2020 News Updates

2020 News Updates

News Updates from 2020

Summer 2020 COVID-19 Centre Updates

We are looking forward to reopening the centre as soon as we finalize the details to keep our staff and members safe. We have been working hard to ensure the new COVID-19 Safety Measures are complete and follow all the appropriate recommendations from Public Health. Stay tuned for more information regarding the opening in the coming days.

Our planned opening is on August 10, 2020. There will of course be some modifiations to the "normal" operations of the centre which include new hours: 4:30pm-7:30pm, mandatory mask wearing (we have some available), physical distancing will be in effect, all youth will receive a Safety Pamphlet. Youth will also take part in an orientation to learn about our important new safety protocals.

Fall and Winter 2019/2020 Updates

The fall season was a busy month at The Door as the youth went back to school and numbers increased at the centre. We gained a significant amount of new youth throughout the month.

During the first week we welcomed some youth we hadn’t seen all summer back to the centre and celebrated back to school. This week we provided youth with a brief info session reminding them about the homework services we offer at the centre, such as homework help and our incentive program. We also enjoyed our second delicious dinner from the restaurant Cumin.

The second week of September we had our first McPhail Dinner after the summer break. The youth were very excited to have this back at the centre, and enjoyed seeing the McPhail volunteers. This same night, in honour of World Suicide Prevention Day, we informed the youth about mental health services in the area, and provided them with crisis line phone numbers to put in their phones.

Later that week we had a Youth of the Month Dessert celebration for our winner Bawi. We also had an Arts and Crafts Night this week, which a surprising amount of youth took part in. A number of youth painted, coloured, drew and made beading designs.

For the third week of September, we had our Back to School BBQ! New Kitchen Coordinator Kelly, along with Placement Student Mohammad, barbequed us up some delicious hamburgers much to the pleasure of the youth. It was also a great chance for some of our new youth to see some of the special events we hold here. Unfortunately, this week our scheduled workshop, “Intersecting Identities” by the Canadian Centre for Gender and Sexual Diversity was canceled by the presenter, but hopefully we will have them in at a later time.

In the final week of September, a cooking demonstration was held by Malik. He showed youth how to make “shakshouka”, a Lebanese dish, and the meal was thoroughly enjoyed by our youth. Later in the week, youth had a board game night, and a movie night. Since the PS4 was moved to the Hangout Room, and the TV section has now become solely used for movies and Netflix, youth have enjoyed having movie nights and chilling in this TV area.

We started October off in the best way, with a McPhail dinner! We were fortunate enough to have two McPhail dinners in October, which the youth were of course very pleased with. This same week, staff made it a priority to go through the Member Survey with youth, and were able to collect a significant amount of data. In the second week of October, we had our first workshop of the month by Up with People. This organization is a collective of young people around the world, who come together to help out different communities. Their workshop focused on encouraging youth to think hard about difficult questions, and acknowledge the complexity of the world we live in. They did this by asking the group different questions, focusing on political and social issues, and got youth to move around the room as a way to represent their answer to the questions. Up with People also helped the centre out tremendously by spending a day cleaning the centre! They were a great group of young people and we are lucky to have had them volunteer their time at The Door.

This same week, we took part in GLAD’s Cleaning the Capital activity. Youth, staff, and volunteers picked up litter around the The Door’s building property, as well as the neighbouring street. Cleaning the Capital is always a great chance for youth to get outside, see the community around them, and play a role in helping their community.

Later in the week we were visited by Emily Fitzgerald, the new Dietician at Massine’s Independent Grocery Store who will be carrying on the cooking class sessions. Emily showed youth how to make delicious yoghurt parfaits as a healthy dessert.

During the short week following Thanksgiving, youth enjoyed their second McPhail Dinner. We continued our Youth of the Month dessert tradition by celebrating youth Tyra Boudreau, who was recognized for her commitment to her school work. Also this week, In honour of International Black Poetry Day, a variety of different poems by Black writers were posted around the centre, and youth were encouraged to read and reflect on them.

We had our second workshop of the month during the fourth week of October. University of Ottawa’s Sexual Health Outreach Program (SHOUT) came to discuss Healthy Relationships and Safe Dating. They encouraged youth to think about what they might like from a partner and discussed boundaries. They also touched on more specific things such as how you might want to ask someone out, how you might want to be asked out, how to deal with someone not feeling the same way about you, and more. The presenters emphasized the importance of consent and respecting others boundaries when it comes to dating. Even though some youth are not yet entering romantic relationships, it was a great chance to have some frank conversations about how dating can be challenging, but it is important to be open and communicate. It was also great to touch on the topic of someone not returning your romantic feelings, and have the youth be able to think of that in a healthier way. For the final week of October, the centre was in full Halloween swing! Youth and staff put up Halloween decorations, and carved pumpkins to get in the spirit. Thanks to a private donor, we also went on a field trip to Saunders Farm! Everyone had a fantastic time exploring the farm and going into the Haunted Houses. It was really great to get the youth out of the centre, and see them having so much fun. Everyone is looking forward to more field trips this year!

January was a great month at The Door as we got back into the swing of things after the holiday break. While numbers were lower, partially due to weather, high school exams and teacher strikes, we still had some very successful programming.

The first two weeks of the month started off fairly relaxed as we enjoyed being back in the centre. We made New Years resolution lists, played lots of board games and card games, had a ping pong tournament, made hot chocolate together, and many youth worked hard on homework in preparation for summatives and exams.

For the third week of January, things started to get a little busier. We had our first McPhail Dinner of the year, and youth were very happy to see the amazing volunteers again.

