p>Students call for education that conveys the holistic consequences for victims as real people, not just statistics, and that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2022.103755">empowers them to understand and prevent gender-based violence in their lives and communities</a>. </p>
<h2>Teaching toolkit</h2>
<p>My team created resources and professional development to respond to <a href="https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/educationpub/77/">teachers’ concerns</a> that they lacked sufficient training and materials about gender-based violence, and that this discourages teaching about it. </p>
<p>Our <a href="https://www.gbvteaching.com/about-6">Teaching About Gender-Based Violence Toolkit</a> is available on our project website. The toolkit has lesson plans, guidance notes and other teaching materials to support teachers to address gender-based violence topics. It aligns to Grade 8-12 Ontario curriculum expectations. </p>
<p>Topics addressed include sexual assault, consent and healthy relationships, human trafficking, transphobia and homophobia, gender policing, cisnormativity and heteronormativity, missing and murdered Indigenous women, girls and Two-Spirit people and intimate partner violence. </p>
<p>More directly addressing gender-based violence through education can help the upcoming generation of Canadians understand how gender-based violence manifests across our society. </p>
<h2>More education needed</h2>
<p>The ongoing <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/mashkode-bizhiki-ikwe-unidentified-homicide-jeremy-skibicki-1.7020242">disappearance and murder of Indigenous women, girls</a> and Two-Spirit people, the <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/9393280/canada-lgbtq-hate-trans-west-block/">proliferation of hate toward 2SLGBTQIA+ people</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/workers-supporting-survivors-of-gender-based-violence-are-demanding-change-195897">the unmanageable demand for women’s shelters</a> and the emergence of new <a href="https://gbvlearningnetwork.ca/our-work/issuebased_newsletters/issue-39/index.html">forms of sexual violence facilitated by technology</a> show the importance of more education about gender-based violence. </p>
<p>Broader awareness of its root causes and devastating consequences is necessary to better address it.</p>
<p>Teachers are uniquely placed to support the development of students’ understanding of gender-based violence. All educators are encouraged to explore the resources that we have created to help students understand that, tragically, gender-based violence exists all around them. </p>
<p>We need to teach students what it looks like and why it happens before we can empower them to collectively act to circumvent it in their lives and communities.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/215046/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Catherine Vanner receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.</span></em></p>The Teaching About Gender-Based Violence Toolkit offers lesson plans and other teaching materials, and is designed to meet Grades 8-12 Ontario curriculum expectations.Catherine Vanner, Assistant Professor of Educational Foundations, University of WindsorLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2177642023-11-23T21:59:03Z2023-11-23T21:59:03ZRevisiting the Williams Treaties of 1923: Anishinaabeg perspectives after a century<p>One hundred years ago this November, the governments of Canada and Ontario signed treaties with <a href="https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/williams-treaties">First Nations of the Chippewa of Lake Simcoe (Beausoleil, Georgina Island and Rama) and the Mississauga of the north shore of Lake Ontario (Alderville, Curve Lake, Hiawatha and Scugog Island)</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.rcaanc-cirnac.gc.ca/eng/1100100029000/1564415701529">The Williams Treaties (1923)</a>, also known as <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gtjUUTCJVQ">the Williams Treaty</a> (named after <a href="https://grasac.artsci.utoronto.ca/?p=2169#">Angus S. Williams</a>, the provincial negotiator) pertained to over 20,000 square kilometers of land in exchange for a one-time cash payment of $25 per person. </p>
<p>Since then, the signatories have shared how they were forced to <a href="https://www.rcaanc-cirnac.gc.ca/eng/1542370282768/1542370308434">sign the treaties, without lawyers, during one-day negotiations, and never were told about the loss of hunting and fishing rights</a>. </p>
