Innovative Social Pedagogy

This project mobilizes evidence-based principles in social pedagogy to promote critical digital literacy and empower marginalized communities.

The Innovative Social Pedagogy* to Empower Indigenous Communities, Reduce Gender, and Racial Biases project is funded by Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC). This project will take place over 3 locations, Montreal, Chicoutimi, and Edmonton and over the span of 3 years. Project Someone (Concordia University, Montreal), the University of Alberta and The Université du Québec à Chicoutimi, along with community partners, will co-create, adapt and evaluate four distinct types of interventions. These are interactive workshops, documentaries and multimedia, online courses, and policy briefs.

*Social pedagogy refers to the inclusive and reflexive co-creation of interventions and strategies to better magnify the voices of marginalized communities that have been undermined due to systemic discrimination that accompany hierarchies of knowledge and power.

Our work is aligned with UN 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) concerning quality education, equality, gender, partnerships and establishment of strong institutions that promote peace and justice.

SDG 4 (quality education): eliminate all discrimination in education;
SDG 5 (gender equality): end discrimination against women and girls; ensure full participation in leadership and decision-making;
SDG 10 (reduced inequality): ensure equal opportunities and end discrimination;
SDG 16 (peace, justice & strong institutions): reduce violence everywhere; promote and enforce non-discriminatory laws and policies; and
SDG 17 (partnerships): target encourage effective partnerships.

SDG 4 (quality education): eliminate all discrimination in education;
SDG 5 (gender equality): end discrimination against women and girls; ensure full participation in leadership and decision-making;
SDG 10 (reduced inequality): ensure equal opportunities and end discrimination;
SDG 16 (peace, justice & strong institutions): reduce violence everywhere; promote and enforce non-discriminatory laws and policies; and
SDG 17 (partnerships): target encourage effective partnerships.

Team

Vivek Venkatesh PhD

Vivek Venkatesh is UNESCO co-Chair in Prevention of Radicalisation and Violent Extremism, and Professor of Inclusive Practices in Visual Arts in the Department of Art Education at the Faculty of Fine Arts at Concordia University. He is an interdisciplinary and applied learning scientist who investigates the psychological, cultural and cognitive factors impacting the design, development and inclusive adoption of digital media in educational and social contexts.

Website

Élisabeth Kaine PhD

Élisabeth Kaine (Associate Professor of Art, UQAC) is involved in many fields of design. She has received grants from CALQ and the Canada Council for the Arts, leading research teams on numerous projects. Huron-Wendat originally from Wendake, she has devoted her career to the development of collaborative research methodologies with the First Peoples of Quebec and Brazil. Élisabeth co-founded La Boîte Rouge VIF and is co-holder of the UNESCO Chair in Cultural Transmission among First Peoples as a Dynamic of Well-Being and Empowerment.

Paul L. Gareau PhD

Paul L. Gareau is Métis and an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Native Studies at the University of Alberta. Grounded in Métis Studies and Indigenous Studies, as well as Religious Studies, Gareau’s work centres on theory and methodology around relationality, gender, Indigenous epistemologies, land and place, and sovereignty/peoplehood.

Mathieu Cook PhD

Mathieu Cook is co-holder of the UNESCO Chair in Cultural Transmission among First Peoples as a Dynamic of Well-Being and Empowerment. Professor in the Department of Human and Social Sciences at UQAC, his academic and social commitments reflect a keen interest in the conditions of immigrants and the relations between non-native and native peoples.

Kathryn Urbaniak

Kathryn Urbaniak is Program Manager at Project Someone, Concordia University. She is an experienced research professional and learning experience designer with degrees in Educational technology, Information Technology, and Business.

Nykkie Lugosi-Schimpf PhD

Nykkie Lugosi-Schimpf, Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Native Studies at the University of Alberta, is a Métis and European scholar at the intersection of Indigenous Studies, Political Science, and Sociology. Her research investigates issues of racism and nationalism in post-colonial (Canada and the US) and post-communist (Central Eastern Europe) contexts.

Lucy Lu

Lucy Lu is a Chinese-Vietnamese Canadian practicing as an art therapist, counselling therapist, and artist currently based in amiskwacîwâskahikan/ Edmonton. She is the Artistic Director of Thirdspace Playback Theatre Edmonton, where she facilitates community dialogue and storytelling with marginalized communities through this form of improvised and participatory theatre.

