Abstract
This reflection writing was co-written by seven young people and three Master of Arts Child and Youth Care (MA CYC) students from Ryerson University. Our writing centres around a Canadian youth-led initiative called Youth First, developed as a MA CYC placement due to the lack of placement opportunities available during the pandemic. Youth First focused on creating safe and interactive spaces in cyberspace for young people during the pandemic. Through this reflection, we hope to share our experiences, accomplishments, lessons learned and overall reflection of being part of this initiative during a global pandemic.
Highlights
This reflection writing was co-written by seven young people between the ages of 19 and 24 who are located in various places in Canada such as British Columbia, Ottawa and Ontario
Youth First is a project that was led by a group of Master of Arts Child and Youth Care (MA CYC) students (Reah Shin, Catherine Howe and Kyla Quigley) and young people from the Youth First’s Online Youth Advisory Group (OYAG) (Harleen Kaur, Justin Whitty, Regan Katerenchuk, Victoria Bonnell, Ronglan Cao, Geoffrey Pearson and James Liu)
MA CYC student Reah Shin, hoped to respond to the current events happening in the world as well as to have an opportunity to work alongside and learn from young people who wished to support other young people who had been affected by the pandemic
Summary
Some of the OYAG members and the MA CYC students had been part of social media groups and communities before starting this initiative. Three MA CYC students were part of the Youth First social media team These online dialogues with young people were held in an inclusive and open-minded virtual environment where youth from various backgrounds exchanged ideas on how to create meaningful connections during the pandemic. Through these initial conversations, it became clear that young people were being significantly impacted by the unpredictability and significant life changes the pandemic presented. It was clear that it was a very dynamic team with diverse backgrounds and identities, lived experiences, age, values, and other social locations It was important for the OYAG members and the MA CYC students to reflect on the imbalance of power that existed in the initiative. Partnership with other organizations and youth-led initiatives proved to be a great way for us to learn and reflect on our initiative
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