The transition from high school to university is a tough one for most students, and young people with disabilities face particular challenges. To help ease them into their new world, researchers at George Brown College in Toronto are developing an online network with e-mentoring.

The Postsecondary Students with Disabilities Network (PSDNet) is intended as one way to help counter the historic failure of the education system, institutions and governments to support students with disabilities, explained Charles Anyinam, professor at George Brown College’s Faculty of Community Services and Health Sciences.

He is the lead researcher on PSDNet, a project funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council’s Community and College Social Innovation Fund. Over three years, Anyinam and a team of partners and students at George Brown will work to set up a mentoring system designed to help students with disabilities thrive at school.

It can be a struggle for them. In Ontario, students with disabilities are less likely to finish high school than those without disabilities (18.7 percent don’t finish, compared to 12.5 percent of able-bodied peers). Twice as many Ontarians without disabilities have degrees as those with disabilities. That attrition may be due, in part, to being isolated from peers and role models — which is why the focus is online mentoring. Anyinam doesn’t want any student with disabilities in Ontario to feel left out.

“When it’s done well, e-mentoring is just as effective, but the cost of e-mentoring is much less,” Anyinam said in an interview. It also removes the considerable barrier of travel from the equation. “If I am a mentor in Thunder Bay, I can still mentor someone at George Brown…we want to make sure as we are building this platform that it will extend all across Ontario — and my dream is, all across Canada. Being web-based keeps costs down but connects more people.”

Because many participants in PSDNet will be underage and potentially vulnerable, several safety precautions are being built in.  Mentors will have to go through police background checks. Online forums will be monitored for bullying or other problems. Mentor-mentee “discussions” will initially be through text messages, and participants will be encouraged to keep it that way, to ensure safety for the mentee and to help mentors feel secure in their role. Ultimately, however, whether to meet will be their decision.

Mentors and mentees will be matched based on three main criteria, Anyinam says. First is gender, because it is a big factor in university life and careers, particularly in sciences and engineer and research shows mentoring for women is best done by women. A shared area of study is also important. Finally, the nature of the disability will be considered, though it is not the most important consideration.

Students from George Brown and its partner schools in the project, Nipissing University and the University of Ontario Institute of Technology will be hired for two teams working on the project — one designing the visual interface and one developing the technical software side people don’t see.

About George Brown College

George Brown strives to build a seamless bridge between learners and employment by developing dynamic programs that are informed by industry and workplace-ready graduates who... Learn more

Where do youth in crisis turn? To the phones that never leave their hands? To friends? To the emergency department, perhaps taken there by desperate family?

Studies done in Peel, just west of Toronto, suggest youth are much more likely to turn to friends, siblings, parents and faith leaders than to teachers, telephone help lines or community crisis workers. They also show the region’s population is comprised of 58 per cent minority ethnic groups. People from different cultures and beliefs react differently to mental health and addiction issues.

Those factors may be keeping youth from getting the help they need, so their first point of contact with mental health and addiction services is in a crisis — often through the emergency department or justice system, according to Elise Hodson, of George Brown College.

She is project director for a team from George Brown and the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health that is looking for ways that will work to connect youth in crisis with services.

“Our goal is to work with youth, find out what kind of support they need and see what role technology can play in preventing and managing crisis.”

Their definition of crisis is broad, because what has an impact on mental health and addiction varies by individual and context. “It can be any situation where they felt overwhelmed and unable to cope on their own — homelessness, a break up, failing in school,” said Hodson.

The project is running on a grant from the Social Services and Humanities Research Council’s Community and College Social Innovation Fund. The Peel Services Collaborative (one of 18 set up around the province to close gaps in mental health and addiction care for children and youth) is a collaborator.

The plan is to create a digital crisis planning tool designed to develop care plans for youth and their families that draw on natural supports, and focuses on person-centred care rather than expert-driven services. Ideally, the plan will be used to keep an issue from escalating into a crisis.

Hodson is chair of the School of Design at George Brown; its role in the project is to design interactive technology that will connect youth in crisis with the support they need. They hope to show how interactive design can improve communication and relationships between users and service deliverers, but it is too soon to say what that will look like. Hodson said there is a “staggering” number of mental health apps available, many of which are well-intentioned but poorly designed, often not backed with any counselling expertise.

The design process will be collaborative, including youth, friends and family as well as 15 service providers, 10 interaction design students and faculty from George Brown, and staff from The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health’s Provincial System Support Program. The team also includes Co-Design’s Connie Chisholm, a designer and educator who brings design students and marginalized groups together to collaborate on projects.

About George Brown College

George Brown strives to build a seamless bridge between learners and employment by developing dynamic programs that are informed by industry and workplace-ready graduates who... Learn more

Showing very small children how to use a tool that was invented after you started teaching is not easy. How to do it in a way that advances learning while using the full range of what the tool has to offer is a challenge for the researchers who are studying the best uses of the tablet computer.

Tablets weren’t available when today’s crop of early childhood educators and kindergarten teachers did their training. As a result, they don’t know how to help students use tablets effectively, according to Monica McGlynn-Stewart, of George Brown College’s Centre for Early Childhood Development.

Nor does anyone else, judging by the lack of research on the topic, said McGlynn-Stewart, principal investigator on a project called “Toys or tools? Using tablet computers for open-ended literacy learning.” If you accept that computers will continue to change the way we live, it only makes sense to adapt teaching to use digital technology from the earliest years, she explained. The goal of her project is to explore effective ways to do that. “We have to figure out the way to use it to help children become resourceful, creative, critical problem solvers.”

Toys or tools is one of 27 projects funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council through its Community and College Social Innovation Fund. It’s a partnership between George Brown and the Peel District School Board, where McGlynn-Stewart is working with researcher and instructional coach Tiffany MacKay. Three tablet computers have been introduced in each of the 14 classrooms in both Peel Region and several of George Brown’s “lab schools” (which offer early learning and care to infants through to full-day kindergarten children while training college students).

One advantage to computers in the classroom is they may level the playing field. Many children are taught to use technology at home. Others may never do more than play a game on a phone. In later grades, when they need to put together a project or do research, some children (usually those already disadvantaged) will be left behind.

The tablets in the project run an app called 30 Hands. It has many functions but no content — the children are not watching cartoons. Instead, it makes the tablet another tool (or toy), like crayons or modelling clay. They can draw pictures right on it, or take photos or make videos and sound recordings of their stories, observations and plans. A child might, for instance, make a model in clay, then make a video tape of it, describing what they made and why. That is reflective learning, and it’s a cornerstone of effective learning at every level.

Classroom educators are supported in the project by George Brown students, who visit weekly to troubleshoot, and share ideas from the other classrooms they visit. The researchers also observe classrooms regularly, to see how tablets are deployed and answer questions. Focus group meetings give the educators opportunities to get together and talk about what is working, or not, in their classes.

About George Brown College

George Brown strives to build a seamless bridge between learners and employment by developing dynamic programs that are informed by industry and workplace-ready graduates who... Learn more