Diane Querrien PhD

Diane Querrien is an assistant professor in the Département d’études françaises at Concordia University. Her research interests include the application of plurilingual and pluricultural approaches to second language teacher education, as well as the development of active and inclusive pedagogy in higher education.

Wynnpaul Varela PhD

Wynnpaul Varela is the Innovative Social Pedagogy project coordinator. Since arriving in Montreal in 2009, Wynnpaul has worked as a freelance editor, researcher, and learning experience designer. He previously lived and worked in Japan for 15 years. His PhD research focused on how music students practise their instruments.

Josie-Ann Bonneau

Josie-Ann Bonneau, coordinator of the UNESCO Chair in Cultural Transmission among First Peoples as a Dynamic of Well-Being and Empowerment, holds a BA in sociology and anthropology and an MA in regional studies and interventions. Her research explored Latin American women’s integration in Saguenay. Her work seeks to decolonize relations between Indigenous and non-Indigenous organizations and promote Indigenous languages and cultures.

Shawn Tse

Shawn Tse 謝兆龍 is a father, multidisciplinary artist, and community organizer living in amiskwacîwâskahikan/ Edmonton. His practice centres around community engagement, social justice, and storytelling from underrepresented voices. He is an actor in Thirdspace Playback Theatre, co-founder of Aiya哎呀, video director at Fallout Media, and creator of the intergenerational cooking show, Seconds, Please!

Dalia Elsayed

Dalia Elsayed is a PhD student in the Department of Education at Concordia University. Her research explores race, identity, intersectionality, and feminist epistemology. Focusing on Black graduate students in Canadian institutions, Dalia seeks to understand blackness and the narratives and frameworks contributing to its construction and articulation from a global perspective.

Emanuelle Dufour PhD

Emanuelle Dufour holds a master’s in anthropology (Université de Montréal) focused on Indigenous cultural security and a doctorate in art education (Concordia University). She authored the comic strip, “C’est le Québec qui est né dans mon pays” (2021). She works as a lecturer, graphic facilitator, and Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion educational advisor at Collège Ahuntsic (Montréal).

Website

Catherine Montmagny-Grenier PhD

Catherine Montmagny-Grenier holds a PhD from the University of Montreal. Her doctoral dissertation investigates the role of space in the (re)production of illegalisms, playful deviance, and knowledge. She has collaborated in research projects on sex work, sexual tourism, women trafficking, homicide against women, and alternative pornography.

Jason Wallin PhD

Jason Wallin is Professor of Media and Youth Culture Studies in the Department of Secondary Education at the University of Alberta.

Website

Veronica Mockler

Veronica Mockler is an artist and student researcher at Concordia University. Her work in contemporary art, social pedagogy, oral history, and documentary media redefines how her collaborators are heard vis-à-vis systemic oppression. Her research-creation explores activists’ unscripted listening and speaking as a practice of resilience. Veronica has worked in Northern Ireland, Scotland, Germany, Uruguay, the U.S., and Canada.

Leslie Touré Kapo PhD

Leslie Touré Kapo explores the social construction of race and its impact on life trajectories of working-class and immigrant individuals. He has extensive experience in social intervention and education in marginalized urban spaces in both France and Québec. His doctoral thesis—an ethnography on the racialization of Montreal youth—received the INRS Urbanisation Culture Société Research Centre’s prize for best thesis 2020–2021.

Stacey Cann

Stacey Cann is a multidisciplinary artist, writer and PhD student working in Montreal, Quebec. She holds a BFA in Print Media from Alberta University of the Arts (formerly Alberta College of Art and Design), and an MA in Art Education from Concordia University. She is a member of the Bureau of Noncompetitive Research. Cann’s research interests include collaboration, post-secondary teaching and learning, as well as slow practices

Victoria Stanton

Victoria Stanton is an international performance artist—and writer, curator, educator—who has co-authored two books and published several texts focusing on the dialogical and performative as it is revealed in material and time-based works. Having begun a research-creation PhD in Art Education at Concordia University, her current work focuses on exploring “Doing Nothing” as a creative vehicle in artistic process through examining the role of rest/pause/interval in both performance art contexts and everyday spaces like the classroom.

José Cortés

José Cortés is a transdisciplinary artist and PhD student in Art Education at Concordia University, researching cognitive practices and collaborative learning. He has a professional background in higher education and cultural management.

Rawda Harb

Rawda Harb is a Ph.D. student working on supporting at-risk youth in Montreal's adult education centers. She is the founder of Communité, an educator at LBPSB and researcher at Project Someone.