<p>Oral histories from treaty educator <a href="https://anishinabeknews.ca/2018/11/21/williams-treaty-settlement-looks-huge-in-headlines/">Maurice Switzer,</a> and former Alderville chief and community historian <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bl9nRtPslM4&t=1s">Dave Mowat</a> now consider the Williams Treaties as <a href="http://education.historicacanada.ca/files/104/Treaties_Printable_Pages.pdf">being among</a> the worst treaties in Canadian history.</p>
<p>A 2018 <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/williams-treaty-reconciliation-1.4910558">agreement between the Williams Treaties First Nations and the governments of Ontario and Canada</a> settled <a href="https://www.ubcpress.ca/lament-for-a-first-nation">litigation about land claims and harvesting rights</a> in the region. But the seven First Nations continue to grapple with the legacy of empty promises and ongoing questions.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/560565/original/file-20231120-28-p42dv2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A map with varied colour zones showing a roughly pacman-shaped periwinkle area representing Williams Treaties territory surrounded by blue areas to the left and bottom." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/560565/original/file-20231120-28-p42dv2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/560565/original/file-20231120-28-p42dv2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=523&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/560565/original/file-20231120-28-p42dv2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=523&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/560565/original/file-20231120-28-p42dv2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=523&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/560565/original/file-20231120-28-p42dv2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=657&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/560565/original/file-20231120-28-p42dv2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=657&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/560565/original/file-20231120-28-p42dv2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=657&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Williams Treaties areas seen in periwinkle blue colour, extending from the left side of the map, at Georgian Bay, and from the bottom of the map, at Lake Ontario. Detail from ‘First Nations and Treaties’ Ontario government map.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://files.ontario.ca/iao_community_wall_map_en_2019-08.pdf">(Government of Ontario)</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Includes some Greenbelt lands</h2>
<p>The Williams Treaties cover <a href="https://www.rcaanc-cirnac.gc.ca/eng/1360941656761/1544619778887">lands between Georgian Bay and the Ottawa River, and along the shore of Lake Ontario up to Lake Simcoe</a>.</p>
<p>Earlier this year, the seven Williams Treaties First Nations again asserted that lands will continue to be protected <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/chiefs-of-ontario-greenbelt-vote-1.6949826">despite the provincial government’s plan to develop the Greenbelt,</a> which overlaps in the southern parts of the territory. </p>
<p>Chief of Alderville First Nation, Taynar Simpson, explained the cultural importance of these lands, and that development could “<a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/chiefs-of-ontario-greenbelt-vote-1.6949826">damage water systems and wetlands that supply groundwater, reduce flood risks and improve climate resilience</a>.”</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">‘In Our Words - Williams Treaty’ video from First Nations, Métis & Inuit Education Association of Ontario.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Encroaching on Indigenous lands</h2>
<p>When the Williams Treaties were signed in 1923, the impacts of colonization had already existed in Anishinaabeg territory for more than a century. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/document/ontarios-long-term-report-economy/chapter-1-demographic-trends-and-projections">wave of new settlement</a> had already encroached onto Indigenous lands in central Ontario and both the <a href="https://cfs.nrcan.gc.ca/selective-cuttings/68">forestry</a> and <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/page/history-ontario-mining-and-lands-commissioner">mining industries</a> had already started operations. </p>
<p>The punishing aspects of the <a href="http://indigenousfoundations.arts.ubc.ca/the_indian_act/">Indian Act</a>, which included the creation of new reserves, and the implementation of residential and Indian Day Schools, had already existed in this region for decades. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.ahtwp.ca/en/explore-and-play/resources/Documents/Alderville-School.pdf">Alderville Manual Training School (later Residential</a>) was first opened in 1836 and numerous other <a href="http://www.indiandayschools.org/">Indian Day Schools existed throughout all seven Williams Treaties First Nations</a>.</p>
