VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
(En)Compassing Heart: A Youth-led, Grassroots NGOs Navigation Towards Sustainability

(En)Compassing Heart explores and documents the organizational journey of POR AMOR Community Enhancement Initiatives. POR AMOR is a current, Toronto based, youth-led, non-profit organization I co-founded with three other young women in 2003. POR AMOR initiatives focus on youth empowerment and specifically helping young people to make responsible transitions into adulthood and become active leaders in their communities. Through the use of arts-informed methodological practices, this project is constructed as a modern narrative, infused with spoken-word poetry, to track the journey of a young girl from her passion for the arts to becoming an empowered individual within her community. The young protagonist is representative of the journey of POR AMOR, our journey as young people navigating our way to meaningful work in communities. The mission of POR AMOR is to promote and facilitate art-based youth empowerment initiatives in local and international community contexts.

Keywords: non-profit organization
sustainability
Youth-led
art-based education
Grassroots
navigation
(en)compassing heart
community development
international community work
youth empowerment
arts-informed methodology
spoken word poetry
Advisor: Cole, Ardra
Contextualizing Outcomes of Public Schooling: Disparate Post-secondary Aspirations among Aboriginal and Non-Aboriginal Secondary Students

To understand how Aboriginal youths’ access to post-secondary schooling opportunities is created and constrained, structures of inclusion and exclusion are examined. In particular, the legitimization of unequal treatment and disparate outcomes is problematized; making the case that public schooling systems limit the opportunities of youth. In this study, youths’ post-secondary aspirations are contextualized on the basis of racial identity, gender, programs of enrolment, graduate destinations, parent’s level of schooling, parental income, and community size; binary analyses evaluate the relationships among these variables. The variables were accessed from the Youth in Transition Survey (YITS) and the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). Findings of this research counter other studies that demonstrate Aboriginal youth with lower post-secondary opportunities relative to their peers. This study substantiates that barriers to aspiration achievement and post-secondary opportunities are not from a lack of ambition or academic preparedness among Aboriginal youth attending Canadian public schools.

Keywords: Aboriginal
Contexts of learning
Post-secondary aspirations
Youth
Public school
School-to-work transition
Social reproduction
Systemic inequality
Equality of opportunity
Bricolage
Structuration
Pragmatism
Programme for International Student Assessment
Youth in Transition Survey
Comparative education
Access to post-secondary schooling
Streaming
Indigenous
Native
First Nations
Métis
Inuit
Socio-economic status
Race
Gender
Location
Higher education
Canada
PISA
YITS
Assessment
Canadian
Meritocracy
Democracy
Advisor: Restoule, Jean-Paul
Bascia, Nina
The Reflective Practitioner: On the Margins­ Talking with Métis Educator Dave Skene about his Life's Work

In this Arts-informed Life History I use dialogue and narrative to illustrate “pedagogy in practice” and illuminate the life’s work of Métis adult educator Dave Skene. Skene tells stories of experience working cross-culturally to illustrate how individuals are transformed by learning experiences and how they contribute to transformative learning in others' lives. He recounts experiences of working for social justice and community development in the global context of north-south knowledge exchange. Skene’s life crosses many borders and the research account walks readers through a life growing up in an urban setting, surviving on the street, discovering God, working internationally with indigenous peoples, listening to stories in areas of protracted conflict and war, and co-founding a Non Governmental Organization, Global Youth Network. As researcher I interweave reflexive accounts of cross-cultural experiences in Canada and Latin America to contribute to understanding how to undertake life history research and issues in its representation.

Keywords: life history
arts-informed
biography
metis
adult education
dialogue
reflexive inquiry
Aboriginal
native
narrative
Advisor: Knowles, J. Gary
Recidivism Among Treated Sexual Offenders and a Matched Comparison of Untreated Sexual Offenders

The present investigation examined a sample of 64 offenders treated at the Regional Treatment Centre (Ontario) Sex Offender Treatment Program (RTCSOTP) and a sample of 55 untreated sexual offenders from the Ontario region of Correctional Service of Canada. Groups were matched on age at index offence, Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) score and type of sexual offender. The Rapid Risk Assessment of Sexual Offence Recidivism Scale was scored on all participants. Recidivism, based upon officially recorded charges and conviction data, was the primary dependent measure. Results indicated that both treated participants and control participants, including those with high PCL-R scores, evidenced low sexual recidivism rates. Based on a survival analysis using time to recidivism as the dependent variable, no differences were found between treated and untreated sexual offenders. The need to consider a wider range of treatment outcome measures and the benefits of using dynamic methods of risk assessment are highlighted.