That same night we had Lydia Collins from Somerset West Community Health Centre come in and have a meet and greet with the youth. Lydia is a Community Development Worker that works specifically in Youth Health and Wellness, as well as HIV Prevention. She has expressed interest in doing monthly informal discussions with the youth that will create a space for youth to discuss mental, physical and sexual health and wellness, in the centre. We are planning for a February session, so this month was just about getting to know the youth and the centre.

Later this week, we had a visit from Sharon, an RBC Dominion-Securities staff who came to volunteer her time and skills to teach youth how to sew! Several youth took part in learning how to sew buttons on and sew hems. Going forward, Sharon will be joining us on the last Wednesday of every month, so we are very much looking forward to her visits.

The final week of January was also a busy one. We had our exam study room set up, and many youth took advantage of the space to work. We also had a workshop this week by Casey from the Wabano Centre. The topic of the workshop was Human Trafficking awareness, however this night we happened to have a fairly young group of youth (12-13), so Casey tailored the presentation to their age group. She focused more on some underlying aspects of control and coercion in relationship, compared to healthy aspects of a relationship. Given that most of the youth present had not been around for some of our other healthy relationship workshops, it seemed to be very informative and helpful for them.

This last week we were also fortunate to have two fantastic food nights. Thanks to Massine’s Independent Grocery Store, Dietician Emily Fitzgerald came to the centre in celebration of the stores Raise a Food Lover week. She brought with her everything needed to make tacos, including lots of toppings and vegetarian alternatives. Later in the night we made black bean brownies. Youth were thrilled by all the delicious food, and throughout the evening, Emily explained the nutritious importance of many of the ingredients. At the end of the week, we had another great food night with Sumaiya, one of Kitchen Coordinator Kelly’s friends. She taught youth how to make delicious vanilla cupcakes, as well as some helpful baking tips.

February was another eventful month at The Door between programming, field trips, as well as some staff changes.

During the first week of the month, our placement student Megan showed youth how to make their own lip balm and lip scrubs! Several youth were really interested in this, and were surprised by how easy it was. We are hoping to have this activity again at some point, so that the youth can take advantage of the supplies we already have here at the centre.

Later this week, we had an awesome field trip to celebrate Black History Month, at the Imagine. Inspire. Ignite! Event by Carleton University. Staff and youth went to the event to see some amazing speakers and performances, all in celebration of Black Excellence, and the African Diaspora in Canada. It was a very inspiring night, as well as a chance for some of our Black youth to see some powerful representation, and our non-Black youth to better understand the Black experience in Canada. We were all very grateful to have had the chance to go to this event. Youth also very much enjoyed stopping before the event to get burgers at Season’s Pizza.

This first week was quite busy, as we also had another visit by King Kimbit from Cap City Cyphers. King Kimbit has been to the centre several times now, but this time she came to start the Arts Programming initiative she has done with a few other youth groups now. The idea is to connect youth to the arts community in Ottawa, encourage them to work on their own art, and also learn the behind the scenes skills, such as promotion, networking, organization and budgeting. She sat with a group of interested youth and brainstormed some possible event ideas, including an art show, a karaoke show, and a talent show. She is returning in March to meet with the youth again and hopefully continue to develop the plan.

The second week was also a busy one. We had a great Info Session led by RBC staff members. This workshop was a response to some of the youth who expressed the need to have a bank account, in order to get a job and receive their pay. The presenters provided the youth with some financial literacy information, such as what a bank account is, the difference between a chequing and savings account, what credit is, and more. They also provided the youth with a budgeting exercise that got youth thinking about the importance of having a budget once they start earning their own money. Overall, youth seemed to learn a lot from the presentation, and the youth enjoyed talking to the presenters and asking all the questions they needed answer for regarding banking and accounts.

The following day we had another Sexual Health Workshop by SHOUT (UOttawa’s Sexual Health Outreach Team). They returned to the centre this time to discuss different types of relationships. They initiated some very open and frank discussions around the variety of forms “relationships” can come in. For example, monogamous, polyamorous, open, sexual, non-sexual, etc. It prompted some very healthy and open discussion between the youth, all of which underlined the importance of having open communication and trust in relationships.

During the third week of February we had our second McPhail Dinner. We were lucky enough to have had one earlier in the month as well. In their first visit, McPhail volunteers brought us some very sweet Valentine’s Day candy to hand out to the youth.

At the end of this week, a very bittersweet celebration was had as we said goodbye to our amazing Supervisor, Kyle. Malik made some special tacos, and farewell signs were put up around the centre. All the youth were very sad to see Kyle go, and were remembering some of the great memories had with him. Everyone is very happy that he will be returning as a volunteer in the spring!

The final week of February was more relaxed, as we welcomed our new Supervisor, Marianne. We had a few simple activities such as pool tournaments, baking, and celebrating National Pancake Day, all well helping Marianne become settled into the role.

In terms of out-of-centre activities this month, our 2nd Annual Comedy Night Fundraiser at Yuk Yuk’s Comedy Club took place, thanks to our Placement student Megan. It was a very fun night with a successful amount of funds raised!

During the 2nd week of March the Door Team decided to take the advice of OPH and close our doors for indoor programming to decrease the spread of Covid-19. We did however continue to support our youth members through social media by providing resources and ideas to keep entertained while social distancing. In the last week of March we began planning for Virtual Programming which will allow us to be available for our youth members during these hard and challenging times. We are hoping to start Virtual Programs through Zoom to allow youth to interact with both the staff and volunteers on specific days and times for the remaining Covid-19 pandemic period and social distancing is practiced.