Janusz Korczak’s Enduring Legacy: Social Paediatrics in Canada and Vancouver.
The fifth presentation of the Janusz Korczak “How to Love a Child” lecture series will take place on Thursday, Feb 18, 2016 promptly at 7:00 PM, at the new Robert H. Lee Alumni Center on the UBC Campus.
For more information and to register for this event and future Janusz Korczak lectures please go to: http://jklectures.educ.ubc.ca/
Janusz Korczak’s Enduring Legacy: Social Paediatrics in Canada and Vancouver tells about building and nurturing the network of support around the child – the Circle of the Child- founded on an appreciation of children’s inherent resiliency, and nurturing their capacity. It is a model based on science and evidence and promises to prepare children and adolescents for a successful and fulfilling adult life, in particular children and adolescents confronting the burden of stress and trauma.
Speakers: Dr. Gilles Julien, Social paediatrician, president and founder of the Fondation du Dr Julien, Dr. Christine Loock, Children’s and Women’s Health Centre of British Columbia and Social Paediatrics RICHER Program leader, and Ardith (Walpetko We’dalks) Walkem, Master of Laws, focuses on Indigenous laws and oral traditions and Indigenous communities assertion of their Aboriginal Title and Treaty Rights, and articulation of communities’ own laws and legal systems
- Equity and accompaniment for all children: past and nowadays – Dr. Gilles Julien
A broad and specific preventive approach is needed when aiming to protect vulnerable children from the negative accumulative effects of toxic stress and traumatic experiences in their preparation towards a successful and fulfilled adult life embracing the principle that it is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men. Social Paediatrics focuses on addressing the social determinants of health of children, including poverty, marginalization and racism through protecting vulnerable children from the cumulative negative effects of toxic stress and traumatic experiences on human development. Dr. Julien will present the mission and the approach he and his team has developed, based on science and evidence, in Quebec over the past decade to reach the goals of building a strong network – the Circle of the Child- and strong children, and improving the well-being of children through an entrepreneurial process within vulnerable communities. The Community Social Pediatric approach is a call to action for vulnerable children. Janusz Korczak’s spirit remains with us in working to build strong children.
He was, and still is, a powerful inspiration for all of us who strive to prevent children from being left hanging in limbo and obtaining the services and accompaniment to enable them to fulfill their developmental needs and preserve their rights in accordance with The United Nations Conventions of the Rights of the Child.
- Promoting Child and Youth Health and Rights in Vancouver through the RICHER Social Paediatrics Model – Dr. Chris Loock
For the past decade the BCCH/UBC Department of Paediatrics has been engaged in a community partnership to enhance access to health care and address inequities in health outcomes for some of Canada’s most socially vulnerable children and youth. The RICHER program (Responsive, Intersectoral, interdisciplinary Child and Youth Health Education and Research), through a collaborative practice model based in multiple community sites in Vancouver’s Inner City. This collaborative approach has enabled a diverse and disenfranchised community to develop shared vision and values, and to address inequities in access and ongoing violations of child/youth rights. The RICHER approach has facilitated a service delivery model supports the community to more fully address child and youth rights to access health, education, and safe spaces; and their rights to an identity, to participate, and to be heard.
- Wrapping Our Ways Around Them: Indigenous communities and the child welfare system – Ardith (Walpetko We’dalks) Walkem, Master of Law
Exploring the ways that Indigenous culture, community, land, and language form part of the identity and belonging for Indigenous children. Rather than looking at attachment and belonging limited to parents or immediate family, equally, for Indigenous children, the broader network of belonging and meaning must be considered in planning to ensure their identity and connections over their lifetime. This presentation will explore the understanding that restoring the ability of our communities and Nation to become actively and meaningfully involved in caring for our children is necessary to break the cycle that keeps Indigenous children in disproportionate numbers entering into – and remaining within – the child welfare system.
About the Presenters:
Dr. Gilles Julien has made it his mission to help children from disadvantaged backgrounds to develop harmoniously and reach their potential. A visionary leader, he has created a preventive approach, community social paediatrics, guaranteeing that each of a child’s fundamental rights as set forth in the Convention on the Rights of the Child will be respected. Over the years, he mobilized the people from Montreal’s underprivileged neighborhoods by founding two social paediatric centers in Hochelaga-Maisonnueve and Cote-des-Neiges. The model of social paediatrics that he initiated has helped shape programs across Canada. He is affiliated with McGill University and the Universite de Montreal.
Dr. Christine Loock MD, FRCPC, is a developmental paediatrician at Children’s and Women’s Health Centre of British Columbia, including Sunny Hill Health Centre for Children and BC Children’s Hospital where she is medical director of the Cleft Palate/Craniofacial Program and specialist lead for the Social Paediatrics RICHER Program. She is an Associate Professor in the Department of Paediatrics, UBC Faculty of Medicine. Early in her medical training at Harvard and the University of Washington, she developed an interest in ‘Social Paediatrics’. Her early clinical and research work focused on children and youth with congenital conditions and developmental disorders, including Faetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders and birth defects prevention. Over the past decade she has been engaged in collaborative interdisciplinary research and practice to develop the innovative and effective RICHER health service delivery models for socially vulnerable children and families in Canada. Dr. Loock is a recipient of the 2012 Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Medal for community service awarded by the Governor General of Canada.
Ardith (Walpetko We’dalks) Walkem is a member of the Nlaka’pamux nation which stretches from the Interior of BC into Washington state. She has a Master of Laws from UBC (with a research focus on Indigenous laws and oral traditions). Ardith has practiced extensively with different Indigenous communities, and in assisting Indigenous communities to assert their Aboriginal Title and Rights and Treaty Rights, with a focus on assisting Indigenous communities to articulate their own laws and legal systems. She has worked as Parents Counsel on CFCSA cases, and as counsel for Indigenous nations in matters involving their child members, and has helped to design systems based on Indigenous laws for children and families. Most recently, she wrote Wrapping Our Ways Around Them: Aboriginal Communities and the CFCSA Guidebook (2015, published by the ShchEma-meet.tkt project) and has worked with Indigenous communities to recover and implement their own laws in the area of Indigenous children and families.
About the Moderator:
Dr. Curren Warf is a Clinical Professor of Paediatrics and Head of the Division of Adolescent Health and Medicine (DAHM) of the Department of Paediatrics at BC Children’s Hospital and UBC Faculty of Medicine. He has a long standing involvement in the care of adolescents and working collaboratively with community agencies.