Keywords: sex offender
psychopathy
treatment
Advisor: Gillis, Joseph Roy
Weighing the Evidence: The Influence of Stereotypical Attitudes and Survivor Body Weight on Public Perceptions of Sexual Assault

The present study explored the influence of survivor weight and participant gender, rape myth acceptance and anti-fat attitudes on perceptions of sexual assault. Using an online survey tool, participants (N = 413) read a vignette describing a hypothetical sexual assault scenario and completed several self-report questionnaires. Generalized linear model analyses revealed that participants were more likely to hold the survivor responsible, excuse the perpetrator’s actions, and respond more negatively toward the survivor and more positively toward the perpetrator when the survivor was depicted as thin versus overweight. Interactions were found between rape myth acceptance and survivor weight, gender and survivor weight, and gender and anti-fat attitudes, for certain dependent variables. In addition, men and those with higher levels of rape myth acceptance and anti-fat attitudes were found to make more negative evaluations of the survivor and more positive evaluations of the perpetrator. Recommendations for future research and interventions are discussed.

Keywords: sexual assault
body weight
rape myths
stereotypes
Advisor: Stermac, Lana
Online Tables & Tablecloths: Facilitating Space for Online Learning & Collaboration

This thesis describes the researcher’s journey as an online facilitator and reflective organization development (OD) practitioner as she explores how to nurture and cultivate space for learning and collaboration in an online community of practice. The research setting is a small group of mostly volunteers in a national health charity. The researcher adopts a reflective practitioner research approach engaging in a continuous process of story-telling throughout the thesis. She struggles with questions such as her own dynamic role as an outside facilitator, the role of technology, dilemmas of emergence versus design and discovery of purpose. Rather than arriving at a to-do-list for potential online facilitators, she discovers that hosting café style conversations, setting the online tables and enabling space for learning, collaboration and aliveness is more a matter of the facilitator’s capacity to listen, to be authentically present and to relinquish control.

Keywords: online learning
online facilitation
organization development
reflective practitioner research
online community of practice
outside consultant
nurturing space
qualitative research
action research
role of technology
authentic online facilitation
emergence
hosting
online collaboration
non-profit
Advisor: Jackson, Nancy
Serial Monogamy and Relational Influences on Patterns of Condom Use for Young Adults in Dating Relationships

Within Canada, young adults have been identified as being at high risk for sexually transmitted infections (STI). One major contributing factor is inconsistent condom use, particularly within monogamous relationships (Civic, 2000; Critelli & Suire, 1998; Misovich, Fisher & Fisher, 1997; Winfield & Whaley, 2005). This research used qualitative methods to investigate the process by which young women rationalize inconsistent condom use and the relational influences that aid in this transition. A sample of fifteen women (between 18-24 years of age) were surveyed and interviewed. Using grounded theory analysis, the results indicated that the process of discontinuing condoms is multifaceted. Within relationships, unprotected sex comes to signify developmental milestones for the couple. It is associated with desirable relationship characteristics of commitment, trust, intimacy and fidelity. The results suggest that health promotion interventions should emphasize the high risk for STI posed by using condoms inconsistently within the monogamous relationships of young adults.

Keywords: serial monogamy
condom use
Advisor: Schneider, Margaret
A Qualitative Analysis of Factors Contributing to Increased HIV Incidence for Gay and Bisexual Men: Implications for Prevention

HIV incidence continues to rise in the population of gay and bisexual men (Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS, 2008), a high-risk group due to the complexity of promoting sexual behavior change on an enduring basis. In the present study, interview data from fifteen self-identified gay or bisexual men living in an urban Canadian city was analyzed in order to determine the most salient psychosocial factors in decision-making leading to safe sexual choices, and the psychological implications of these factors for the mental health and well-being of participants. Results suggest three core factors are most relevant to sexual decision-making for gay/bisexual men: self-efficacy, sexual communication and/or negotiation, and individual assessment of risk. A conceptual model of factors influencing sexual decision-making is presented. These results are discussed in terms of their implications for future HIV prevention interventions and the clinical practice of counselling psychology with gay and bisexual male clients.

Keywords: gay
bisexual
men
counselling
HIV
prevention
Advisor: Gillis, Joseph Roy
Learning and Activism: Iranian Women in Diaspora

This qualitative study looks at the learning that takes place during activism. Throughout this work, learning is conceptualized as the ongoing formation of critical consciousness rather than the acuqisition of skills for the purpose of securing menial employment. Furthermore, critical consciousness is seen to develop through the nonlinear interplay of thoughts and actions. This investigation uses the life history method to explore the learning of five Iranian women throughout decades of struggle against repressive social structures. It focuses on questions of motivation for activism, formation of critical consciousness, and activism in diaspora. At the theoretical level, this study criticizes current learning theories while its educational implications place critical consciousness as the goal of radical adult education. On a practical level, this investigation records successful political study groups and suggests such groups as models for sites of radical adult education.

