The Young Canadians Roundtable on Health (YCRH) was created in 2013 in response to the interest generated by the report Reaching for the Top: A Report by the Advisor on Healthy Children and Youth, conducted by The Sandbox Project’s founder, Dr. Kellie Leitch.
Over the last 8 years, the YCRH has grown its membership and is composed of strong Canadian youth leaders from regions including Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Alberta, Ontario, Quebec, British Columbia, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland and Labrador, with ongoing recruitment of youth from regions including Northwest Territories, Yukon and Nunavut. The YCRH comprises over 40 students and young professionals ranging from 15 to 31 years old with an academic and/or professional background in: Public Health, Public Relations, Health Policy, Global Politics, Criminology, Epidemiology, Kinesiology, Psychology, Sociology, Social Work, Therapeutic Recreation, Nursing, Medicine, Nutrition, Biomedical Engineering, and Programming and Web-Development.
The diverse academic and professional backgrounds as well as national membership distribution allowed the YCRH to expand its reach in partnering with organizations such as: the Canadian Institutes of Health Research’s IHDCYH youth advisory council, Healthy Debate, Children’s Healthcare Canada, Frayme, Inspiring Healthy Futures, and Participaction; with additional access to collaborating partners of The Sandbox Project including: Jack.org, BGC Canada, CHEO, Wisdom2Action, Mental Health Literacy and many more.
The YCRH’s broad network and young professional membership allows for the creation of youth-led projects and collaborations with youth across Canada as well as professionals who work with youth. The most recent project “In Their Own Words” partnered with Healthy Debate, a news outlet that publishes journalism about health care in Canada, and The Sandbox Project. This series facilitated the storytelling of Canadian youth’s COVID-19 experiences utilizing multimedia as a form of communication. Presently, the YCRH is leading a Children’s Book regarding youth resiliency throughout COVID-19, partnering with professionals who work with youth including Psychiatrists, Pediatricians, Principals and Psychotherapists. The YCRH is concurrently pursuing a Photovoice project, a qualitative research project that aims to understand youth’s mental health experiences during COVID-19, utilizing photos to express the participant’s story accompanied by group discussion sessions.
To support the YCRH to amplify youth voices, please consider donating here: http://sandboxproject.ca/support-the-sandbox-project
Please ensure you select “The Young Canadians Roundtable on Health” as the fund you would like to donate to.