Lubna Alli

About the Neighbourhood

Reaching on specific demographic data about the KGO neighbourhood, which falls in Ward 24, Scarborough-Guildwood, the 2016 Census Profile data shows demographic data that is very telling of the socio-economic status of the area in comparison to that of Toronto’s. For someone like myself, who has grown up in Scarborough and the neighbouring Neighbourhood Improvement Area (NIA) wards, this information comes as no shock to me as these statistics represented my lived experience in many ways. Like the statistics for the KGO area shows, the average household income was disproportionately lower than the rest of Toronto, showing up at a staggering $30,000/year margin. In addition to this, the percentage of visible minorities in Ward 24 is 71%, coming in at 20% higher than the rest of Toronto. Last, 58% of KGO residents are first generation immigrants, meaning that race, class, and economic barriers are an added factor in the continued marginalization of these communities to succeeding at their full potential. Although these facts were fairly consistent with my knowledge of the neighbourhood, the thing that I found to be a new addition to my knowledge of the area was the specific breakdown of these numbers. Personally, I noticed a higher percentage of Black and Caribbean immigrants at the ESBGC than I did brown, which is contrary to the 2016 Census data that shows the top places of birth in the ward were India, Sri Lanka, Phillipines, Guyana, and then Jamaica. With the exeption of Jamaica, and a marginal exception of Guyana (which has a high Indo-Caribbean population), the list even continues to follow with more predominantly brown countries, like Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan. This raises many questions for me with regard to the gap in Ward 24’s representation and ESBGC’s representation. What does this say, perhaps, about the disproportionately high numbers of poverty and programming dependent Black families compared to brown families? Ward 24’s top industry of work is retail trade, whereas for the rest of Toronto it is professional, scientific & technical services. This alone speaks to the level of opportunity to further schooling and the trickle down effects of this when it comes to needing ESBGC’s daycare and afterschool programming services as a result of lower paying and less benefit secure jobs. These intersectionalities within each broader description are incredibly important in the handling of information that paints an overall picture that covers up many of the detailed intracisies behind the numbers.

Preconceptions About the Neighbourhood

Without having a look at census data for the Kingston-Galloway/Orton Park neighbourhood prior to my first placement shift, I already thought I had a good sense of what the community was like. In some ways I was presumptuous and, dare I say, arrogant, but in other ways I felt like I was projecting and grappling with my own experiences growing up in a low income neighbourhood. Much to my surprise, there is a very strong sense of community at the East Scarborough Boys and Girls Club and from my observations, it was a place of community and respite for not only many children, but also for many recent immigrant women looking for an introduction to working in Canada. Unfortunate enough to say, but I think my “me versus them” thoughts came out in more implicit ways that I was not proud of. I consider myself to be quite progressive, so for me it was very confusing as to why I felt my empathy could have been better practised in many interactions I had with those who came by my office to chat when I was working. There were a few adults on the autism spectrum, many camp staff who were recent immigrants, and many children that seemed ‘rougher around the edges’. I hate that I am even writing these descriptions to be quite honest, but I am here to tell my story in the most honest and raw way possible. I have had many experiences interacting with individuals of the like, especially in previous school and volunteer situations, so going into this environment I expected a fairly smooth transition, which, practically speaking, it was. I think my reservations came primarily in the form of internalized stigma that I didn’t realize I still had. I suspect that this is for two main reasons, the first beign unresolved trauma about my past experiences of shame for being involved with community groups that attract people of this nature, and second my experiences of social mobility over the last few years that have removed me from these situations that were once a heavy part of my lived experiences as a low income, immigrant, Muslim, woman of colour. It was the work that I was most worried about initially, but grappling with these internalizations throughout my time there, surprisingly, became the biggest worry of all. 

Enhancing the Neighbourhood’s Identity and Community Building Practices

Drawing on the community organizing models touched on, the East Scarborough Boys and Girls Club falls into many different model types, namely the Power-Based Model, the Community Building Model, the Women Centred Model, and the Transformative Model. Starting with the Power-Based Model, where urban problems stem from residents’ lack of power and push for resident involvement in decision making, ESBGC is a good example because they don’t do small bake sale fundraisers but they strategize to progress in bigger ways through external policy and funding from United Way and the City of Toronto, for example. The Community Building Model is also an appropriate classification for ESBGC as they use a build-from-within, asset-based approach that favours collaboration between neighbourhood stakeholders that focus on strengthening the internal social and economic fabric of the neighbourhood. These neighbourhood stakeholders include local schools and churches in the vicinity to run after school programming as well as the snack program. As an extension of this, ESBGC also uses the Women Centred Model when approaching their community organizing, which is an extension of women’s traditional ‘caretaking’ role into broader community action to address the needs of children and families, in particular, they offer summer camp, daycare and EarlyON programming services, where a majority of the camp staff are women. Last, the transformative model is used as a main pillar in ESBGC’s community building model as they focus on problems in the neighbourhood that are symptoms of broader systemic injustice, including radical restructuring of political, social and economic institutions. This agreement that unequal power relations need to be changed are reflective in their Diversity and Equity policy, which is an area that my colleage Munira focused her efforts primarily on. This meant changing for progress through a radical dismantling of the systemic structures that cause inequality. As an extension of these community building models, my placement tasks relate to building and enhancing the neighbourhood’s identities and community building practices as it supported all of these models in some way or the other. By creating a comprehensive manual that can be used by camp staff to support positive programming for children in underserved communities, I supported all of the community building models that were previously highlighted. In addition to this, through the women centred model, the camp programming manual that I created supports women and family needs to create a safe and nurturing space. Last, through the tranformative model I involved the community in informing the programming I created (as I made blank templates with reference examples that could be filled in and tailored to specific groups). Looking back now that I am at the finish line, all of the pieces make sense and I feel good about the work that I have done, no matter how small or easy I thought the tasks were in the beginning. I am coming to realize that there is value in the so-called “easy” tasks as they are necessary for achieving the greater vision at hand. From this experince I hope to take this notion with me moving forward with future work that I do, as I think this ego check has been humbling in many ways, especially now that I am submitting my final assignments with a heavy heart as the promising full time opportunities that I thought were coming my way have been pulled from in front of me in an instant due to the coronavirus outbreak. Perhaps this is a good time to take a step back and reflect, and hopefully this means that something greater is in store for me in the near future. 

Sources:

“Boys & Girls Club of East Scarborough.” Boys & Girls Club of East Scarborough, 30 Jan. 2020, esbgc.net/.

“Ward 24 Scarborough-Guildwood 2016 Census Profile.” City of Toronto Ward Profiles, 2018, http://www.toronto.ca/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/8f23-City_Planning_2016_Census_Profile_2018_25Wards_Ward24.pdf.