OTTAWA, November 2, 2012 – CAAWS is excited to announce the release of a new report about the healthy living experiences of girls and young women from ethnic communities.
The report, based on focus groups with girls and young women, and with practitioners involved with program and service delivery for this important target group, discusses the unique sport and physical activity needs, interests and experiences of girls and young women from ethnic communities, shares insights and experiences from community and program leaders, and provides recommendations to enhance program and service delivery.
The report is part of CAAWS’ Making Healthy Connections with Racialized Communities: Girls and Young Women’s Experiences with Sport, Physical Activity and Healthy Living project, designed to enhance capacity at the community, regional and provincial to increase healthy living opportunities for girls and young women from ethnic communities. Karin Lofstrom, CAAWS’ Executive Director, said, “This project fills an important gap in knowledge and practice at the community level about how to best address the needs of our diverse communities. While the benefits of engaging girls and young women from ethnic communities in healthy living have tremendous value for their health and well-being, connecting with them will also have positive impacts on the health of their families.” According to Sport Canada’s 2005 “Sport Participation in Canada” report, girls and women from ethnic communities are the most underrepresented in the Canadian sport and recreation system. In the 2006 “Inclusive Model for Sport and Recreation Programming for Immigrant and Refugees Youth”, the Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants (OCASI) reported that many community-based sport and physical activity programs are not gender appropriate, and fail to address parental and cultural concerns with respect to girls’ and young women’s participation. OCASI recommended that more girl-focused programs be created.
CAAWS’ Making Healthy Connections with Racialized Communities project is funded by the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care’s Healthy Communities Fund (2011-2013). In addition to the Report, the CAAWS project also involves the training of 10 women as workshop facilitators, and the delivery of 20 workshops across the province. Workshops are half-day, interactive, issue-based sessions that provide an overview of the project, share focus group findings, discuss the complexities of race and multiculturalism in an increasingly diverse society as they apply to sport, physical activity and healthy living, and provide tips and recommendations to increase the participation of girls and young women from ethnic communities. Applications to become a workshop facilitator and/or to host a workshop are now available on the CAAWS website – the deadline is November 30, 2012.
Take Action and Be Involved!
To download the Report visit www.caaws.ca/onthemove/e/racialized_girls/index.htm.
To download the application package to be a Workshop Facilitator, visit www.caaws.ca/onthemove/e/racialized_girls/index.htm.
To download the application package to host a workshop in your community, visit www.caaws.ca/onthemove/e/racialized_girls/index.htm.