<h2>Impacts on lands, <em>manoomin</em>, animals</h2>
<p>These restrictive policies were coupled with a complete reconstruction of Anishinaabek traditional lands and waterways. Through the building of the <a href="https://direct.mit.edu/glep/article/19/3/16/14962/En-gendering-Shoreline-Law-Nishnaabeg-Relational">Trent-Severn waterway, thousands of acres of manoomin (wild rice) were destroyed</a>. </p>
<p>Overharvesting of these regions by settlers resulted in the extirpation of key animals such as <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/page/fish-management-history">salmon and eels,</a> the extinction of the <a href="https://digitaleditions.library.dal.ca/environmentalscience/chapter/chapter-27-the-biodiversity-crisis/">passenger pigeon, and massive declines in wild turkey populations</a>.</p>
<h2>Continued practise of ways of life</h2>
<p>Under these pressures, the Anishinaabeg communities continued to practise their ways of life and challenged the treaty continually in court. </p>
<p>As Elder <a href="https://www.trentu.ca/news/story/38505">Doug Williams-Ban</a> from Curve Lake First Nation has explained: “<a href="https://www.thepeterboroughexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/williams-treaty-settlement-looks-huge-in-headlines/article_ca41e002-ac17-59fe-869d-4ccd83d45a95.html">One of our favourite tricks was to plan our fishing expeditions for Saturday nights – we knew the game wardens would be watching Hockey Night in Canada!”</a> </p>
<p>By 1994, the Supreme Court in <a href="https://scc-csc.lexum.com/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/item/1138/index.do">R. v. Howard</a> ruled that a Hiawatha First Nation man could be charged for fishing out of season as his harvesting rights had been “extinguished” in the 1923 treaty.</p>
<h2>Williams Treaties Settlement, 2018</h2>
<p>In 2018, the Williams Treaties First Nations and the governments of Ontario and Canada came to a final agreement, settling litigation about land claims and harvesting rights in the region. </p>
<p>The 2018 agreement saw governments of Ontario and Canada <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/williams-treaty-reconciliation-1.4910558">apologize and</a> say: <a href="https://anishinabeknews.ca/2018/11/21/williams-treaty-settlement-looks-huge-in-headlines/">“We are sorry … continued injustices provided insufficient compensation and inadequate reserve lands … and failed to recognize and protect your treaty rights</a>.”</p>
<p>The collective Williams Treaties First Nations approved a <a href="https://www.rcaanc-cirnac.gc.ca/eng/1542370282768/1542370308434">proposed $1.1 billion settlement</a>. The settlement amounted to approximately <a href="https://anishinabeknews.ca/2018/11/21/williams-treaty-settlement-looks-huge-in-headlines/">$85 per acre for land surrendered under the Williams Treaties of 1923</a>. The value of the land during the settlement was between $10,000-15,000. </p>
<p>The agreement outlined four key areas: recognition of pre-existing treaty harvesting rights, financial compensation <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/crown-indigenous-relations-northern-affairs/news/2018/09/canada-ontario-and-williams-treaties-first-nations-reach-negotiated-settlement-agreement-for-alderville-litigation.html">($666 million from Canada and $444 million from Ontario), the opportunity to acquire additional reserve lands (plus the apology)</a>.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1063892094148857856"}"></div></p>
<h2>Family lineage of 1923</h2>
<p>Co-author Jackson Pind’s own great aunt, Ruby Marsden Hicks, was 95 years old and the oldest person from Alderville who received the settlement. </p>
<p>She said “<a href="https://anishinabeknews.ca/2018/11/21/williams-treaty-settlement-looks-huge-in-headlines/">it was a long time coming … and would have really helped Ma and Pa</a>.” </p>
<p>She remembers that her father, Moses Muskrat Marsden, was there in November 1923 when the Williams Treaties were signed in Alderville. He had said, <a href="https://anishinabeknews.ca/2018/11/21/williams-treaty-settlement-looks-huge-in-headlines/">“The Indians only wanted to know if they would still have their hunting and fishing rights</a> and when they were told they would, they signed.”</p>
<h2>Ongoing questions</h2>
<p>However, the restoration of harvesting rights has caused confusion among members of the Williams Treaties First Nations. </p>
<p>Before the settlement, a status member of the seven Williams Treaties First Nations could hunt and fish on reserve lands or within 50 feet of the “Indian Islands,” established under the islands of the [Trent Treaty of 1856 (Treaty #78)].
