Category: The Conversation – Canada

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Nadia Hasan, Assistant Professor, School of Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies, York University, Canada

In April 2024, a video circulated online showing an Oakville, Ont. high school teacher and a student having an alarming and contentious conversation about his keffiyeh.

The Iroquois Ridge High School educator says mid-way in the clip: “I didn’t call you a terrorist. I said it (the keffiyeh) reminds me of …” When the student pushes her to finish her sentence and suggests “Hamas?” she answers “yes.”

The Halton District School Board (HDSB) quickly placed the staff member on leave and launched an investigation, deeming her language “harmful and discriminatory.”

This incident, a clear example of Islamophobia and anti-Palestinian racism, is one of many detailed in our recently released Islamophobia Research Hub report, Documenting the “Palestine Exception”: An Overview of Trends in Islamophobia, Anti-Palestinian and Anti-Arab Racism in Canada in the Aftermath of October 7, 2023.

Our findings point to a pattern of unethical use of institutional power to intimidate and alienate those expressing support for Palestine or their identities — what many community organizers in Canada now call “the Palestine exception.”

What is the Palestine exception?

The expression describes how democratic freedoms and multicultural ideals historically meet their limits when it comes to Palestinian human rights, history and identity. Studies in Canada and the United States show systemic silencing and erasure of Palestinian experiences — often through unfounded accusations of antisemitism.

Race scholars have long argued that Canadian multiculturalism practises inclusion through exclusion, demanding that racialized people suppress parts of their identity to gain conditional belonging in order to uphold a normative racial order.

For Palestinians in Canada, this often means hiding their heritage for fear of stigmatization, or facing punishment for expressing pro-Palestinian views.

As Nihad Jasser of the Association of Palestinian Arab Canadians, an Ottawa-based community collective, said:

“It feels that institutions in our society will support all human rights except Palestinian human rights, celebrate all cultures except Palestinian culture, and condemn all forms of racism except anti-Palestinian racism.”

Unfair targeting, censorship and discipline of those speaking out for Palestinian rights — or merely perceived as Palestinian, Arab or Muslim — is a common theme in our report and particularly disturbing in terms of young people’s experiences.

A pattern of targeting young people

According to our research, young people in schools, universities and early careers are facing Islamophobia, anti-Palestinian racism and anti-Arab racism in the form of employment discrimination, doxing, hate-motivated violence, bullying and the suppression of their democratic rights.

The HDSB keffiyeh incident reflects a wider reality: a treatment of suspicion toward Palestinian expressions.

Another example that drew attention was a Toronto District School Board (TDSB) field trip to the Indigenous-led Grassy Narrows River Run in September 2024. During the march, some participants used chants connecting settler colonialism in Canada to the experiences of Palestinians.

This led to social media backlash from parents who claimed the trip exposed students to pro-Palestinian political activity and compromised safety. The Ontario education minister’s office demanded an investigation — an unusual move that many felt revealed a double standard compared to other incidents.

The TDSB issued an apology for the “harm” caused and pre-emptively cancelled another planned field trip for National Day for Truth and Reconciliation — ironically undermining commitments to decolonization.

Patrick Case, a former Ontario Ministry of Education chief equity officer, conducted an independent review, interviewing 146 parents, students, Indigenous leaders, staff and trustees. His report found that the Grassy Narrows event was not overshadowed by pro-Palestinian activism and that the TDSB’s reaction reflected a broader pattern of erasure and suspicion toward Palestinian identity.

Indigenous leaders also noted that media outrage diverted attention from pressing issues of environmental justice in Indigenous communities.

Despite these findings, the education ministry has not promoted the report and has rejected some of its key recommendations.

Punishment over pedagogy

Our report raises concerns about a growing political culture that punishes rather than engages young people advocating for Palestinian human rights. Instead of fostering critical thinking, institutions are choosing repression.

Another striking example is the treatment of students at the Lincoln Alexander School of Law at Toronto Metropolitan University, who were accused of antisemitism for signing an open letter in solidarity with Palestinian people and critical of Israeli state actions. Several law firms and the Ontario Ministry of the Attorney General blacklisted them from recruitment as punishment for signing the open letter.

In an external review, Justice J. Michael MacDonald condemned this response as a “rush to judgment” that unfairly targeted “young idealists motivated by immense human suffering.” He ruled that the students’ actions were a “valid exercise of freedom of speech” and criticized the administration for negatively impacting the students.

He also criticized members of the legal community for fuelling the backlash against these students. Some of these students are now suing Toronto Metropolitan University for defamation.

Many young people have shown resilience in the face of such repression, but the harm is undeniable. Being punished for expressing solidarity with Palestinians — and witnessing peers being punished — affects young people’s sense of safety, intellectual curiosity and career prospects.

Protecting Canadian multiculturalism

Two years into the brutal genocide in Gaza, there is a notable shift in public discourse and policy related to Palestine. Yet many remain deeply skeptical of the sincerity of this shift.

Earlier this fall, the federal Liberal government introduced the Combating Hate Act, proposing amendments to the Criminal Code.

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Critics warn these changes could further curtail civil liberties, particularly around expressions of Palestinian identity and solidarity.

The amendments would ban the public display of “hate symbols” and criminalize protests near places of worship, schools and community centres. The government defines hate symbols as those associated with terrorist entities such as the Nazi swastika and SS (Schutzstaffel) bolts. And so, understandably, questions abound about whether this means that Palestinian flags or the script of the shahada (Muslim declaration of faith) could be deemed hate symbols.

Given recent institutional responses to pro-Palestinian expression, there is little confidence these sorts of laws will not be weaponized to criminalize Palestinian identity, dissent and criticism of the Israeli state.

In large part, this pervasive suspicion stems from the widespread experience of Palestinian identity and pro-Palestinian positions being treated as inherently suspect, even dangerous. Such exceptional treatment exposes the profound fissures — and in fact the limits — of Canadian multiculturalism and its professed commitments to democratic freedoms.

Nadia Hasan receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, Canadian Heritage, The Muslim Fund, the Bay Tree Foundation and The Olive Tree Foundation.

Sarah Abou-Bakr 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.

– ref. Anti-Palestinian and anti-Arab racism is on the rise in Canada – https://theconversation.com/anti-palestinian-and-anti-arab-racism-is-on-the-rise-in-canada-266637

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Emilda Thavaratnam, PhD student, Leadership and Higher Education, University of Toronto

The establishment of Ontario’s colleges of applied arts and technology 60 years ago marked a pivotal moment in the province’s educational history. The founding vision was based on principles of accessibility and community, as colleges were designed to strengthen Ontario’s growing social and economic fabric.

Today, this promise is unravelling. Students now face limited program choices with the cancellation or suspension of 600 programs over the past year, rising fees and mounting debt, while faculty and staff contend with precarious contracts and widespread layoffs.

