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Dawn Lavell Harvard, 2003 Foundation Scholar, contributed to a report which was recently published by Journalists for Human Rights (JHR): Emerging Voices: A Dual Examination into Access to Post-Secondary Education for Indigenous Youth in Ontario.

The report examines the pathways of opportunity and the barriers facing Indigenous students interested in studying journalism or media at a post-secondary level, and what journalism and media programs are doing to develop and implement curriculum on coverage of Indigenous stories (as was recommended in Call to Action #86 of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada).

Read the report here.

Our congratulations to Dawn Lavell Harvard for also receiving the 2018 Spirit of Barbra Schlifer Award, in recognition of her struggle against the violence experienced by Indigenous women.

In the opinion piece "Complicit scholarship", published on the digital forum The Immanent Frame, Professor Ayesha S. Chaudhry, 2018 Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation Fellow, tackles head-on social inequalities and the issue of diversity in the discipline of religious studies. Denouncing the supremacy of men and whites among researchers in this field, she identifies a series of questions that must be considered by any movement toward structural change.
Read the article here.

2012 Scholar Nathan Andrews, now Assistant Professor in Global and International Studies at the University of Northern British Columbia, has just published a book at Palgrave Macmillan entitled Gold Mining and the Discourses of Corporate Social Responsibility in Ghana.
This book offers a critical examination of the practice and meanings of corporate social responsibility by drawing on extensive fieldwork material collected in Ghanaian communities located around mining project sites.
More details on this publication are available here.

2018 Scholar Phoebe Stephens co-authored with Jennifer Clapp a chapter titled "Researching the Global Environmental Politics of Food" in the book A Research Agenda for Global Environmental Politics, released in the fall of 2018.

An overview of this book is available here.

The research findings of 2014 Scholar Melanie Doucet, as part of her doctoral project which she completed in 2018, are now publicly available in a policy & practice-oriented report entitled “Relationships Matter for Youth 'Aging Out' of Care”.
The latter is a photovoice project that Melanie undertook in collaboration with eight former youth in care from the Greater Vancouver area. The report features 12 relationship-related themes emerging from images captured by youth and outlines 34 concrete recommendations for improvements in child welfare policies and practices.
The full report as well as an executive summary are available here.

Vathsala Illesinghe, 2017 Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation Scholar, recently co-published, with a team of researchers, an article in Conflict and Health about healthcare needs and health service utilization by Syrian refugee women in Toronto.
The article is available here.

Cecilia Benoit, 2018 Foundation Fellow and sociologist at the University of Victoria, recently co-published in Archives of Sexual Behavior, an article on the question of prostitution.
“The Prostitution Problem”: Claims, Evidence, and Policy Outcomes

With the challenges posed by climate change and the often modest commitments of states in this regard, it is not always easy to remain hopeful about the future of the planet. Through her public engagement, 2018 scholar Grace Nosek reminds us that we ought not merely wait for hope and action to emerge only from governments and major world meetings on the subject.
In a recent opinion piece published by CBC, Grace argues that one way of finding hope is making climate action feel local and grounded in community. “Hope is contagious”, Grace underlines, “and by working together in our local communities, we can all play a role in inspiring more action to help turn the tide in the climate fight”.
You may also discover Grace's engaging ideas on tackling climate change by listening to a recent episode of CBC's Degrees of Change podcast. Together with David Suzuki and Simon Donner, she discusses solutions and changes in response to climate change.
Grace has also created her own podcast, Planet Potluck, which combines personal storytelling and interviews to explore stories of hope, joy, and community in the climate movement.

Congratulations Grace for these contributions to citizens’ reflection and action on climate change!

On September 6th and 7th, 2018, the University of Helsinki hosted a conference entitled Women of the Arctic: Bridging Policy, Research and Lived Experience, an event co-hosted by Tahnee Prior, 2015 Foundation Scholar, in parallel with the 2018 UArctic Congress.

Bringing together women living or working in the Arctic, including decision makers, activists and artists, the conference explored the challenges and successes women face in the Arctic. In a context where numerous discussion forums about the Arctic are taking place each year, this was a rare opportunity to focus specifically on women's perspectives on the region and their roles and contributions to different challenges and various aspects of life in the Arctic.

The conference focused on three major topics: northern women in leadership roles; women in Arctic science and exploration; and the role of arts in healing from systemic and gender-based violence in northern communities.

Tahnee has published a report, along with co-authors Malgorzata Smieszek and Olivia Matthews, about this event in Arctic Yearbook 2018.

In large Canadian cities, Indigenous homelessness represents a particularly high proportion of the total homeless population, ranging from 20% to 50% (Canadian Observatory on Homelessness). The work of Jesse Thistle, a 2016 Pierre Elliott Trudeau Scholar, is helping to address this growing social problem by exploring the effects of intergenerational trauma experienced by the Métis.
In its 2018 fall edition, The York University Magazine chronicles the work and personal journey of Jesse, a Métis and Cree doctoral student who lived on the streets for several years before using his talent and resourcefulness to climb the academic ladder.
Having worked on developing a more holistic definition of Indigenous homelessness, he explains in this article that homelessness is a much more complex problem than simply not having a roof over your head: “Indigenous homelessness, from an Indigenous perspective, implies a disconnection from all things: your land, your culture, your identity, your traditions, stories, customs and language.”
To learn more about Jesse Thistle and his work, read the article in The York University Magazine.