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Welcome to News that Nourishes, the newsletter from the Live Work Well Research Centre at the University of Guelph!
October 2020 Issue
We are excited to share our work, news, and upcoming events. We publish and distribute our newsletter four times each year, with collaboration and input from diverse families, organizations, and communities. There are many ways you can contribute, including guest posts, research spotlights, Twitter take-overs, and more. Got other ideas? Great, get in touch and let us know. We look forward to hearing from you!
1. Around the Centre
2. Research Spotlight
3. Upcoming Webinars
4. Project Updates
5. Congratulations
6. Past Events
7. Responding to COVID-19
8. Notes from the Field
9. Stay Engaged
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The interactive dragonfly activity is still open. Follow the link to send us your ideas about families, livelihoods, living environment and well-being, and your thoughts will become part of our new Centre sign.
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Around the Centre:
Introducing new staff members of the
Live Work Well Centre
We are happy to introduce you to the new addition to the Live Work Well Research Centre.
Kim Garwood
Kim joins us from the University of Guelph Library, where she has worked since 2007. As part of the Library's Learning Commons, she provided services, programs, and resources to support learners at all levels in strengthening their writing and academic skills. She has taught courses in academic and business writing at the University of G uelph and University of Waterloo. Prior to joining University of Guelph, Kim worked in communications and public affairs at the University Health Network in Toronto and in medical education research at the University of Toronto and Hospital for Sick Children. Kim completed her PhD at the University of Waterloo, and her dissertation focused on plain language. She is energized by working with others to support shared goals, and she is excited to join the Centre in her new role as Research and Knowledge Mobilization Manager. She looks forward to meeting colleagues and project partners in upcoming online meetings, though she is regularly upstaged on Zoom calls by her cats, Kermit and Mrs. Tiggy Winkles.
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Research Spotlight
New legislation greatly increases the rights of Ontario’s landlords at the expense of tenants, opening the door to mass evictions during a pandemic
Dr. Laura Pin, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Guelph, and Sabina Morris, a student at Mount Holyoke College, published an article that discussed the effect of Ontario’s Bill 184, the Protecting Tenants and Strengthening Community Housing Act on Ontario Tenants.
Bill 184 has created an opportunity for massive evictions during the pandemic, a concerning policy strategy from a public health perspective. This wave of mass evictions will disproportionately target low-income tenants experiencing intersecting vulnerabilities
The Bill allows landlords and tenants to determine their own repayment plans for late and unpaid rent. Tenants who fail to meet the deadlines of the repayment plan are subject to eviction, without a formal hearing in front of the Landlord and Tenant Board. Locking tenants into plans that they cannot afford will disproportionately affect marginalized people, including those with disabilities, who may be at high risk for COVID-19 as well as lone mothers who lack access to child care during school closures; both groups may be unable to return to work during the pandemic.
Given the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on racialized and low-income communities, it is crucial to examine Bill 184 using an intersectionality-based policy analysis (IBPA). This involves looking at the experiences of people often ignored in policy analyses that are affected by legislation.
Read the article here.
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Upcoming Webinars
Co-Creating and Mobilizing Knowledge for Change: Workshops and Live Q&A Sessions
WHEN: November 2020
TIME: November 3rd at 8:00 a.m.; November 3 at 1 p.m.; November 5th at 9 a.m.; November 5th at 3 p.m.
Deepen your knowledge of Integrated Knowledge Mobilization and Critical Community Engaged Scholarship with two webinars, and attend a live question and answer session. This session is provided as part of the Engendering Disability-Inclusive Development Project.
Recorded webinars will be provided by the Community-Engaged Scholarship Institute (CESI) of the University of Guelph. Recordings will be made available to you in October, followed by live question and answer sessions in November with Elizabeth Jackson and Lindsay Thomson from CESI.
Register for a live Q&A session (choose the time that works best for you):
Tuesday, November 3rd, 8:00 a.m. - 9:00 a.m. (ET)
Tuesday, November 3rd, at 1:00 p.m. - 2:00 p.m. (ET)
Thursday, November 5th, at 9:00 a.m. - 10:00 a.m. (ET)
Thursday, November 5th, at 3:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m. (ET) - French language session/Séance de questions-réponses en français
Disabilities and Livelihoods
WHEN: mid November 2020
TIME: TBD
The Live Work Well Research Centre will be hosting a webinar series in mid November for the Disabilities and Livelihoods project. The Disability and Livelihoods partnership will 1) examine how livelihoods interact with diverse experiences of disability in Canada and 2) begin to develop a strong, practical, and conceptual livelihoods approach to work and families research.
**Stay tuned for updates on this webinar series as well as confirmation of dates.
World Data Forum side-event on “Persons with Disabilities and COVID-19 Data Collection and Disaggregation Efforts”.