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luC8j5qWJlU&t=15s&pp=ygUUZG91ZyB3aWxsaWFtcyB0cmVhdHk%3D">For the Anishinaabek who occupied the north shore of Lake Ontario</a>, that included thousands <a href="https://ojs.library.carleton.ca/index.php/ALGQP/article/view/1115">of islands in all the rivers and tributaries</a> that flowed into Lake Ontario. </p>
<p>The settlement’s terms, <a href="https://georginaisland.com/williams-treaty-first-nation-harvesting-rights/">aimed at protecting fish during spawning season, restrict harvesting in these sanctuaries</a>. These sanctuaries are significant historical gathering spots for ceremonial, practical and political activities. </p>
<p>The agreement doesn’t extend harvesting rights beyond pre-existing treaty areas. First Nations harvesting is <a href="https://vitacollections.ca/kl-digitalarchive/3730175/image/4599929">limited to areas up to Silent Lake Provincial Park (Treaty 20)</a>.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Chippewas of Rama First Nation video, Williams Treaties Settlement Agreement Signing Ceremony, Nov. 17, 2018.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Nations incurring tax expenses</h2>
<p>The financial compensation was divided equally among the seven Williams Treaties First Nations, with a portion distributed to members and the rest retained for infrastructure development or land acquisition. </p>
<p>To add new lands, First Nations must navigate the lengthy <a href="https://www.sac-isc.gc.ca/eng/1465827292799/1611938828195">“Additions to Reserve” (ATR) process</a>, which can take up to 25 years. </p>
<p>The settlement allows for the addition of 11,000 acres to each First Nation’s reserve, but they must first purchase these lands and then undergo a sped-up, five-year ATR process. During this time, the First Nations incur tax expenses on these large land parcels. They indirectly return funds to the governments responsible for treaty malpractice.</p>
<h2>Grappling with legacies</h2>
<p>These communities continue to call on the provincial government to adequately consult <a href="https://tworowtimes.com/news/national/chiefs-of-ontario-demand-return-of-all-removed-greenbelt-land-parcels/">Williams Treaties First Nations when making important decisions on their lands</a>, in the Greenbelt and beyond.</p>
<p>Reflecting on this treaty history, one can imagine that if our great-grandparents truly understood the full implications of their 1923 agreements, they might have chosen to reject the documents that have continually dispossessed their great grandchildren from their ancestral lands.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217764/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jackson Pind receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jack Hoggarth has previously received funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. He is affiliated with Curve Lake First Nation and Kawartha Nishnawbe First Nation.</span></em></p>Seven Williams Treaties First Nations continue to call on the provincial government to adequately consult them when making important decisions on their lands in the Greenbelt and beyond.Jackson Pind, Assistant Professor, Indigenous Methodologies, Chanie Wenjack School of Indigenous Studies, Trent UniversityJack Hoggarth, Chair, Anishinaabeg Knowledge and Assistant Professor at Chanie Wenjack School for Indigenous Studies, Trent UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2173542023-11-22T20:54:00Z2023-11-22T20:54:00ZAre small nuclear reactors the solution to Canada’s net-zero ambitions?<iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/are-small-nuclear-reactors-the-solution-to-canadas-net-zero-ambitions" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>As Canada grapples with the imperative to meet its net-zero carbon emission targets, a new player has emerged on the energy scene: <a href="https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/what-are-small-modular-reactors-smrs">Small Modular Reactors</a> (SMRs). These compact reactors present a modern twist on traditional nuclear technology, which has <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360544211003653">languished without significant new developments for three decades</a>. </p>
<p>By promising faster construction, lower costs and enhanced safety, SMRs are not just another alternative energy source. They represent a <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-11-14/us-uk-to-push-pledge-to-triple-nuclear-power-by-2050-at-cop28#xj4y7vzkg">potential game-changer in our energy landscape</a>.</p>
<p>But is this the solution Canada has been waiting for <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/services/environment/weather/climatechange/climate-plan/net-zero-emissions-2050.html">in our quest for net-zero</a>?</p>
