Will the kids be alright post-COVID? Maybe, if we do the right thing

We hear a lot about how kids are resilient and “will be fine” as justification for poor support and policy.  I live in Ontario, where, as of mid-April 2021, we are well into a completely detrimental third wave of COVID – this has included the closure of in-person schools a week ago.  I am furious…

Doing differently starts with reflecting

Often at this time of year many folks reflect and consider where they are, look back on what they have ‘done’ or ‘accomplished’ (and I use that word ‘accomplished’ with wide interpretation), and consider how they might move ahead differently in the New Year. The thought of ‘reflecting-and-resolution-making’ might seem eye-stabbingly exasperating in this particular…

How can change happen ‘in relationship’?

One of the tricky things about change is how it can be perceived to happen.  Often I see folks who think that they just need to tell people what they know (and that their view is right) and then those people will just take it up (lookin’ at you, academics!). But in my experience this…

Arts and culture must be central in Canada’s COVID reality

COVID-19 has brought incredible social unrest and change, as well as personal disillusionment, and feelings of overwhelm. Many of us feel like we’re lurching from one task to the next, drowning in overwhelming inequities exposed by COVID and the realities of juggling multiple-roles and tasks simultaneously.  And with winter looming, my friends, this is why…

“I have no way of seeing the world that isn’t colonized”

“I realize that I have no way of seeing the world that isn’t colonized. It has shaped everything I am and do.” This was said by a white student in a grad seminar course about critical qualitative methodologies I co-taught in 2019 in Toronto Canada, after having read Eve Tuck and K. Wayne Yang’s seminal…

Building a foundation on sand: navigating the arbitrariness of academic life

It’s been well over a year since my last blog post (yoinks!) and for that, I apologize. Prior to my last post, I had just found out that I was not only turned down for a SSHRC postdoctoral fellowship, but my application was ranked really (really) terribly.  I reapplied last fall for the same SSHRC…

Embracing Failures: lessons from clowns

I’ve fallen in love with the clowns at my work. They’re therapeutic clowns, actually. I followed them around a few weeks ago as they made their rounds through the units  (they indulged me) and in our debrief afterwards I cried from being completely overcome by the amazingness of what they do. I tried to offer…