WHEN: Wednesday 21 October, 2020
TIME: 11:00 – 12:15 PM (UTC) | 7:00 – 8:15 AM (EDT)
At the upcoming virtual World Data Forum (19-21 October), the Stakeholder Group of Persons with Disabilities, the International Disability Alliance, World Blind Union and CBM Global Disability Inclusion will organise a session on persons with disabilities and COVID-19 data collection and disaggregation efforts.
The panelists include: Jose Viera, Chief Executive Officer, World Blind Union & Permanent Representative, Stakeholder Group of Persons with Disabilities; Neda Jafar, Head of Statistical Policies and Coordination Unit, UNESCWA; Anderson Gitonga, Chief Executive Officer, United Disabled Persons of Kenya; Mirjam Gasser, Head Advocacy, CBM Switzerland; Jennifer Madans, Acting Director for the National Center for Health Statistics; and Facundo Chávez Penillas, Human Rights & Disability Adviser, OHCHR as moderator.
This session will discuss the role of disability data advocacy in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, in order to:
- exchange information, share good practices, and collaborate on disability data collection, disaggregation, and analysis in the context of COVID-19; and
- strengthen engagement of persons with disabilities and their representative organizations in this realm to influence COVID19-related evidence-based policy changes to ensure no one is left behind.
Click here to register
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Project Updates
Disabilities and Livelihoods in Canada Project Website
With employment rates among people with disabilities in Canada at less than 50 percent, and a resulting reliance on government transfers, we ask: how do people with disabilities in Canada survive, let alone thrive? People with disabilities continue to respond imaginatively by finding alternatives to paid work to sustain themselves and their families.
The Disabilities and Livelihoods in Canada (DLC) project is a SSHRC-funded research project that aims to develop a framework to understand how people with disabilities survive and thrive in Canada. The DLC project includes 3 pilot projects, as well as 2 overarching circles. This partnership examines how livelihoods interact with diverse experiences of disability in Canada and uses a strong, practical, and conceptual livelihoods approach to work and families research.
We have launched a DLC website, where you’ll find more information on each of the three pilot projects, and on our evolving understanding of livelihoods. Stay tuned for events and new publications!
Engendering Disability-Inclusive Development (EDID)
The Engendering Disability-Inclusive Development (EDID) is a 7-year Partnership Grant, led by Dr. Deborah Stienstra. The project aims to better understand and improve the lives of diverse girls and women with disabilities across four countries – Canada, Haiti, Vietnam, and South Africa - as well as transnational and thematic efforts towards these ends. Specifically, through collaborative, community-engaged and participatory approaches, the EDID partnership will work towards:
- Uncovering, co-creating and mobilizing knowledge about their struggles for and progress toward disability-inclusive development, including the root causes of their persistent marginalization; and
- Engendering and enabling disability-inclusive development policies that are critical to removing these barriers and creating the conditions for inclusion and participation. Find out more on the project’s website www.edid-ghdi.ca (currently under construction)
Storied Lives: Shifting Perspectives on Poverty
This project is a partnership engaged grant between the Live Work Well Research Centre (within the Displacements, Emergence and Change Research Cluster), the Guelph & Wellington Poverty Task Force for Poverty Elimination and the Community-Engaged Scholarship Institute (CESI) that seeks to develop and share a collection of composite stories of those living in poverty in our community.
In collaboration with the Guelph-Wellington Task Force on Poverty Elimination, we will work with the students of ASCI 3000: Equity, Community and COVID-19 (Instructor: Dr. Kate Hoad-Reddick) to share what we learned in this project.
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Congratulations
We would like to recognize the accomplishments of our members:
Disability Inclusion Analysis of Lessons Learned and Best Practices of the Government of Canada’s Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic
The Live Work Well Research Centre and partnered organizations have been selected to assist Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC) in identifying best practices and lessons learned from the response to the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada. Using an intersectional disability inclusion analysis, in addition to gender-based analysis + (GBA+), which will be called an intersectional disability and gender policy analysis (iDGA), the team will analyze and evaluate policy documents and quantitative and qualitative data collected to determine best practices in the COVID-19 response.
This team, headed by Dr. Deborah Stienstra (who is also the Director of the LWWRC), along with Dr. Leah Levac, an Associate Professor, Political Science and the co-lead of the Displacement, Emergence and Change cluster at the Live Work Well Research Centre; Bonnie Brayton, National Executive Director of the DisAbled Women’s Network (DAWN) Canada; Steve Estey, who has led the Council of Canadians with Disabilities and worked at Disabled Peoples’ International, and others will develop a snapshot of people with disabilities in Canada, gather policy documents, undertake key informant interviews with relevant policy makers and community organization representatives, and host a minimum of 5 focus groups (in French and English) to identify good practices and lessons learned.