As students settle into fall semesters, it’s essential to reflect on the history of Ontario’s colleges in order to envision a future that safeguards the public mission on which these institutions were founded.

Founding vision

Ontario redefined post-secondary education in 1965 by creating a new college system under the leadership of William G. Davis, then the province’s education minister, later its premier. This marked a turning point in Ontario’s educational history and the birth of the college system.

In response to the province’s rapid demographic and economic shifts, Davis proposed a model of affordable, accessible vocational education aimed at preparing students for the workforce.

The foundational principles emphasized that college programs should be “occupation-oriented” and “designed to meet the needs of the local community”;
Additionally, the plans highlighted there should be a “close relationship between any college program and the long-term economic development plans for a particular region” to respond to immediate labour market demands and broader societal needs, including arts, health, science and technical fields.

This approach ensured that the founding vision was connected to regional development, allowing colleges to address Ontario’s diverse social, economic and cultural needs across multiple sectors.

In a 1967 Department of Education publication, Davis cited an earlier 1964 report that named the unique role that colleges would play:

“In the present crisis .. we must turn our attention to the post-secondary level, where we must create a new kind of institution that will provide, in the interests of students for whom a university course is unsuitable, a type of training which universities are not designed to offer.”

This mandate gave colleges their distinctive purpose of filling gaps that universities were never meant to address.

Economic and social development

There are now 24 colleges with campuses in 200 communities throughout Ontario. This college system plays a vital role in the province’s education and economy.

Davis’s legacy is evident in the generations of students who have attended these institutions. Since 2018, an average of 140,000 people have graduated annually from Ontario’s colleges.

It is reported that an average of 83 per cent of Ontario college graduates are employed within six months of graduation. These outcomes highlight the pivotal role that colleges play in contributing to Ontario’s economic and social development.

Shifts in funding

The financial foundation of Ontario colleges has shifted dramatically over the past six decades. When colleges were first established most operating expenses were financed by the province, with tuition contributing to a lesser extent.

By the late 1980s, however, per-student funding had already fallen by roughly one-third. The trend accelerated in 1995 when $120 million was cut. Rather than raising tuition directly, colleges responded by introducing ancillary fees, expanding international student enrolment, postponing capital projects and turning to private funding.

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From the 1990s onward, tuition increasingly replaced public investment as the financial backbone of the college system. Data from the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario illustrates that between 1992 and 2008, total college revenue rose from $972 million to $1.6 billion, but this growth was driven primarily by student fees. Tuition revenue more than tripled during this period, while government funding shrank as a proportion of overall revenue.

This reliance on student-paid fees deepened in the following decade. Between 2010-11 and 2022-23, provincial grants per student operating revenue (adjusted for inflation) declined by 29 per cent, while tuition revenue once again tripled.

By 2022-23, Ontario colleges received approximately $11,081 per full-time-equivalent student, compared to the national average of $19,292. This figure is just 56 per cent of the Canadian average across provinces.

A 2023 provincial report, Ensuring Financial Sustainability for Ontario’s Post-Secondary Sector, confirms the crisis surrounding underfunding.

What does this mean for students?

These funding changes have reshaped the classroom experience. For students, this means higher tuition and shifted program priorities that limit access and opportunity.

For the public, it’s the loss of an original promise of accessible vocational education. Rising tuition fees have created barriers to access, especially for low-income, first-generation Canadian students.

At the same time, the Ontario government has framed college funding heavily around immediate provincial and national economic pressures, for example in trades and construction, as well as STEM and health care.

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While public funding of colleges has been eroded, the Ontario Public Service Employees Union reports that Ontario has also spent significant funds cultivating “non-college training providers and projects” through a Skills Development Fund.

It also notes that while public colleges are required to disclose a great deal about their funding and outcomes:

“… very little is known about the funding levels, training quality or employment outcomes of SDF-funded projects. Instead, the province relies on campaign-style funding announcements, often showcasing private companies receiving multi-million dollar training grants.”

Move away from founding vision

Davis’s founding vision was rooted in regional development. Programs were designed to serve the long-term needs of communities, including the arts, local culture and community services. The goal was to strengthen entire regions and broaden opportunities through a balanced system that reflected both economic and social priorities.

This shift reflects the broader marketization of higher education. Education is valued less for cultivating critical thinking, civic participation and community life and more for producing workers to meet short-term market needs.

For students, this means diminishing autonomy as their choices are increasingly shaped by labour market pressures rather than broader civic needs and personal vocational interests. These funding trends raise concerns about the fate of a broader range of programs that sustain the social fabric of communities.

Ongoing college support staff strike

Finally, these policy shifts ignore the immediate impact on students, faculty and staff. The ongoing support staff strike at Ontario colleges is one expression of these pressures, and its complexity deserves discussion beyond the scope of this piece.

The question remains: where is our government in all this, and what will be done to save our colleges?

Today, Davis’s legacy is being dismantled by chronic underfunding. The future of our colleges depends on renewal. We must reclaim these values and call on our federal and provincial leaders to support a truly public system of higher education that serves the communities it was created to serve.

Emilda Thavaratnam 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.

– ref. Ontario’s colleges were founded to serve local and regional needs — have we forgotten that? – https://theconversation.com/ontarios-colleges-were-founded-to-serve-local-and-regional-needs-have-we-forgotten-that-262760

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Charlotte Nau, PhD Candidate in Media Studies, Western University

Law enforcement agencies across Canada are sounding the alarm over a rise in sexual extortion (“sextortion”) against young people.

The problem goes far beyond sextortion, as this is only one form of many variations of online sexual harms that target youth today. Teenagers in Canada can be victims of sexual catfishing, AI-generated sexual deepfakes and violent extremism.

Some high-profile sextortion incidents include the deaths by suicide of Rehtaeh Parsons, Amanda Todd, Daniel Lints and a boy in British Columbia.

The scale of the problem

Technology-facilitated sexual violence (TFSV) includes harmful practices such as sexual name-calling and rumour spreading, non-consensual distribution of intimate images (nudes) and other forms of sexual harassment.

Our research team recently conducted a survey with more than 1,000 teens aged 13 to 18 across Canada to learn about youths’ experiences with TFSV.

Our findings underscore how widespread these harms are: more than a quarter of the teens (28 per cent) reported experiencing at least one form of TFSV.

In addition to so many youth experiencing TFSV, almost half (47 per cent) said that TFSV had happened to someone they knew. The most common forms of TFSV reported in our survey were receiving unwanted sexual images (15 per cent), encountering unwanted porn (13 per cent) and being sexually harassed online (11 per cent).

Online platforms

We also asked the teens which social media sites and online gaming services had the most sexual harassment. The platform they mentioned most often was Snapchat, followed by TikTok and Instagram. Snapchat has been known for its potential risks to youth and privacy concerns.

Girls experienced TFSV at a higher rate (32 per cent) than boys (23 per cent), which is consistent with research from Statistics Canada.