Keywords: critical consciousness
radical adult education
Advisor: Mojab, Shahrzad
"A Spirit of Service:" Conceptualizing Service in Learning through the Preparation for Social Action (PSA) Program in Uganda

This research explores implications of service in learning for social change through an investigation of the Preparation for Social Action (PSA) Program in Uganda against the backdrop of the literature on service learning. Employing critical pedagogy as a theoretical framework, I approach questions regarding the conceptualization of self and society in service as a relational process, the conceptualization of service as praxis, and the conceptualization of social change within an orientation towards service. Through this analysis I present a case for conceptualizing service in learning within a dialogical framework oriented towards change.

Keywords: Curriculum and Instruction
Advisor: Gaztambide-Fernandez, Ruben
Collaging Complexity: Youth, HIV/AIDS and the Site/Sight of Sexuality

Using collage as a methodological and conceptual framework for re-conceptualizing knowledge in HIV/AIDS education, this thesis attends to young women’s understandings of HIV/AIDS and sexuality. Through engaging in the process of making collages, what stories do young women tell about HIV/AIDS? What discourses are produced when collage and narrative are used as methodological tools to address participants’ understandings of HIV/AIDS? By responding to their own collage texts, as well as the collage texts of others, how are issues of representation addressed? Using narrative and post-structural discourse analysis, this study explores how participants’ complex and contradictory understandings of HIV/AIDS diverge from the content and form of current school-based HIV/AIDS curriculum. Whereas the curriculum presupposes a rational and linear subject, participants’ reflexive understandings of HIV/AIDS shift throughout the study, varying as a result of roles performed, the context of the collage or image being discussed, and the dynamic interchange between participants.

Keywords: HIV/AIDS
Youth
Arts-Based Research Methodologies
Visual Culture
Curriculum
Sexuality Education
Advisor: Gaztambide-Fernandez, Ruben
Alter(n)ative Literacies: Elementary Teachers' Practices with Culturally and Linguistically Diverse students in one French-language School in Ontario

This case study was conducted in one elementary French-language school in Ontario with 1 administrator, 4 teachers and their culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) students. Through the integration of bhabha’s (1994) notion of Third space, multiple literacies theory (Cummins, 2001; Masny 2009) and by drawing on interviews, observations, and students’ work samples, I conceptualise an alter(n)ative literacies framework to address growing diversity in French-language schools. The term alter(n)ative is developed to express the intertwined benefit of expanding traditional notions of literacy to include alternative language practices and the potential alter-ative effect of re-envisioning the resources children bring to their literacy and language development at school. This thesis argues that teachers can critically (re)interprete official policies concerning Frenchlanguage schools in order to effectively foster students’ alter(n)ative literacies development. In doing so, teachers affirm the plurality of students’ multiple identities as a foundation for their participation within evolving cosmopolitan franco-ontarian communities.

Keywords: multiple literacies
multiliteracies
french-language schooling
minority education
arts-informed research
bilingualism/multilingualism
second language education
Advisor: Labrie, Normand
A Holistic Approach to the Ontario Curriculum: Moving to a More Coherent Curriculum

This study is an interpretive form of qualitative research that is founded in educational connoisseurship and criticism, which uses the author’s personal experiences as a holistic educator in a public school to connect theory and practice. Key research questions include: How do I, as a teacher, work with the Ontario curriculum to make it more holistic? What strategies have I developed in order to teach a more holistic curriculum? What kinds of difficulties interfere with my practice as I attempt to implement my holistic philosophy of education? This dissertation seeks to articulate a methodology for developing holistic curriculum that is in conformity with Ontario Ministry guidelines and is also responsive to the multifaceted needs of the whole student. The research findings will serve to inform teachers who wish to engage in holistic education in public schools and adopt a curriculum that is transformative while still being adaptable within mainstream education.

Keywords: holistic education
holistic learning
holistic teacher
holistic curriculum
curriculum development
Ontario curriculum
transformative curriculum
holistic philosophy of education
developing mindfulness
meditation in schools
visualization as a learning tool
yoga in schools
journal writing
Gulu walk
An Inconvenient Truth
Uganda Rising
anti-bullying education
human wholeness
Whole Child School
personal development
professional development
personal practical knowledge in teachers
educational connoisseurship and criticism
empowering students
Math trail
pedagogical approaches
autobiography
parents as partners in education
EQAO testing
student-led conferences
self awareness
balance in education
limited vision of Ontario curriculum
tensions between Holistic education and the Ontario curriculum
critical literacy ideology
ommission on the Whole Child
spirituality in education
anecdotal reporting to parents
social consciousness
Roots of Empathy
Who is Nobody
spiritual growth
ecological awareness
wholeness of human experience
creativity and intuition in education
Advisor: Miller, John P.
Cohen, Rina
The Educative Practices of Public Alternative Educators Around Student Choice and Student Directed learning in the Ontario Context

This thesis explores educative ideas such as student choice, student autonomy and student directed learning in an educational environment dominated by a top-down, provincially legislated curriculum. Qualitative data was obtained from the professional stories of two experienced educators teaching in public alternative schools in Toronto, Ontario. Using the theoretical lenses of autonomy, relatedness and competency to filter the collected data reveals that offering students authentic choice in their school day has many benefits. Despite this, our globally entrenched educational paradigm dominates our educational world usurping many alternative models.