<p>In my academic career exploring the energy transition — from researching <a href="https://news.usask.ca/articles/research/2022/city-usask-projects-target-m%C3%A9tis-history,-clean-runoff,-green-rental-housing.php">energy efficiency in low-income households </a> to fostering <a href="https://policyoptions.irpp.org/magazines/september-2023/scale-up-renewable-energy-co-operatives-to-energize-the-nation/">renewable energy co-operatives</a> and <a href="https://scholar.google.ca/citations?view_op=view_citation&hl=en&user=dYV4k9gAAAAJ&citation_for_view=dYV4k9gAAAAJ:u-x6o8ySG0sC">decentralized energy systems</a> — the most common hurdle I have observied is achieving the right scale and speed of deployment. </p>
<p>SMRs offer an intriguing proposition, potentially overcoming deployability challenges due to their uniquely <a href="https://www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/application/pdf/2021-03/7560_smr_report.pdf">scalable and flexible implementation</a>. But as with any emerging technology, their promise comes with uncertainties.</p>
<h2>What are small modular reactors?</h2>
<p>SMRs offer a compact alternative to nuclear power, with outputs much smaller than traditional reactors, usually in the range of <a href="https://small-modular-reactors.org/smr-environmental-impact/">10 to a few hundred megawatts</a> — enough to indefinitely power approximately 10,000 to 300,000 homes. This smaller scale and modularity allows for more flexible site placement and <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666032620300259#abs0010">potentially faster, more cost-effective construction</a>.</p>
<p>Unlike large-scale renewables, SMRs provide a less visually intrusive and space-consuming option, making them suitable for diverse locations, including <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364032121009138?casa_token=__wKJ8X9D0wAAAAA:WArV8jcyT5GdC0rDWVN0jQaYbg5OYx3vaeAlfajpuheqshVqDda2mL4KQF15yofcDnvv9go">remote areas</a>. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">A brief overview of Small Modular Reactor technology produced by Undecided with Matt Ferrell.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The overall life-cycle emissions of SMRs are significantly lower than those of fossil fuels, and comparable to other low-carbon energy sources like wind and solar power.</p>
<h2>Emerging technology concerns</h2>
<p>The primary concerns with SMRs are their largely untested nature on a commercial scale and the <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364032121011473">speculative nature of their economic projections</a>. The actual costs of building, operating and maintaining these reactors <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364032119307270">could differ significantly</a> from initial estimates. For instance, the recently approved <a href="https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/02/08/1067992/smaller-nuclear-reactors/">Oregon-based NuScale</a> cancelled their project, <a href="https://www.science.org/content/article/deal-build-pint-size-nuclear-reactors-canceled">citing concerns related to its escalating costs</a>. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/small-nuclear-power-reactors-future-or-folly-81252">Small nuclear power reactors: Future or folly?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Regulatory hurdles also present a challenge, <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360544220312445">necessitating the development of new regulations and standards</a>, which can be a time-consuming and complex process.</p>
<p>Canada’s approach to managing waste from SMRs echoes its <a href="https://natural-resources.canada.ca/our-natural-resources/energy-sources-distribution/nuclear-energy-uranium/radioactive-waste/canadas-policy-for-radioactive-waste-management-and-decommissioning/24987">policy for conventional nuclear plants</a>, addressing a key concern in the nuclear debate. </p>
<p>The strategy, shaped by the Nuclear Waste Management Organization, integrates <a href="https://www.nwmo.ca/Canadas-plan">community input and focuses on sustainable, long-term disposal solutions</a>. This reflects Canada’s proactive stance on responsible and environmentally conscious nuclear waste management.</p>
<p>For SMRs to succeed in Canada, it’s essential to establish a supportive regulatory environment, ensure financial viability and leverage existing nuclear expertise while focusing on safety and environmental sustainability.</p>
<h2>Economic and environmental potential</h2>
<p>Economically, SMRs present a promising avenue for growth. A <a href="https://www.conferenceboard.ca/product/a-new-power-economic-impacts-of-small-modular-nuclear-reactors-in-electricity-grids/">recent report</a> from the Conference Board of Canada projects that building and operating a fleet of four SMRs could contribute approximately $15.3 billion to Canada’s GDP, with a notable $13.7 billion impact on Ontario’s economy. </p>
<p>According to the Conference Board, this initiative is also expected to sustain 2,000 jobs annually over the next 65 years, marking a significant stride in job creation. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/nuclear-power-why-molten-salt-reactors-are-problematic-and-canada-investing-in-them-is-a-waste-167019">Nuclear power: Why molten salt reactors are problematic and Canada investing in them is a waste</a>