Teens who said they were neurodivergent or had a learning disability were more likely to be subjected to TFSV (39 per cent). TFSV was also higher among teens with a mental health condition (40 per cent).

These findings are consistent with previous research that showed higher victimization rates among people with disabilities.

A small but significant number of teens (seven per cent) reported committing at least one form of TFSV. This was more common among boys (nine per cent) than girls (six per cent).

Insufficient support

Parents and guardians were the most relevant source of support for teens who had been subjected to TFSV. Nearly half (44 per cent) of the teens turned to them, and most of these teens found them helpful.

The teens were much less likely to seek support from institutions. Only about one in 10 (12 per cent) told someone at their school, with only seven per cent telling the police. Unfortunately, these numbers are consistent with other statistics, as most people do not report sexual violence to the police.

Young people showed little confidence in the reporting tools and moderation systems of social media platforms. As little as five per cent of the teens had used these to report sexually harmful materials. Almost one in three teens (29 per cent) thought that the digital platforms should do a better job supporting them.

This finding is important to consider as social media companies are dropping content moderation, making their platforms possibly more hazardous for youth.

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Teens’ misconceptions

Most teens (90 per cent and up) knew that several forms of TFSV were illegal in Canada. However, they were less certain when asked if it was legal to create a fake sexual video of someone. This is unsurprising: legal views of sexual deepfakes vary by province. Some allow civil action, while others treat it as child pornography.

The teens’ knowledge of the law was incomplete in other areas. Almost two-thirds (61 per cent) thought that sending a nude picture of themselves to other youth was illegal. This is not true. Minors can share sexual images with each other as long as they are consensual and kept private between them; that most teens don’t know this is troubling.

Sexting and sharing nudes is a common form of sexual expression among teens. In our survey, teens who though that nude image sharing was illegal were less likely to seek help with TFSV.

Some teens (26 per cent) thought that taking a nude picture of themselves was illegal. This is also incorrect.

These misconceptions matter, as young people need to be informed about their legal rights to sexual expression. Proper education will prevent shame, fear and other barriers to seeking support when someone is distributing their images against their will or coercing them into harmful practices.

An urgent issue

Social media and other forms of digital communication are central to young people’s lives, which means that addressing TFSV is an urgent issue. While the federal government and some provincial governments have taken steps or proposed legislation aimed at protecting youth, some responses have been proven to be unrealistic and ineffective.

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Governments — and tech companies in particular — need to do more to prevent TFSV and support youth who experience it.

Schools can also take action to help youth. However, there is considerable variation in the TFSV responses and interventions within educational curricula, policies and legislation across the provinces and territories. This means that even though TFSV is a common problem, most parents, teachers, police and frontline workers lack the resources and strategies needed to respond effectively and promptly.

Our findings highlight the impact of these shortcomings on teens, as many youth in our survey did not receive help for TFSV, even when they sought it out. In many instances, telling others actually made the situation worse.

TFSV is a gendered problem that disproportionately impacts certain groups. It is important to keep in mind who is most at risk when developing TFSV resources and interventions.

We believe that with evidence-informed and co-ordinated action from the private and public sectors, young people can live in a digital world where they feel safe online and can easily access effective resources and support.

Charlotte Nau receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Christopher Dietzel receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Estefanía Reyes receives funding from the International Development Research Center (IDRC).

– ref. More than a quarter of Canadian teens have experienced sexual violence online – https://theconversation.com/more-than-a-quarter-of-canadian-teens-have-experienced-sexual-violence-online-265625

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Laszlo Sarkany, Assistant Professor, Political Science, Western University

Canada has formally recognized the state of Palestine, drawing the ire of United States President Donald Trump.

At the same time, the U.S. is continuing to oppose the International Criminal Court (ICC) by sanctioning several of its judges, citing their involvement in investigations related to alleged war crimes by American and Israeli officials.

The ICC investigates and prosecutes individuals for international crimes that include genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.

Despite Canada’s historic support for the ICC, the current government has yet to officially defend it against the recent accusations, even though one of its sanctioned judges, Kimberly Prost, is Canadian.

American threats

There are two key questions worth asking in relation to these shifts in Canadian foreign policy:

• Why did Canada recognize Palestine despite signals from the U.S. that the move would impact its trade relationship?
• What does Canada’s silence on the sanctions against the ICC suggest about how and why Canadian foreign policy in relation to the court may have changed?

Recognizing Palestine placed Canada’s policy — and its trade negotiations — on a collision course with the U.S. as American officials called the move “reckless …and undermines prospects for peace.”

The stakes seemed even higher when Trump linked Canada’s recognition of Palestine with trade deals. Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, mentioned Canada in his warning that if American allies comply with the ICC arrest warrants against Israeli officials, the U.S. will “crush” the economies in question.

The recognition seems to be a substantial shift in Canadian foreign policy. For a considerable amount of time, at the very least stretching back to the days of Stephen Harper’s Conservative government — Canada has been a staunch supporter of Israel.

Canada even publicly said on the international stage in 2014 that it didn’t recognize Palestine.

Canada’s lack of support for the ICC

Mark Carney’s Liberal government, however, has yet to push back against the U.S. attacks on the ICC. Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand did note that she has “utmost confidence” in Prost and praised the court, but made no reference to the American sanctions against her.

Canada has missed two opportunities to support the ICC: one in July 2025, when other states, members of civil society groups and international organizations defended the court during its Assembly of States Parties meetings in New York.

The second arose during the 59th meeting of the United Nations Human Rights Council in June 2025.

What could explain these shifts and apparent snubs?

The middle ground

There has been extensive domestic and global pressure to keep the plight of Palestinians caught up in the humanitarian catastrophe in the spotlight, and to recognize Palestine.

Canada has attempted to chart a middle ground on the issue, accusing Hamas of terrorizing both Palestinian and Israeli civilians.

Canadian allies like the U.K. and the European Union, along with other like-minded states, declared in July that Palestine is a state.

On the question of why Canada has not voiced public support of the ICC since Carney was elected in April 2025 — as France, Belgium, Slovenia and the UN have done — there are two possible explanations.

On the surface, it might be because the government is still weighing its options and isn’t ready to act. If so, however, its silence suggests a lack of support of the ICC given Canada’s previous backing of the court until March 2025, during Justin Trudeau’s years in office.

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The ‘value of our strength’

Another explanation could involve Canada’s commitment to NATO and its new, broader foreign policy aims.

The Canadian government has promised it will allocate five per cent of its GDP to NATO by 2035. In the same declaration, Carney noted that “global conflict [is] becoming more frequent and volatile.”

Therefore, the federal government could be adopting a pragmatic position and aiming to prioritize security and sovereignty from now on. A wider global engagement for the Canadian military would mean that its service members could, at least conceptually, come under closer scrutiny by the ICC, which steps in when national judicial systems are unable or unwilling to hold perpetrators accountable.

