COH-AWH-What_Would_it_Take

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WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE? PREVENTING YOUTH HOMELESSNESS IN CANADA Many young people can pinpoint the key moment or intervention that could have changed their path into homelessness. These young people have showed us the urgent work needed to end youth homelessness, and their voices and wisdom must guide the shift towards homelessness prevention in Canada. Youth’s voices have shaped the forthcoming Roadmap for the Prevention of Youth Homelessness, and should serve as an opportunity for all levels of government to enhance and adapt their system interventions. One message from youth stood out: We are waiting too long to intervene when a young person is at risk of homelessness. Youth showed us that, by building a response that is primarily reactive, we not only condemn them to hardship and trauma, we actually ensure it by refusing to provide the resources, services, and supports they need until after they become homeless. Importantly, youth explained that both structural and system change is needed to prevent youth homelessness. We cannot rely exclusively on programmatic interventions targeted to individuals or families and expect to end youth homelessness. WHAT WOULD IT TAKE? 120
We need to dramatically shift our approaches to youth homelessness to ensure systems no longer contribute to the problem. Systems change is difficult work, requiring an integrated systems approach where multiple departments across governments work collectively towards the goal of better outcomes for all youth. This requires expanding the role of systems like education and healthcare, as well as re-defining who “owns” the issue of youth homelessness. Many systems do not see themselves as responsible for ensuring young people are housed, and do not have the mandate, resources, or tools to do this work. However, it is clear that assigning sole responsibility of this issue to the youth homelessness sector makes it very difficult to prevent homelessness before it happens. Homelessness prevention thus must go hand-in-hand with the tough work of redefining how systems and institutions operate and see themselves. Youth showed us the crucial role that public systems workers play in their trajectory into, and out of, homelessness. As we move towards an integrated systems approach, it is essential that we scale up, scale out, and scale deep. This means that we must simultaneously make changes at broad policy levels, foster change across all systems and communities, and ensure frontline workers have the tools, training, supports, and workload to engage in this shift. To do so, we need to tackle how workers’ roles and positions in some systems may change during the shift to prevention. Often a shift in organizational culture is required, and this can be very difficult work. Paramount to this shift is mobilizing the knowledge and experience of the sector to ensure that workers are equipped to implement preventative services and supports that produce better outcomes for young people. WHAT WOULD IT TAKE? 121
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WHAT WOULD IT TAKE? Youth Across Ca
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This research was made possible thr
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Are we making sig
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YOUTH’S PERSPECTIVES ON PREVENTIO
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Youth’s Proposed Solutions • In
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• Lack of education for youth on
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“My trauma led me down a wrong pa
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5. Align ministerial, departmental,
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INTEGRATED GOVERNMENT SUPPORTS 1. W
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INTRODUCTION Youth homelessness in
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Systems change is difficult work. T
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Finally, youth homelessness prevent
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CONSULTATION PROCESS National consu
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Prior to beginning the study, resea
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62 % Self-identified as currently e
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WHAT IS YOUTH HOMELESSNESS PREVENTI
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YOUTH’S PERSPECTIVES ON PREVENTIO
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WHAT WOULD IT TAKE? 1. STRUCTURAL P
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“I think that affordable housing
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LOW SOCIAL ASSISTANCE RATES Many yo
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LOW WAGES & TIGHT JOB MARKETS In th
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MOVING FORWARD To ensure better out
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1.2 LACK OF HOUSING While youth vie
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Public Housing Challenges The lack
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MOVING FORWARD The solutions propos
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“Well, for me, like, because of r
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MOVING FORWARD Indigenous youth vie
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“I have friends that are in foste
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MOVING FORWARD While youth describe
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1.5 HARMFUL SOCIETAL BELIEFS & VALU
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“A lot of systems are still set u
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ADDRESSING ADVERSE CHILDHOOD EXPERI
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WHAT WOULD IT TAKE? 2. SYSTEMS PREV
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2.1 EDUCATION For young people who
Page 69 and 70: 2. Professional Training For the mo
Page 71 and 72: Investments • Provide significant
Page 73 and 74: “Educating teachers, principals,
Page 75 and 76: Experiences in Foster Care Many you
Page 77 and 78: Difficult Transitions from Care Tra
Page 79 and 80: “My parents were good enough at l
Page 81 and 82: 2.3 HEALTHCARE & ADDICTIONS For you
Page 83 and 84: An additional issue raised by many
Page 85 and 86: MOVING FORWARD Without a Home: The
Page 87 and 88: 2.4 YOUTH HOMELESSNESS SECTOR In fo
Page 89 and 90: “Requirements to access help some
Page 91 and 92: “Yeah, when I first moved in [to
Page 93 and 94: PREVENTING YOUTH HOMELESSNESS IN TH
Page 95 and 96: While the recommendations below can
Page 97 and 98: 2.5 CRIMINAL JUSTICE A common conce
Page 99 and 100: PREVENTING YOUTH HOMELESSNESS IN TH
Page 101 and 102: MOVING FORWARD Canadian research sh
Page 103 and 104: WHAT WOULD IT TAKE? 3. PREVENTING I
Page 105 and 106: ADDRESSING FAMILY CONFLICT, ABUSE,
Page 107 and 108: “This is real. We did not choose
Page 109 and 110: Lack of services and supports also
Page 111 and 112: MOVING FORWARD Youth across the cou
Page 113 and 114: ADDRESSING SOCIAL EXCLUSION & ISOLA
Page 115 and 116: “I’m just trying to say that, i
Page 117 and 118: ADDRESSING VIOLENCE IN THE COMMUNIT
Page 119: YOUTH’S MESSAGES TO ALL LEVELS OF
Page 123 and 124: RECOMMENDATIONS 1 GOVERNMENT OF CAN
Page 125 and 126: 5. Align ministerial, departmental,
Page 127 and 128: 2. Embed youth homelessness prevent
Page 129 and 130: INTEGRATED GOVERNMENT SUPPORTS 1. W
Page 131 and 132: 3. Require that all school boards a
Page 133 and 134: 5. Offer comprehensive, youth-focus
Page 135 and 136: 8. Systematically investigate and e
Page 137 and 138: Provincial/Territorial Ministries R
Page 139 and 140: 6. Seek to provide highly integrate
Page 141 and 142: 3. Foster meaningful youth engageme
Page 143 and 144: Gaetz, S., O’Grady, B., Kidd, S.,
Page 145: Statistics Canada. (2011). National
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