Social and community development

The Process of Establishing a Food Cooperative: A Promising Intervention for Improving Physical Access to Food

In this issue

  • Establishing food cooperatives in rural areas with poor geographic access to nutritious foods.
  • The food cooperative as a response to collective needs for improved access to food and local services, as well as community vitality.
  • The steps required to set up a food co op, in short.

And answers to the following question

  • • What are some of the facilitating factors and difficulties encountered in the process of establishing a food cooperative?

Youth Cyber Dating Violence: Knowledge Synthesis on the Effectiveness of Prevention Programs

Violence in youth dating relationships is a concerning public health issue. It affects a significant number of young people and negatively impacts the health and well-being of its victims. Young people’s increasing use of technologies means that violent behaviours now occur via social media, messaging services, cell phones, and other technological devices. Youth cyber dating violence, defined as the use of these technological means to control, monitor, or harass a partner or ex-partner, is prevalent in the adolescent population and becoming increasingly well-known. The characteristics that distinguish cyberviolence from “offline” violence, such as its lack of temporal, physical, and geographical limits, underscore the importance of examining this type of violence specifically to better understand the issues associated with it. It is therefore essential to document the practices that aim to prevent youth cyber dating violence in order to determine their effectiveness and issue recomm…

Disparities in mental health and its determinants among Québec high school students by language of instruction

This paper provides a comparative analysis of several mental health indicators and determinants by language of instruction. All data discussed in this analysis is from the Québec Health Survey of High School Students 2016–2017.

For most of the indicators analyzed, there is no disparity between students in English and French high schools. When there is a gap between the two groups, it can be to the disadvantage of students taught in either language.

For example, a greater proportion of students in English high schools reported that they:

  • Had been medically diagnosed with depression
  • Had been medically diagnosed with an eating disorder
  • Did not feel healthy
  • Slept less than recommended during the school week
  • Had poor social support from their family
  • Had low overall self-efficacy
  • Had been bullied at school, on the way to school, or online during the school year
  • Had b…

Safety Diagnosis Tool Kit for Local Communities: Safety Diagnosis Handbook

Promoting safety and preventing crime through a setting-oriented approach requires a structured procedure for planning the various activities to be carried out. The procedure involves mobilizing the population and intersectoral partners, making safety diagnoses and drawing up action plans. The Safety Diagnosis Tool Kit for Local Communities was prepared to assist with this procedure. It comprises several tools, including the Safety Diagnosis Handbook and six methodology guides. The document Turning Safety Diagnoses Into Action Plans: A Guide for Local Communities was prepared in addition to the tool kit, to facilitate the process of translating diagnoses into effective action plans.

To make sound decisions as to what should be done to improve safety and prevent crime in a particular life setting, it is useful to have access to a safety diagnosis for the setting concerned. A rigorous safety diagnosis will enable you to identify the problems and the social and physical conditi…

Turning Safety Diagnoses Into Action Plans: A guide for Local Communities

In recent years, several tools based on a setting-oriented approach have been developed to support safety promotion and crime prevention initiatives. This approach advocates the use of a structured procedure for planning and implementing prevention measures in life settings. The procedure involves mobilizing the population and intersectoral partners, making safety diagnoses and preparing action plans. The present document, Turning Safety Diagnoses Into Action Plans: A Guide for Local Communities, is one of the tools that follows this setting-oriented approach. It is designed to assist people who are working to develop coherent, integrated action plans that propose feasible, acceptable and effective actions based on safety diagnoses.

It is taken for granted in this tool that 1) local safety promotion and crime prevention initiatives aresupported by a cooperative mechanism, 2) the communities concerned are mobilized around the issues of safety promotion and…

Child and Adolescent Development in a School-Based Health Promotion and Prevention Perspective

A framework for integrated health promotion and prevention actions based on a competency approach

The framework for integrated promotion and prevention actions in schools seeks to promote the development of competencies that contribute to academic success and are common to a range of subjects related to health and well-being. It is aimed at counteracting the tendency to compartmentalize actions (e.g., healthy eating, sexuality). The framework also lays out the organizational conditions that promote synergy between stakeholders as well as key actions to deploy and knowledge (knowledge, attitudes and skills) to be acquired at different stages in the child’s development and school career.

A positive, comprehensive intervention strategy based on the development of personal and social competencies

The framework’s intervention strategy has three guiding principles: 1) Act according to a positive and continuous vision of development…

Establishing a CISSS/CIUSSS to support community development

In Québec, an integrated health and social services centre (a Centre intégré de santé et de services sociaux CISSS) or an integrated university health and social services centre (a Centre intégré universitaire de santé et de services sociaux – CIUSSS), along with its area network (réseau territorial de services – RTS) partners, is responsible for improving and maintaining the health of the population it serves. It must offer the best possible services to the clients who consult with it and, at the same time, anticipate problems relating to health and well-being. For that reason, it is called on to play a role in addressing several health determinants, including housing conditions, education, social support, access to employment, etc.

Community development support is an essential response measure in doing so. In addition to helping a CISSS/CIUSSS carry out its mission, community development support encourages CISSS/CIUSSS stakeholders to adopt practices that reflect populatio…

Initiative sur le partage des connaissances et le développement des compétences

Community development in English-speaking communities in Québec: Lessons learned from a participatory action research project

This report presents a community development project carried out from 2009 to 2013 at the Institut national de santé publique in collaboration with the Community Health and Social Services Network (CHSSN), an organization devoted to improving the lives of English-speaking Quebecers. The project objectives were three-fold:

  • to increase knowledge on English-speaking communities in Québec;
  • to develop tools for mobilizing theses communities;
  • to support English-speaking communities in implementing a community development approach.

Community portraits were completed with six English-speaking communities in different areas of Québec, representing very different socio-economic, demographic and geographic realities.

After presenting the background to the project, including an overview of the situation of English speakers in the province, we will discuss the conceptual framework for the project as well as the methodology used. We will t…

Safety Diagnosis Tool Kit for Local Communities: Guide to Developing a General Portrait of Life Settings

To do a safety diagnosis for a particular life setting, you have to get to know the setting. You will thus obtain a good understanding of its specific characteristics, as well a frame of reference for data collection activities. The present guide describes the main steps involved in developing a life setting’s general portrait.

Although many parameters can be used to characterize a life setting, some warrant special attention in a process aimed at improving safety or preventing crime; for example, the setting’s geographic, human and economic characteristics and some of its physical characteristics pertaining to housing. Gaining insight into these characteristics will enable you to:

  • share in general knowledge about the life setting under study;
  • clearly define the setting in relation to the surrounding area and according to zones of interest;
  • ensure that all segments of the population are well represented;
  • frame requests for informa…

Safety Diagnosis Tool Kit for Local Communities: Guide to Organizing Focus Groups – 2nd edition

A focus group is a group discussion led by a facilitator. Participants are asked to share their thoughts on a particular topic, based on their personal opinions and experience. They are also encouraged to react to the views expressed by other participants and to say where they stand in relation to those views.

In the model proposed in this guide, focus group participants are selected on the basis of criteria that ensure the life setting under study is well represented. This approach guarantees that the groups provide a wide range of viewpoints and perceptions, and can thus help to shed light on the different opinions and degree of consensus that exist on a given topic, such as the feeling of safety in a regional county municipality (RCM) or a municipality. In safety diagnoses, focus groups are used primarily to gather the opinions and perceptions of a population about the following safety-related topics: the safety of a particular life setting, the feeling of safety, and pro…