During the so-called Somalia Affair in the early 1990s, Canada did prosecute its own. The government went as far as to disband the unit the soldiers involved belonged to. But Canada was not, in the early 1990s, bound by the Rome Statute of the ICC until 2002. The statute established four core international crimes — genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression — and stipulated they aren’t subject to any statute of limitations.

Current global geostrategic dynamics are also very different today than they were in the 1990s. Canada could be anticipating a much broader military engagement.

The pragmatism explanation is supported by the latest declaration Anand made in her recent speech to the United Nations General Assembly as Canada’s foreign affairs minister.

She noted that the three priorities of the Carney government will be “security and defence,” “economic resilience” and “core values.” Anand, a former defence minister, concluded her speech — echoing Carney’s words — that Canada will be defined not “by the strength of our values, but by the value of our strength.”

Laszlo Sarkany 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.

– ref. Why is Canada quiet on the International Criminal Court while recognizing Palestine? – https://theconversation.com/why-is-canada-quiet-on-the-international-criminal-court-while-recognizing-palestine-265930

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Vanessa Fong, Postdoctoral Fellow, University of British Columbia

As students settle into the school year, the reality is that many will not experience full inclusion in the classroom.

Every child has the right to an education under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Yet, for many autistic students in Canada, this promise falls short.

Our recent study published in Autism Research uncovers why so many autistic students are denied their right to a full education and highlights what must change to make schools truly inclusive.

What exclusion looks like

Exclusion takes many forms. Sometimes, it’s overt, with students being told they cannot attend school for a period of time.

More often, it is informal or partial, where students are told to come on modified hours or days or sent home early because there aren’t enough staff to support their needs, or they aren’t permitted to participate in certain activities, like field trips.

In our online survey of 412 primary caregivers of autistic children in Ontario, primarily recruited through Autism Ontario, 42.3 per cent reported that their autistic children had experienced some form of school exclusion.

These exclusions have cascading effects on families, forcing parents to miss work and jeopardize their employment. They also drive some households closer to poverty.

Previous research from our team has indicated that many parents of autistic children, particularly mothers, struggle to maintain full-time employment as they need to be available to care for their children during school hours.

Powerful predictors of exclusion

Our survey also identified several important factors related to school exclusion.

Something that predicted lower rates of school exclusion was greater parental satisfaction with the child’s Individual Education Plan (IEP) — a legally mandated document meant to outline supports and accommodations for students with disabilities.

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Analysis of parent responses to the open-ended survey questions revealed two critical factors contributing to exclusion:

• Bullying, where autistic children are victimized by peers, leaving them isolated, afraid for their safety and more likely to avoid school;

• A lack of specialized training and resources for school staff. This lack of training and resources leaves autistic students without the support they need to participate and engage fully in school life.

These findings echo international patterns. Autistic students face increased risk of exclusion because of sensory overload, lack of staff training and the absence of genuinely supportive environments.

The illusion of inclusion

The assumption that simply integrating autistic students into mainstream settings guarantees inclusion is not only misleading, but harmful. As many advocates warn, true inclusion demands a fundamental shift in attitudes, environments and policies.

Current failures are seen in the use of physical restraint and seclusion practices as well as insufficient funding and under-staffing that leave children’s needs unmet and their safety at risk.

Parents’ responses also indicated concerns about IEPs that are written but not followed, and lack of effectiveness or practical application of existing anti-bullying policies that leave students vulnerable.

What must change?

If we are serious about inclusion, several steps are critical.

Schools must develop robust anti-bullying initiatives that foster a culture of acceptance, empathy and understanding of neurodivergence. In Ontario, the Ministry of Education requires all school boards to have bullying prevention and intervention policies.

While previous research has examined the effectiveness of school bullying policies more broadly, research is needed to assess their impact within Ontario schools, particularly in relation to neurodivergent students.

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Staff training must be comprehensive, mandatory and ongoing, centred on understanding the needs and strengths of autistic and neurodivergent students. Indeed, previous research has shown that targeted professional development can strengthen teachers’ confidence and preparedness to support autistic students.

Greater collaboration is needed, with families and autistic youth being real partners in IEP planning and schools held accountable for following through. Classrooms must be tailored to be sensory-friendly and flexible, providing predictable routines and spaces for self-regulation.

Importantly, increased funding is also necessary. School staff, such as education assistants, are often required to support far too many students, with a lack of replacements when they are absent.

These issues ripple out to affect the entire classroom. A stable workforce of skilled staff with specialized training who are compensated competitively is essential if inclusion is to be a reality and not just a slogan.

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A call to rethink inclusion

The latest estimates from the Public Health Agency of Canada indicate that about one in 50 children and youth aged one to 17 are diagnosed with autism.

In other words, just about every classroom will likely have at least one autistic student, among other neurodivergences.

Integrating these students fully and meaningfully is important not just for their education, but also for the betterment of the broader classroom culture, as well as families’ employment security and economic well-being.

In addition to exclusions, our previous research found that many families elect to keep their autistic children home, or enrol them in alternative programming, because they are unable to find an appropriate placement within a public school.

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The current system is not working for too many; systematic improvements are needed to ensure that all children and their families are supported to reach their full potential.

We must start by listening to educators, parents and autistic students to understand these students’ diverse needs, and then put the resources in place to make these accommodations a reality. Until then, many children and youth will remain either partially or fully excluded from a safe, meaningful and reliable education.

Vanessa Fong receives funding as a Postdoctoral Fellow from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and Michael Smith Health Research BC, and from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council through her Research Associate position at Wilfrid Laurier University.

Janet McLaughlin receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Margaret Schneider receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.

– ref. Many autistic students are denied a full education — here’s what we need for inclusive schools – https://theconversation.com/many-autistic-students-are-denied-a-full-education-heres-what-we-need-for-inclusive-schools-265147

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Nicholas A. R. Fraser, Senior Research Associate , Toronto Metropolitan University

Most of us, whether we admit it or not, engage in a great deal of passive scrolling through social media daily.

And while the platforms have proliferated for years, experts are only now beginning to demonstrate their full impact on our attention, mental health, spending habits and politics.

Despite the benefits, social media is also creating new problems. A pressing concern is the dissemination of misinformation by political extremists, a trend amplified by the unprecedented reach of platforms like Facebook and X (formerly Twitter). When it comes to issues like immigration, many activists, experts and pundits point to social media as a vehicle for the spread of prejudice, conspiracy theories and false claims targeting immigrant and minority populations.

Even before launching his 2016 presidential bid, for example, Donald Trump used Twitter to share messages attacking immigrants and ethnic minorities with millions of people, giving him the power to dominate news cycles and shape public policy.

Does social media make people more xenophobic?

Polarizing platforms

For decades, scholars studying how people consume information about immigration have argued that print and TV news stories often portray the economic and social impact of immigration negatively.