A significant proportion of the team identifies as a person with disabilities and have significant experience is disability-related research, intersectional gender-based policy analysis, human rights evaluation and monitoring, community-based research, qualitative and quantitative research skills.
Dalhousie University - Successful Grant: Accessibility Standards Canada and Dalhousie University
The Dalhousie University’s project, Interdisciplinary Study of Evacuating Persons with Disabilities from an Urban Center, has been approved for funding! This project will improve governance and practice of all phases of the evacuation process, ensuring that people with disabilities needs are met in regard to access and their functional needs. This project will examine the social, economic, and environmental risks and pressures faced by various organizations involved, including considerations from the lived experiences of persons with disabilities.
The Live Work Well Research Centre will assist in this project by sharing the research through the Centre to foster the creation of better inclusive emergency management practices as well as help communities understand the diverse needs of their community members.
Global Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Benchmarks: Standards for Organizations Around the World (GDEIB)
Thomas Sasso, Co-Lead of the Sexual and Gender Diversity cluster, has been invited by the Centre for Global Inclusion  to serve as an expert panellist to help draft the 2021 edition of the Global Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Benchmarks: Standards for Organizations Around the World (GDEIB). Thomas Sasso is one of only a few Canadians invited to serve on the international team. The panel members will conduct research and determine best practices to help organizations draft best practices to foster equity and inclusion.
Best of luck in your future endeavours, may you continue to be inspired in your research and teaching.
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Past Events
KS+: More Promise than Practice. On June 17, 2020 the Live Work Well Research Centre  held a webinar on the More Promise than Practice report. Dr. Deborah Stienstra, Dr. Leah Levac, and Susan Manning (Ph.D. candidate) published a knowledge synthesis report on the practices in intersectional impact assessments. This research had a particular focus on the experiences of Indigenous women and Two-Spirit persons, youth, and people with disabilities in resource development and extraction contexts.
Panelists discussed the effect of resource extraction companies on Indigenous communities and their members, agreeing that they often have negative effects on local communities, resulting in loss of accessibility, loss of spiritual/heritage aspects, and creating dangerous environments. Panelists also discussed the 2019 Impact Assessment Act (Bill C-69) and how its implementation has affected communities.
Read the More Promise than Practice event summary
Read the More Promise than Practice Report
Poverty and Housing from the Margins: Communities Respond to COVID-19. On June 25, 2020 the Live Work Well Research Centre held a webinar titled “From the Margins: Communities Respond to COVID-19.” Panelists captured everyone’s attention with their insightful comments about specific challenges their communities and organizations are facing due to COVID-19.
Panelists discussed how the pandemic has affected poverty and homelessness in the Guelph-Wellington and Dufferin counties as well as what resources, actions and partnerships organizations used to alleviate some of the challenges around poverty and housing. Panelists also discussed what political changes need to happen in order to address the inequalities underlying poverty and homelessness.
Read the Poverty and Housing from the Margins event summary
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Responding to COVID-19
Building Communities in Times of Pandemic
We launched a section on our website called “Covid-19 Resources: Building Communities in Times of Pandemic.” Here, we amplify the work, research and partnerships that address the emergent issues we are facing, including various perspectives on the pandemic and calls for action.
We know that many of you are deeply engaged in areas that can shed light on how diverse communities respond to the current crisis. We believe that sharing this knowledge among our members will allow us to continue building strong community ties and foster hope.
If you have resources to share or are looking for specific resources within the scope of our work, please contact Kim Garwood at liveworkwell@uoguelph.ca, Research and Knowledge Mobilization Manager of the Live Work Well Research Centre.
We are looking forward to learning with you.
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Notes from the Field
With the Covid-19 pandemic, we are learning to deal with more responsibilities and uncertainties.
We do our best to survive, and perhaps even thrive, given the different parts of our lives: work, family, food, wellbeing, and more. In this blog, we explore what it means to live and work well from various angles and from different perspectives including community members, students, faculty, and staff.
By keeping up with our Centre’s blog, you will read fascinating interviews with community organizations, people with lived experiences, and researchers around the globe; uncover new ways to think about and practice living and working well; and learn about the work being done at the Live Work Well Research Centre. This blog is a dynamic space where stories, resources and knowledge can be shared and created.
Visit the blog here.
Your stories, musings and learning are welcome! Email us at liveworkwell@uoguelph.ca and share your idea.
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Stay Engaged
Become a member!
It's free and all researchers, students and community members are welcome. We also encourage and welcome organizations that are interested in or already doing work in responding to the changing needs of families, livelihoods and living environments. Become a member and participate, collaborate and contribute to knowledge sharing, research and teaching in many areas.
Twitter Take-over!
If you are a researcher, student or community member, and you are interested in communicating to diverse individuals about a topic or issue related to families, work and well-being, share your voice and experience through our social media. Contact us and we would be happy to chat with you about it!
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