Keywords: alternative education
student choice
student autonomy
student directed learning
competency
public education
Advisor: Farrell, Joseph P.
Analyzing English L1 and L2 Paraphrasing Strategies Through Concurrent Verbal Report and Stimulated Recall Protocols

Paraphrasing is taught to postsecondary students to help them avoid plagiarism in their academic essays, but it can be challenging for native speakers (L1) as well as nonnative speakers (L2) of English. To examine these challenges I analyzed 35 paraphrases written by 4 English-Canadian students and 5 Japanese international students at an English-medium community college in Ontario. I evaluated paraphrase quality through a modified replication of Keck’s (2006) analytic method, and I analyzed paraphrase appropriateness through a set of criteria I developed and verified with a second rater. I then analyzed 6 concurrent and post-task reports of 3 L1 and 3 L2 students, who used a variety of paraphrasing strategies. All participants wrote relatively inappropriate paraphrases which did not always correspond with perceived appropriateness. L1 students tended to copy directly from the original text excerpts more often than the L2 students did. Implications for teaching and further research are discussed.

Keywords: second language writing
paraphrasing
academic writing
composition
verbal report
plagiarism
ESL
postsecondary
Advisor: Cumming, Alister
Second Chances: A Study of Rural Malawian Youth in a Complementary Basic Education Programme

In Malawi, an estimated 202 000 children are out of school and of those in school, less than 50 percent reach grade five. Increasingly, alternatives to the formal school system are gaining traction as a means to reach these excluded children. Recognizing the necessity, the Malawian government recently stipulated a non-formal provision in its education plan. As demand increases, it is important to consider what makes these programmes appealing and sustainable. Using qualitative interview methods, this study explores the lives of ten rural Malawian youth who are participating in an alternative initiative and investigates factors that have influenced the students to initially join and remain in the programme. The study sheds light on experience with alternative education initiatives as seen from the student perspective and provides insight into influences, motivation and successful non-formal programming by linking the theoretical framework to the findings.

Keywords: Education
Non-formal Education
Malawi
Alternative Education
Basic Education
Comparative Education
Complementary Education
Out of school youth
International Development of Education
Africa
Access to Education
Advisor: Farrell, Joseph P.
An Exploratory Case Study of the Participation and Interaction Among Elementary School English Language Learners and Native Speakers in Online Discussions

Research studies demonstrate that L2 learners participate more equally when using synchronous computer mediated communication (CMC). However, most of these studies have involved adult students only, in college or university settings. Few have explored the use of synchronous CMC with elementary school learners. Thus, this case study explored the participation of Grade 8 native speakers and English language learners as they interacted in the online environment. It examined the number of turns taken by each participant, the discourse functions used, as well as participants’ perceptions of communicating online. This was accomplished through collection of chat transcripts, questionnaires and semi-structured interviews. It was found that native speakers tended to take more turns in online discussions. Also, responses and questions were the discourse functions that were used most by participants in this research. Finally, the students viewed this mode of communication favourably, and believed that it aided their communication with one another.

Keywords: English language learners
native speakers
synchronous computer mediated communication
Advisor: Gagne, Antoinette
Pathways to Collaboration: A case Study of Local and Foreign Teacher Relationships in a South-eastern Chinese university

This qualitative case study explored the nature of the relationships between Local (English) Teachers (LTs) and Foreign (English) Teachers (FTs) who worked at the same English institute of a foreign studies university in south-eastern China. Employing the community of practice framework, this research drew insights from a questionnaire, interviews, and observations. The findings revealed that the teachers seldom interacted and, furthermore, were influenced by broader social structures that were not considered in the framework. Accordingly, the theory was extended to include other perspectives, such as native and non-native English speaking teacher issues and the Chinese concept of face, in order to determine the underlying reasons that inhibited their interaction. Notwithstanding these challenges, three cases of FT-LT collaboration were discovered, and the factors that enhanced their collaboration were analysed. The LT and FT participants provided suggestions to each other and the administrators on how collaboration could be improved in their institute.

Keywords: foreign and local teacher collaboration
native and non-native English speaking teachers
communities of practice
local and foreign teacher relationships
Chinese concept of face
Chinese university
Advisor: Gagne, Antoinette