Studies on major American newspapers and news stations show that traditional media coverage has encouraged prejudice toward Latin American immigrants and Muslims.

Does social media follow this trend? Social scientists are beginning to disagree.

Scholars point to racist and anti-immigration messages on social media as evidence that platforms like Facebook, X and Reddit encourage users to speak freely without the constraints of social norms to a broad and diverse audience.

Other studies argue that social media creates uniquely polarizing environments where users organize themselves into political tribes that fight one another using aggressive dialogue. Even in Canada — a country often touted as pro-immigration — social media has allowed users to attack immigrants and minorities.

Users’ attitudes, however, may matter more than the specific platform.

Politically aggressive users

Recent studies from the United States and Western Europe show that social media attracts politically aggressive users who often do most of the talking in heated online conversations.

Based on my recent research on Canadian X users, I found similar results. I analyzed roughly 13,000 English-language posts discussing immigration and Canada’s housing crisis in 2023. Unsurprisingly, I discovered that many users blamed immigrants for a lack of affordable housing, including influencers with tens of thousands of followers.

In August 2023, discussions about housing on X peaked, with 3,638 posts mentioning both immigration and housing. This significant increase in online conversation coincided with federal government’s public comments linking international students to the housing crisis. The data supports the idea that Canadians were actively discussing the housing crisis in relation to immigration during this time.

Does this mean that Canadian X users are now seething with hatred for immigrants? While some are, a closer look reveals the partisan nature of these posts.

When I examined users’ identities and networks, it became clear that their anti-immigration messages were often a means of criticizing Justin Trudeau and his Liberal government. In other words, right-wing users (with large and small followings) were chiefly responsible for creating and sharing these posts, including People’s Party of Canada leader Maxime Bernier.

For instance, Fringe Albertan (about 2,500 followers in August 2023) posted in response to a post by Rebel News:

“@RebelNewsOnline Its a lie! Typical Liberal. Hes lying bc Canada is a UN member, and as a member, has signed onto an immigration pact to flood Canada with migrants, destroying our economy, social network, housing, and culture. #EndUNMembership @UCPCaucus @CPC_HQ @Buffalo_AB @BuffaloPartySK”_

Similarly, lloyd (about 50 followers at the time) posted in response to a post by CTV News:

“@CTVNews Thanks CTV News it’s no wonder why they are leaving as Canada is so poorly governed ! Housing shortage when Immigration brings millions of Migrants and never checked to see how many homes they had and shortage worst ever for Canada! Worst blunder in Canadian History! HELP.”

Right-wing social media users significantly contributed to public discourse blaming immigrants for Canada’s problems.

Some might argue polarizing content is simply a reflection of free speech.

This is true to some degree, but recent studies suggest online polarization can also threaten free societies. Algorithms designed to focus users’ attention on threats and conflict can reliably make users engage with content; this is what makes social media platforms potentially dangerous. Fortunately, users are far from powerless.

Reducing online polarization

While figures like Trump show that social media can be used to spread prejudice to mass audiences, it also matters that users often self-select into networks they like.

New studies make clear that users’ socio-political context, partisanship and behaviour seem to matter as much as the platform itself.

It turns out both platforms and users are responsible for online polarization.

What can we do about social media platforms?

Ultimately, we need socially responsible online platforms that focus less on producing outrage and division to attract users. This means including researchers, governments and civil society in designing social media interfaces and algorithms to establish reasonable community standards for sharing information and regulating users’ behaviour.

But we cannot wait for politicians to solve this problem. Even if we get platforms that focus less on outrage, trolls will still exist.

Social media’s rapid pace and the lack of consensus over online behaviour create ethical dilemmas for users everywhere. For example, many people passively scroll and react to content they skimmed, but if conflict arises later in the thread, many users are unsure how to respond or whether they should respond at all.

To see less polarizing social media content, we need to both consciously choose what platforms we wish to join (and why), and we need to cultivate better ways to handle online conflict.

Nicholas A. R. Fraser 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.

– ref. Politically aggressive social media users are creating most of the anti-immigrant content – https://theconversation.com/politically-aggressive-social-media-users-are-creating-most-of-the-anti-immigrant-content-264750

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Emine Fidan Elcioglu, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of Toronto

There is a widely held misconception that young people are politically disengaged. This is based on narrow measures like voter turnout. But this overlooks the fact that many young people are deeply curious, especially when politics is understood more broadly: as a way to make sense of society, power and everyday life.

In my research with youth in the Greater Toronto Area, I explored how their views on inequality, identity and government form over time.

My findings build on my earlier research, conducted with second-generation Chinese and South Asian Canadians, where I found that many of them turned to conservative ideas to access feelings of dignity and belonging. For them, embracing meritocracy wasn’t about denying racism — it was a way to prove they’d succeeded by Canada’s rules.

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Read more:
Why are so many second-generation South Asian and Chinese Canadians planning to vote Conservative?

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In this new study, I wanted to understand what shapes that gap — what makes some students more likely to see power as structural, and others more likely to see it as personal or cultural.

I found that young people now form political beliefs through two competing knowledge systems: a hollowed-out university, and YouTube’s attention economy. In the university classroom, students learn to connect experience to systems like racism or class inequality. On YouTube, other students encounter simplified stories or common-sense clichés.

The result is a generation pulled between critique and clarity, where YouTube offers answers that feel true.

Changes to postsecondary education

Post-secondary institutions in Canada have historically played a central role in public life. They offered young people a place to explore political ideas, learn history and develop critical thinking skills. That mission has since eroded.

In Ontario, former premier Mike Harris’s so-called “Common Sense Revolution” marked a turning point in government approaches to education. Post-secondary education was rebranded as an individual investment rather than a public good. The cost of tuition increased, public funding stagnated and student debt rose.

As a result, academic paths became stratified. Lower-income students pursued vocational degrees, while their wealthier peers could afford less lucrative paths, like the social sciences and humanities.

The ability to encounter transformative ideas narrowed along class lines.

Market priorities

At the same time, disciplines like sociology and history began to lose institutional standing as universities became increasingly reliant on tuition fees, corporate partnerships and research tied to economic outcomes. Funding shifted toward programs seen to deliver market returns — like business and technology — while fields focused on critique or public interest were sidelined.

This reorientation entrenched the idea that higher education exists to serve the market. So it was no surprise when Ontario announced $750 million in new post-secondary funding; none for the social sciences and far below the $2.5 billion recommended by a government-appointed group tasked with reviewing the financial sustainability of Ontario’s post-secondary system.

Universities are now judged by job outcomes for graduates, with less support for courses that analyze, critique or challenge inequality or power.

YouTube steps in

As universities retreat, platforms like YouTube have increasingly stepped in as a political educator. This is accelerating a shift that may have happened anyway, but has now taken on a new urgency in this hollowed-out educational landscape.

