Anti-Racist, Anti-Oppressive E-course for the Canadian Women’s Foundation
March 2024 - February 2025
In collaboration with
THE CONTEXT
A national leader in advancing gender justice, the Canadian Women’s Foundation (CWF) funds community programs across Canada that support women, girls, and gender-diverse people. Their work spans economic empowerment, gender-based violence prevention, leadership, and inclusive mental health initiatives.
The CWF partnered with Taylor Newberry consulting to research and understand the unique circumstances and needs of girls and youth aged 9-13 from equity-deserving communities. The research clearly indicated the need for inclusive, trauma-informed, and equity-based support for Black, Indigenous, and racialized girls, as well as trans, two-spirit, nonbinary, and gender-questioning youth who experience disproportionate rates of gender-based violence and systemic marginalization.
This was a project about equipping youth workers with the tools, confidence, and community-rooted knowledge to support the mental well-being of girls and gender-diverse youth through an anti-racist, trauma-informed lens.
THE ASK
CWF engaged us (alongside our collaborator Pure & Applied) to develop a transformative, trauma-informed e-learning curriculum and course. The program’s goal: build the capacity of youth workers to better support the mental well-being of girls and gender-diverse youth — particularly those who are Black and Indigenous, and those from 2SLGBTQIA+ communities navigating systemic barriers.
The Foundation recognized a need from their grantees and an opportunity to support: many frontline staff in girls’ and youth programs were being asked to support mental health needs without having the tools, frameworks, or confidence to do so through an anti-racist, culturally responsive lens.
OUR APPROACH
Centering the needs of equity-deserving youth and youth-care providers in order to design with care.
This project wasn’t just about creating a course — it required deep care and intentional co-creation. In the aftermath of a global pandemic and ongoing social uprisings, youth workers across the country were experiencing burnout, secondary trauma, and the weight of trying to meet increasingly complex needs with limited resources.
We understood that for any training to be meaningful, it had to speak to both the systemic and relational layers of care work. That meant creating a learning experience that validated the lived experiences of racialized and gender-diverse youth — and of the workers supporting them — while offering practical strategies grounded in equity, justice and belonging.
OUR SOLUTION
Working in collaboration with Pure & Applied and key CWF team members, informed by the rich insights and lived-experiences of the Foundation’s grantee organizations and youth-care providers, we co-designed and piloted an e-learning course that equipped youth workers with the tools to recognize, respond to, and support the mental health of Black, Indigenous and gender-diverse girls and youth.
What we delivered:
A trauma-informed, culturally responsive training model
Curriculum rooted in anti-racist, anti-oppressive principles
Real-world case studies and applied learning activities
Interactive, accessible modules designed for CWFs online-learning platform
Key Features:
Deep listening and engagement with youth workers and community leaders
Balance of theory and practice, including emerging mental health research
Exercises that model inclusive practices and prioritize psychological safety
Frameworks for navigating mental health care in resource-constrained settings
Scope & Reach:
Cross-national co-creation process with diverse practitioners
100% of design informed by frontline experiences
Pilot phase designed to be adaptable across sectors, languages, and geographies
THE IMPACT & RESULTS
Who Cares? An ARAO Guide to Supporting Youth Mental Health is now available for free in both English and French. Since its public launch at the end of June, 2025, the course has been accessed by ~600 youth-care professionals.
The e-course represents a foundational investment in gender justice and mental well-being. We are proud to have contributed to creating and providing:
A scalable, equity-centered curriculum now available to frontline workers
Increased knowledge, confidence, and skills among youth workers who engage in the course
Frameworks and tools for organizations to better support both staff and youth
A tangible contribution to the broader movement toward inclusive mental health support for equity-deserving communities
This important work continues.
New Room and Pure & Applied are continuing to grow the impact of this important course. The CWF team has mandated us to design an additional module specifically exploring youth care within the northern context. This module will be designed in collaboration with youth care providers who deeply understand the context, through the participation and engagement of a Community of Practice of youth care providers from Northern communities in the Subarctic and Arctic of Canada.
“It was a pleasure to work with New Room. At every stage of the project, I could see their passion and strong sense of organization. They are truly committed to social justice and bring a clear expertise that shines through in their work.
Their creativity and vision allowed our ambitious project to come to life. Our ask was significant, and they delivered a high-quality product.”
Catherine Plouffe Jetté, Manager Community Initiative, Canadian Women’s Foundation
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