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<p>Environmentally, SMRs stand out for their potential in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.150297%22%22">reducing greenhouse gas emissions</a>, particularly in the heavy industrial sector. <a href="https://cna.ca/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/GHG-Study-Slide-Deck.pdf#:%7E:text=Beyond%20their%20value%20in%20cutting%20GHG%20emissions%20in,to%20%245%20billion%20to%20GDP%20annually%20by%202050.#:%7E:text=Beyond%20their%20value%20in%20cutting,to%20GDP%20annually%20by%202050">Projections suggest</a> that by 2050, SMRs could reduce these emissions by 18 per cent, signifying a considerable step towards Canada’s net-zero goals.</p>
<p>SMRs, alongside renewable energy sources like solar and wind, as well as advancements in energy efficiency, are crucial components to reduce emissions at the scale necessary to reach our national targets.</p>
<h2>The current state</h2>
<p>The journey towards SMR development is marked by strategic initiatives and significant investment. </p>
<p>The Canadian government’s <a href="https://natural-resources.canada.ca/our-natural-resources/energy-sources-distribution/nuclear-energy-uranium/enabling-small-modular-reactors-program/24959">Enabling Small Modular Reactors Program</a> underscores this commitment with its funding pool of $29.6 million over the next four years. </p>
<p><a href="https://cib-bic.ca/en/projects/clean-power/darlington-small-modular-reactor/">Financing provided by the Canada Infrastructure Bank</a> for the Darlington SMR project in Clarington, Ont. further positions Canada at the forefront of commercial SMR deployment. Meanwhile, Ontario has <a href="https://news.ontario.ca/en/release/1003248/ontario-building-more-small-modular-reactors-to-power-provinces-growth">received approval</a> for the development of the first SMR in Canada, the <a href="https://nuclear.gepower.com/bwrx-300">GE BWRX-300</a>, by 2028.</p>
<p>At this crossroads, SMRs represent more than an innovative clean energy solution; they offer a chance for Canada to assert global leadership in a <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/B9780128239162000229">rapidly evolving energy landscape</a>. </p>
<p>As the world races to mitigate climate change and energy security, Canada has the opportunity to pioneer a technology that could make significant strides to advance the energy transition.</p>
<h2>A collaborative approach</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/conservative-premiers-meeting-trudeau-carbon-tax-1.7025799">Amid tensions</a> surrounding Canada’s carbon tax, SMRs are emerging as a point of <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/11926422.2022.2116063">collaborative progress</a>. </p>
<p>The Canadian federal government has shown substantial support for SMRs. The <a href="https://smractionplan.ca/">SMR Action Plan</a> was launched in December 2020 with <a href="https://smractionplan.ca/#inline_content">significant progress</a> across sectors: from utilities, municipalities, provincial governments, vendors and universities to Indigenous organizations. </p>
<p>Together, Ontario, Saskatchewan, New Brunswick, and Alberta have made a joint strategic plan for SMRs and an inter-provincial <a href="https://publications.saskatchewan.ca/api/v1/products/117374/formats/134796/download">Memorandum of Understanding</a>. These commitments — and more — show strong collaboration.</p>
<p>As Canada ventures into developing SMRs, we find ourselves at a pivotal juncture — a now-or-never moment in our energy transition. This exploration isn’t merely about embracing a new technology; it’s a crucial opportunity to assert leadership in global clean energy innovation and make tangible strides toward our net-zero targets.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217354/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Martin Boucher does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Small modular reactors may hold the key to Canada’s net-zero energy future.Martin Boucher, Faculty Lecturer, Johnson Shoyama Graduate School of Public Policy, University of SaskatchewanLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2171802023-11-22T19:09:36Z2023-11-22T19:09:36ZQueer archives preserve activist history and provide strategies to counter hate<iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/queer-archives-preserve-activist-history-and-provide-strategies-to-counter-hate" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>With <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/9542496/anti-lgbtq2-protests-rise-canada-explainer/">anti-2SLGBTQ+ protests</a> and <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/facing-calls-to-act-canadian-lawmakers-note-rising-tide-of-hate-and-violence-against-lgbtq2s-community-1.6402660">hate and violence</a> against 2SLGBTQ+ communities on the rise, it’s a tough time to be queer or trans in Canada. </p>