In 2015, YouTube’s algorithm shifted to maximize watch time, pushing content independent of its quality.

I found that for students in technical or vocational programs — where inequality is rarely addressed — YouTube often becomes their main source of political learning.

Conservative influencers offer simplified narratives: inequality reflects natural differences, tradition ensures order, progressivism is elitist.

These messages land because progressive ideas remain concentrated in universities, out of reach for many working-class youth. This dynamic has also expanded across platforms like TikTok and Instagram, where short-form content delivers similar emotionally charged explanations.

When critical education is confined to elite spaces, structural thinking becomes a privilege and not a public tool. This matters because it shapes who feels entitled to analyze power and imagine alternatives — and who is left to make sense of inequality through personal experience and YouTube algorithms.

Some young people are pushing back: BreadTube creators, civic tech projects and public sociology podcasts translate progressive ideas for digital audiences.

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Read more:
Meet BreadTube, the YouTube activists trying to beat the far-right at their own game

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But these efforts remain small compared to the reach and resources of right-wing media. Without broader infrastructure — from education funding to algorithmic transparency — even the most compelling content struggles to shift how people understand the world.

The decline of progressive institutions

Universities were never the only sites of political education. In earlier generations, unions, political parties and community groups shaped public consciousness.

They established adult education programs, published newspapers and linked political ideas to everyday life. Feminist and anti-racist traditions added their own spaces, from women’s consciousness-raising circles to Black political study groups.

Civic initiatives like Company of Young Canadians, supported youth in under-served communities with political engagement and collective action. These institutions helped working people identify shared interests and organize for change.

That world has largely disappeared, especially with the decline of unions in Canada, driven by decades of neoliberal restructuring that weakened collective bargaining and eroded political education.

In Canada, the New Democratic Party has increasingly prioritized electoral success over grassroots organizing. This isn’t unique to the NDP. Across the North America, left-leaning organizations often function as symbolic communities, struggling to build collective power.

Their abstract language feels out of step with people navigating material problems like rent hikes and job precarity.

In contrast, the political right speaks plainly. And, its messages may be simple, but they are easy to find.

Cultivating critical thought

When universities retreat and progressive organizations lose influence, new forces shape how people come to understand the world.

My research found that the way Canadian youth explained inequality differed depending on their access to education. Students with post-secondary social science education connected personal experience to systemic inequality. Those outside these spaces — especially those relying on YouTube — were more likely to see inequality as natural, rooted in individual effort or cultural values.

This divergence reflects a deeper shift: the pipeline for developing structural literacy has broken down. Where critical thinking was once nurtured through unions, political parties and public education systems, those institutions have thinned out.

With unions weakened and parties consumed with electoral success, the university remains one of the few institutions still cultivating critical thought — and conservative leaders know it.

Ahead of the 2025 election, the Conservative Party pledged to end the “imposition of woke ideology” in university research funding and steer university hiring “away from ideology.”

For from neutral, these efforts turn universities into places where challenging ideas are no longer welcome. In their place, young people are left to navigate politics through platforms shaped by algorithms, where nuance is rare.

A different future

If we want a different future, where more people feel equipped to understand and change the world, we need institutions that foster imagination, inclusion and collective purpose. That means rebuilding unions, community-based groups and civic networks.

It also means rethinking what political parties and universities are for.

Political parties must organize, not just campaign. Universities must educate for democratic participation, not just employability. These institutions must do the slow, relational work of building solidarity: helping people understand the systems they live in and feel part of something larger than themselves.

Without that kind of infrastructure, progressive ideas stay abstract: visible to some, but disconnected from the everyday lives of most.

Emine Fidan Elcioglu 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.

– ref. YouTube shapes young people’s political education, but the site simplifies complex issues – https://theconversation.com/youtube-shapes-young-peoples-political-education-but-the-site-simplifies-complex-issues-260758

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Tamara Krawchenko, Associate Professor, School of Public Administration, University of Victoria

As Canada advances toward its 2050 net-zero emissions target, it’s facing a fundamental challenge: ensuring all parts of the country can participate in and benefit from the transition to a clean economy.

Canada’s regional economies are diverse, spanning Alberta’s oilsands, Québec’s hydroelectric systems, northern mining operations and urban tech hubs. These differences mean that net-zero transitions will manifest differently, creating opportunities for some regions and vulnerabilities for others.

Rural and remote regions accounted for 52 per cent of Canada’s total greenhouse gas emissions in 2022 alone, and these regions in particular face complex transition dynamics. These regions host oil, gas, coal and mining industries that power Canada’s economic development.

An equitable net-zero transition requires promoting regional competitiveness while ensuring no place is left behind; in other words, cohesion. Successful sustainability transitions demand both innovation-driven growth strategies and support for regions facing economic disruption.

Canada needs to ensure a net-zero transition translates into broadly shared prosperity rather than exacerbated regional inequalities. Doing so can help rectify the historical pattern of resource extraction that has not always benefited local communities.

Challenges faced by rural and remote regions

Rural and remote communities are typically less economically diverse than urban centres. They are often built around one or more dominant industries and have smaller labour markets with fewer specialists. They also have limited access to the financial and human capital necessary for transitioning to net-zero.

Energy transitions can create new industries and transform existing ones to be cleaner. They can replace old industries with new ones and diversify the economy. However, they can also phase out industries in areas where there aren’t enough replacement options. Communities that depend on a single industry are often hit the hardest by these changes.

Canada’s transition policies are rightly focused on regional competitiveness and innovation through, for example, the Regional Economic Growth through Innovation and the Global Innovation Clusters programs. However, they often fail to proactively support the rural, remote and resource-dependent regions and communities most vulnerable to the disruptions of transitions.

This results in reactive policies and programs that are often deployed only after economic shocks. They rarely target the most at-risk groups and governance frameworks lack clear mechanisms for co-ordinated action, accountability and consideration of Indigenous rights and local well-being.

European precedents

The European Union’s 55 billion euro Just Transition Mechanism provides valuable insights for Canadian policymakers. The EU initiative combines both competitiveness and compensation strategies within a comprehensive development model.

The mechanism integrates investment schemes that promote innovation in clean technologies with targeted support for the regions most vulnerable to job losses and economic downturns. Each EU member state develops just transition plans identifying specific regions and industries requiring support, alongside dedicated investment programs tailored to local economic conditions.

This approach recognizes that effective sustainability transitions require incentives for innovation and protections for disrupted communities.

In addition, the EU’s Just Transition Fund specifically targets regions that are socially, economically and environmentally most vulnerable to transition impacts, while simultaneously encouraging investments in emerging sectors critical for reaching net-zero.

Canadian regional development approaches have historically emphasized competitiveness and innovation, with transition management remaining largely reactive rather than proactive.

An exception is the Canada Coal Transition Initiative, which provided flexible, locally tailored approaches and co-ordinated support across federal, provincial and local levels. That approach is essential for sustainable and equitable transition outcomes in diverse regions.

