The past four months have been action packed for the RSEKN team. During KNAER’s full-day pre-OERS meeting on February 28th, our RSEKN team had the opportunity to connect with representatives from three other KNAER knowledge mobilization networks, communities of practice, and school board partners, the KNAER’s Secretariat evaluation team, and representatives from different branches of the Ministry. We then had an amazing time attending and presenting at the 12th Ontario Education Research Symposium (OERS) which ended on March 2nd!
During OERS, RSEKN led a workshop titled “Fondements pour la diversité et l’équité : Place aux connexions communautaires et aux voix de la diversité par le biais de la poésie parlée” (Staging Diversity and Equity: Community Connections & Diverse Voices through Spoken Word Poetry). Poet, Bassam and RSEKN Network Coordinator, Noor El-Husseini, facilitated discussions and activities on how spoken word can be used as a culturally responsive and relevant pedagogy to create spaces for marginalized voices to express the challenges they face in light of different systemic barriers. RSEKN also led an Equity Panel chat, featuring its three regional team leads – Nicholas Ng-A-Fook, Jacqueline Specht and Vidya Shah – with questions facilitated by Noor E.
RSEKN also held a kiosk at the Forum Synergie 2018, which took place on March 28 and 29th! Co-director, Nathalie Bélanger, and Noor El-Husseini presented RSEKN, connected with new partners and built links to the work of other participants of the forum.
RSEKN received significant feedback from colleagues, partners, and stakeholders that are now part of the network’s structure. For example, since officially launching RSEKN, we have updated our regional team titles and priority area themes. We have now added the following 6th priority area: Income Inequality and Poverty. We also launched RSEKN’s official website in English, with the French website to follow in the coming weeks.
RSEKN is also excited to announce the winners of its student logo design contest! A big thank you to all those who submitted entries to help design our logo! The RSEKN logo contest winners are:
To connect with RSEKN, please direct questions, ideas, and insights to the RSEKN Network Coordinator, Noor El-Husseini:
Twitter: @RECRAE_RSEKN / @KNAER_RSEKN.
Web: http://www.rsekn.ca
Equity Knowledge Network (RSEKN), hosted by the University of Ottawa’s Faculty of Education and the Centre for Research on Educational and Community Services (CRECS), is a provincial multi-stakeholder bilingual knowledge mobilization network that brings equity innovators together in order to stimulate activities and support product development that can be used to break down current systemic barriers to children and youth from marginalized groups. Email: Twitter: @KNAER_RSEKN