<p>2SLGBTQ+ people and organizations have a long history of resisting efforts to harm or erase us, and much of that history is preserved in community-based archives.</p>
<p>The Canadian Gay Liberation Movement Archives <a href="https://arquives.ca/about">was founded in 1973</a> and still exists today as <a href="https://arquives.ca">The ArQuives: Canada’s LGBTQ2+ Archives</a>. There are also a growing number of smaller 2SLGBTQ+ archives across the country. </p>
<p>Since 2020, I have been helping to <a href="https://www.thespec.com/news/hamilton-region/mcmaster-professor-and-students-build-hamilton-2slgbtq-community-archive/article_c6324960-b9d4-5725-831d-04488e702a11.html">build a 2SLGBTQ+ Community Archive in Hamilton, Ont.</a> My students and I are often amazed at just how long 2SLGBTQ+ communities have been resisting very similar kinds of backlash, hate and violence to what we’re seeing today.</p>
<p>Anyone concerned about 2SLGBTQ+ struggles today can learn from the history of resistance and activism preserved in these archives.</p>
<h2>Narratives about saving children</h2>
<p>In the 1970s, gay and lesbian groups successfully fought back against conservative U.S.-based celebrity Anita Bryant’s “<a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-news/1970s-christian-crusader-anita-bryant-helped-spawn-floridas-lgbtq-cult-rcna24215">Save Our Children</a>” campaign. Today, Bryant’s anti-gay sentiments are amplified by campaigns like the “1 Million March 4 Children.” </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-parental-rights-movement-gave-rise-to-the-1-million-march-4-children-213842">How the 'parental rights' movement gave rise to the 1 Million March 4 Children</a>
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<p>But we can learn from the successful tactics of 2SLGBTQ+ organizers who fought against those campaigns. By building alliances with labour groups, progressive churches and more, these activists held successful counter demonstrations across Canada, from Toronto to Winnipeg to Edmonton to places as small as <a href="https://www.figure1publishing.com/book/out-north/">Moose Jaw, Sask.</a></p>
<p>More than a decade after these events, organizations like the Hamilton United Gay Societies (HUGS) and the Gay and Lesbian Association of McMaster refused to forget the hate-filled vitriol of Bryant’s campaign. They exposed her tactics in their monthly newsletter and reminded readers about the power of the counter-demonstrations that took place.</p>
<h2>Lack of BIPOC and trans representation</h2>
<p>My students and I noticed right away that the gay and lesbian people and histories documented in 2SLGBTQ+ archives were mostly white. There is very little representation of <a href="https://read.dukeupress.edu/tsq/article-abstract/4/2/170/84689/All-Power-to-All-People-Black-LGBTTI2QQ-Activism?redirectedFrom=fulltext">Black, Indigenous or other racialized groups</a>, and also very little representation of <a href="https://archivaria.ca/index.php/archivaria/article/view/13729">trans lives and histories</a>.</p>
<p>Many 2SLGBTQ+ archives are now working to <a href="https://arquives.ca/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Historical-Inequities-Statement.pdf">remedy these gaps</a> in their collections by actively seeking to collect materials from racialized queer and trans community members.</p>
<p>From these gaps we can learn about the <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatoon/people-of-colour-say-racism-exclusion-fetishization-rampant-in-lgbtq-communities-1.6471430">ongoing effects of racism and transphobia within 2SLGBTQ+ communities</a>. While building the Hamilton 2SLGBTQ+ Community Archives, we began with a series of <a href="https://buildingthearchive.hamont.org/critical-engagements-2021/">critical conversations</a> intended to get us thinking about how to move beyond centering whiteness in our collections. We learned about how essential it is to have the diversity of 2SLGBTQ+ communities represented from the outset.</p>
<p>Today, there are also stand-alone archives in Canada for <a href="https://archives.uwinnipeg.ca/our-collections/two-spirit-archives.html">two-spirit</a> and <a href="https://www.uvic.ca/transgenderarchives/index.php">trans</a> communities, while projects like <a href="https://marvellousgrounds.com">Marvellous Grounds</a> in Toronto produce alternative archives of racialized queer and trans people. </p>
<p>The long history of struggle to address racism within 2SLGBTQ+ communities prompts us to be mindful of where and how racism shows up in our present-day organizing. For example, a lot of concern has recently been expressed about the number of Muslim participants in the “1 Million March.”</p>
<p>While we do need to keep talking about the role of religious groups and leaders in these movements, we can also learn from the struggles queer Muslim groups face to address Islamophobia, racism and homo/transphobia all at once. In the ArQuives, we can learn about groups like <a href="https://arquives.ca/curriculum/min-alaq">Min-Alaq</a>, one of the first organizations for gay, lesbian and bisexual Muslims in Canada. </p>