But Canada has generally been reluctant to explicitly identify and designate regions most at-risk from net-zero transitions. This hesitancy may leave vulnerable communities without targeted support.

Institutional capacity and governance challenges

The effectiveness of both competitiveness and cohesion strategies depends on a region’s institutional capacity and governance. On this point, rural and remote regions are often at a disadvantage. They have smaller administrations, fewer resources and limited capacity to manage complex transitions.

The Canadian government’s Regional Energy and Resource Tables offer a new collaborative approach to help bridge these gaps by bringing federal, provincial, territorial and Indigenous partners together.

The tables aim to co-ordinate expertise, resources and partnerships to identify economic priorities and build the capacity to pursue low-carbon growth opportunities. Ten tables are presently underway. This will be an important initiative to watch and evaluate.

Other collaborations can also facilitate peer learning and shared problem-solving. For example, Yukon University’s Northern Energy Innovation group partners with First Nations and utility companies to provide place-based solutions and facilitate knowledge networks. The challenge here lies in connecting these local strengths with external resources and expertise and to expand them as needed.

Sustainable transitions

As Canada encourages new economic activities essential for net-zero transitions, such as critical minerals development, it’s crucial that past inequalities are not reproduced, particularly regarding Indigenous rights holders on territories where these projects are operating.

Canadian governments have substantial room for improvement in this regard, as a lot of rural policy in Cananda continues to treat these regions as sites of resource extraction detached from broader development strategies.

The stakes of this transition are considerable. Managed effectively, net-zero transitions can put Canada on a path to sustainable and inclusive growth. Managed poorly, they risk deepening territorial divisions and creating new patterns of regional disadvantage.

The policies adopted today will determine which of these futures emerge, making the integration of competitiveness and cohesion approaches not merely desirable but essential for Canadian prosperity and social cohesion in the decades ahead.

Tamara Krawchenko received funding for this research from the Centre for Net-Zero Industrial Policy. She is an expert panelist with the Canadian Climate Institute, a Visiting Scholar with the Institute for Research on Public Policy, and a Board member for Ecotrust Canada.

– ref. How Canada can support rural regions in its net-zero transition – https://theconversation.com/how-canada-can-support-rural-regions-in-its-net-zero-transition-264747

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Andrew Buzzell, Postdoctoral Fellow, Rotman Institute of Philosophy, Western University

On Sept. 25, the Donald Trump administration in the United States again extended the TikTok ban-or-divest law, possibly for the last time. The latest extension to the law, which was passed in 2024 by the Joe Biden administration, includes a deal to transfer TikTok to American owners as a condition required to avoid a ban.

This raises the question on the validity of the warnings about the app as a tool of Chinese influence and whether American ownership will help.

Canada should be watching closely, because anxieties about foreign manipulation and social media exist north of the border, too. These range from bans on TikTok and concerns about Beijing-linked surveillance to efforts like Bill C-18 aimed at safeguarding domestic news sources.

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Read more:
Concerns over TikTok feeding user data to Beijing are back – and there’s good evidence to support them

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What happens in the Canadian information environment has always been shaped by the U.S., a dependence that is even more precarious now that American politics has turned hostile to Canada.

TikTok concerns

TikTok is not the only digital media platform susceptible to worries about hostile influence. All major platforms introduce the same vulnerabilities. If the policy objective is to enhance the security of democracy, then a focus on TikTok is too narrow and divestment as a solution accomplishes little (especially because it appears China will retain control of the algorithm).

Worries about TikTok come down to two big fears. The first is that it functions as a spying machine, feeding data to the Chinese government. The spying concern isn’t just about espionage, learning about sensitive infrastructure and activities, but also personal — the software itself might be unsafe and can be used to track individuals.

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Read more:
Canada’s decision to ban TikTok from government devices is bad news for the NDP’s election strategy

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As a result, many countries have banned the app on government devices, and securing data along national borders may well address this.

The second fear, more vivid in the public and political imagination, is that TikTok functions as an influence machine. Its algorithm can be tweaked to push propaganda, sway opinion, censor views or even meddle in elections.

Such worries reached a fever pitch in America in 2023, when Osama bin Laden’s “Letter to America” suddenly went viral on TikTok. Lawmakers seized on this as evidence that TikTok could amplify extremist content, reinforcing fears that the platform can be weaponized.

These worries aren’t merely speculative. Investigations have shown that topics sensitive to China, such as Tiananmen Square and Tibet, are harder to find or conspicuously absent on TikTok compared to other platforms.

Social media is also used as a tool for influence by hostile groups, corporations and governments, and concerns about ownership are often a proxy for deeper anxieties about the platforms themselves.

As users, we know little about how our feeds work, what’s shaping them, what they might look if they were built differently and how they are affecting us.

There is a rational basis to be mistrustful, and this cuts both ways. It’s not just the fear that we could be manipulated without realizing it; it’s also the temptation to see our opponents as manipulated, too, as if every disagreement might be product of someone rigging the system.

Manipulated anxieties

Fear of TikTok as an influence machine continues to play a substantial role in politics, as “Washington has said that TikTok’s ownership by ByteDance makes it beholden to the Chinese government.”

U.S. Vice President JD Vance remarked that the executive order would “ensure that the algorithm is not being used as a propaganda tool by a foreign government… the American businesspeople … will make the determination about what’s actually happening with TikTok.”

Meanwhile, Trump ostensibly joked that he’d make TikTok “100 per cent MAGA” before adding “everyone’s going to be treated fairly.” And Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told an audience of content creators that “weapons change over time… the most important one is social media,” stressing the importance of divestment of TikTok to U.S. owners.

One implication of these comments is that divestment doesn’t change the threat of manipulation — it just changes who’s doing the manipulating. Divestment is framed as resisting foreign propaganda, but at the same time domestic manipulation is legitimized as politics as usual.

Collective dependence

This is a squandered opportunity for the U.S. By treating TikTok as a weapon to be seized, leaders have passed up the chance to model a more enduring form of soft power: building open, transparent, trustworthy information systems that others would want to emulate. Instead, what is gained is a temporary and possibly illusory sharp power advantage, at the expense of an enduring source of legitimacy.

The bigger problem is that the normalization of social media as a weapon is, to borrow a fear familiar to Trump, riggable. We know that social media can be manipulated, and yet we rely on it more and more as a source of news. And even if we ourselves don’t, we are influenced indirectly by those who do.

This collective dependence makes the platforms more powerful and their vulnerabilities more dangerous.

Protecting the public sphere

Canada has already had its own TikTok moment: the Online News Act (C-18), which required platforms to pay news outlets for sharing their content. This was intended to strengthen Canadian journalism, but in response, Meta banned news on its platforms (Facebook, Instagram) in Canada in August 2023, leading to an 85 per cent drop in engagement. Instead of strengthening Canadian journalism, Bill C-18 risks making it more fragile.

If we’re serious about protecting the public sphere from manipulation, what matters is the outsized power the platforms have, and the extent to which that power can be bought, sold or stolen. This power includes the surveillance power to know what we will like, the algorithmic power to curate our information diet and control of platform incentives, rules and features that affect who gains influence.

Bargaining with this power, as Canada tried with Bill C-18 — and as the U.S. is now doing with China and TikTok — only concedes to it. If we want to protect democratic information systems, we need to focus on reducing the vulnerabilities in our relationship with media platforms and support domestic journalism that can compete for influence.

The biggest challenge is to make platforms less riggable, and thus less weaponizable, if only for the reason that motivated the TikTok ban: we don’t want our adversaries, foreign or domestic, to have power over us.

Andrew Buzzell 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.

– ref. The American TikTok deal doesn’t address the platform’s potential for manipulation, only who profits – https://theconversation.com/the-american-tiktok-deal-doesnt-address-the-platforms-potential-for-manipulation-only-who-profits-266441

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Jeremie Molho, Senior Research Associate, Canada Excellence Chair in Migration and Integration Program, Toronto Metropolitan University

Settling in a new country is often imagined as a sequential process, built on a supposed hierarchy of needs. You accomplish one priority, then another, and another and then you’re integrated into the country and economy.

Material and essential matters — housing, employment, language classes — come first. Cultural or spiritual matters — a sense of belonging, community connections, civic participation — come second.

The recently released research I conducted with Toronto Arts Council (TAC) on its Program for Newcomers and Refugees (PNR), however, suggests this logic needs to be challenged.

What does art have to do with settlement?

Founded in 1974, TAC is an independent funding organization that operates at arm’s length from the City of Toronto. Its mission is to enrich the quality of life in the city by supporting the arts. The decision to create a program specifically for newcomers was driven by research highlighting the barriers newcomer artists faced in finding work and navigating the Canadian arts landscape.

The PNR launched in 2017 and has allocated about $2.92 million between its inception and 2023. Forty organizations received support through the Newcomer and Refugee Arts Engagement stream, while 176 individual artists received Newcomer and Refugee Artist Mentorship grants.

Two years ago, along with TAC, I began researching to learn about who benefited from this support and how. We held focus groups with newcomer artists, arts managers and settlement organizations, analyzed program data and produced film portraits of two artists.

Our goal was to understand what the arts contribute to integration and what challenges newcomer artists face. Our findings show that the divide between settlement and the arts should be reconsidered.

Instead of being treated as separate domains, they can complement each other in ways that strengthen integration.

The arts as holistic settlement support

The Newcomer and Refugee Arts Engagement stream provides grants to organizations — including settlement agencies, community arts organizations and artistic institutions — with experience serving newcomers through artistic activities. Beneficiaries of the engagement stream showed that arts projects are not cosmetic add-ons.

Community arts professionals work hand in hand with settlement workers to address practical barriers from the outset.

Child care is arranged so mothers can attend. Interpreters support multilingual workshops. Programs offer snacks and Toronto Transit Commission fare. Schedules are adapted to hospitality and shift-work hours. These small design choices make participation possible.

The outcomes are multidimensional. Arts programs support language learning in low-pressure, confidence-building settings. They open pathways to employment through the acquisition of digital skills, production experience and access to professional networks. They reduce isolation and support mental health by creating safe, culturally sensitive spaces.

Newcomers Dance Too!, a free dance class for refugee-background women and girls in Flemington Park run by dancers from Fusion Cardio Toronto — which was promoted in Arabic, Urdu, Punjabi and other languages — is one example.

StoryCentre Canada, a non-profit that empowers short multimedia first-person narratives, set up digital storytelling workshops that taught photography and video editing while letting participants share their stories in the language of their choice, building both technical and communication skills. Hinprov, a collective of South Asian improvisers, created spaces where expression was possible even for those still learning English.

Arts projects also spark civic conversations. At Matthew House, which offers transitional housing settlement assistance, a mural led by a refugee artist-in-residence prompted neighbours to ask questions about refugees, opening dialogue that challenged stereotypes. Another PNR project collaborated with LGBTQ+ newcomers, using photography and film to counter stigma and create networks of care.

These initiatives show how the arts allow creative newcomers to assert their voices and identities on their own terms, positioning them not simply as guests but as active shapers of the cultural fabric of their new country.

Newcomer artists face systemic barriers

Newcomer artists design and deliver effective arts-based projects. Their ability to contribute, however, is limited by systemic obstacles.

General settlement services rarely provide tailored guidance for creative careers. Newcomer artists are directed toward generic job markets or told to pursue “Canadian credentials,” with little information about arts funding, networks or sector norms.

Discrimination compounds these hurdles: accents and linguistic differences become barriers to casting and collaboration; racial bias and expectations about “ethnic” content narrow opportunities; western-centrism and unfamiliarity with certain artistic traditions from outside the West devalue skills gained abroad. For instance, an Indian musician criticized the tendency to classify Indian classical music as “world music” rather than recognizing it as a classical form, limiting its appropriate recognition and funding.

Administrative rules add further exclusions. Temporary residents may be ineligible for public arts funding. Artists living in the Toronto area but outside the city proper can be excluded by residency requirements, even when they exhibit and perform in Toronto. These policies limit access to precisely the resources that help artists integrate into local scenes.

As part of our project, we worked with filmmaker Ogo Eze to produce two short portraits of newcomer artists: Iranian artist Aitak Sorahitalab and Palestinian-Syrian musician Tarek Ghriri.

Both stories illustrate how, despite formidable challenges, newcomers can become community leaders, using their art to support other newcomers while enriching Toronto’s cultural scene. Their stories show resilience but also underline how much potential is lost when systemic barriers remain in place.

Mending the arts and settlement divide

We have too often treated settlement and the arts as separate and incompatible worlds. Bridging them requires a shift on both sides.

On the settlement side, we must move away from sequential-needs thinking that relegates the arts to the bottom of the priority list or treats cultural activities as communications window dressing. This underestimates the concrete, multifaceted support community arts professionals can provide and sidelines newcomer artists.

On the arts side, TAC’s program is a promising template. By offering targeted support to newcomers, the PNR acknowledges the particular challenges they face when starting out, while avoiding the trap of permanently labelling them as “migrant artists.”

Given that only two per cent of Canadian arts funders offer targeted support for newcomers, lessons from this program can guide similar initiatives across Canada and beyond.

Jeremie Molho received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Partnership Engage Grant for the project Fostering Integration through the Arts: Learning from Toronto Arts Council’s Program for Newcomers and Refugees’, conducted in partnership with Toronto Arts Council

– ref. How the arts strengthen newcomer settlement in Canada – https://theconversation.com/how-the-arts-strengthen-newcomer-settlement-in-canada-265462