<p>Today, <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/lgbtq-muslims-speak-out-1.6985792">queer Muslims are speaking out</a> about anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric from some Muslim organizations, and calling on all of us to prioritize the needs and well-being of queer Muslim youth. If we want to meaningfully redress those gaps in queer archives, we have to begin by learning from the organizing efforts of racialized queer and trans communities, historically and today.</p>
<h2>Resisting policing</h2>
<p>My students sometimes start out thinking their generation is the first to push back against police discrimination, harassment and violence.</p>
<p>However, these archives show us that 2SLGBTQ+ communities have been resisting unjust police practices for a long time. We can learn from the strategies and tactics of the organizing done in previous generations, if we know where to look for them.</p>
<p>For example, in the organizational records of HUGS we found one document from 1981 that lays out several concerns the community brought to the Hamilton-Wentworth Regional Police following increased police harassment of people presumed to be gay. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559438/original/file-20231114-29-dq9wl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A black-and-white photo of police officer holding back a protester" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559438/original/file-20231114-29-dq9wl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559438/original/file-20231114-29-dq9wl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=650&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559438/original/file-20231114-29-dq9wl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=650&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559438/original/file-20231114-29-dq9wl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=650&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559438/original/file-20231114-29-dq9wl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=816&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559438/original/file-20231114-29-dq9wl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=816&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559438/original/file-20231114-29-dq9wl2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=816&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">On Feb. 6, 1981, around 1,000 gay liberation demonstrators marched through downtown Toronto protesting the arrest of nearly 300 men in four city bathhouses the previous day.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/UPC/Gary Hershorn</span></span>
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<p>Community members wanted to know how decisions were made to target the gay community — and who was making these decisions. </p>
<p>They also wanted to know how to lay a complaint against a police officer for harassment or verbal abuse. </p>
<p>This approach demonstrates a clear opposition to police interaction with 2SLGBTQ+ communities. </p>
<p>It can be understood as an early precursor to later actions that have challenged police involvement with the community, <a href="https://www.noprideinpolicing.ca">including restricting their participation in Pride</a>.</p>
<h2>Keeping 2SLGBTQ+ archives alive</h2>
<p>In a 1973 pamphlet calling for donations to the Canadian Gay Liberation Movement Archives, the collective noted that building an archive is <a href="https://www.figure1publishing.com/book/out-north/">“painstaking and timeconsuming work.”</a> Now that I have a bit of first-hand experience with building an archive, I couldn’t agree more. </p>
<p>Most 2SLGBTQ+ archives survive on the labour of volunteers and on donations from members of our communities. Queer archives, according to archivist Rebecka Taves Sheffield, need at least <a href="https://litwinbooks.com/books/documenting-rebellions/">three things to survive</a>: space, money and expertise. To that list I would add that they need visitors, and not just students or academics like me, but anyone interested in learning from past social movement struggles. </p>
<p>In a time when anti-2SLGBTQ+ movements are becoming more vocal, and trying to push 2SLGBTQ+ communities out of public spaces, these archives are an essential resource for preserving histories and providing strategies for resistance.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217180/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Amber Dean does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Anyone concerned about 2SLGBTQ+ struggles today can learn from the history of resistance and activism preserved in these archives.Amber Dean, Professor, Department of English and Cultural Studies, McMaster UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.