June 21 is National Aboriginal Day in Canada. At YWCA Toronto, we celebrate and honour Indigenous peoples and heritage – today and everyday. We are dedicated to the work of reconciliation and continue to call for justice, safety and a new relationship with Indigenous Peoples. Honouring the Truth, Reconciling for the Future – the ground-breaking Truth and […]
Most women remain silent. For every 1,000 sexual assaults, only 33 are reported, 12 result in charges, only 6 are prosecuted and only 3 lead to a conviction. In other words, there are largely no consequences for the men who continue to sexually assault women. Many have fought to change this terrifying reality. One of […]
Toronto City Council made history and sent a strong message by unanimously adopting TO Prosperity, our city’s first-ever poverty reduction strategy. Now, Council must fund it in the 2016 budget. YWCA Toronto has joined with over 50 civic leaders in calling on Council to ensure that the 2016 budget includes the funding necessary to reduce […]
I survived a vicious assault that was life threatening on May 2, 2014. As I struggled to recover, care for my two children and re-build my life, I learned that there were very few resources available to help. There was limited trauma informed counselling support, I could not access affordable housing and the social assistance […]
I survived a vicious assault that was life threatening on May 2, 2014. As I struggled to recover, care for my two children and re-build my life, I learned that there were very few resources available to help. There was limited trauma informed counselling support, I could not access affordable housing and the social assistance […]
As soon as I announced that I was pregnant, the warnings began: Get on the child care subsidy list. Put your name down on as many child care waiting lists as possible. Do it now. Little did we know that there were 16,802 children ahead of us and that a subsidy was well out of […]
Kofi Annan once said, “There is no tool for development more effective than the empowerment of women.” In Canada, the struggle to realize equal rights for women and girls is far from over. Our gender pay gap is twice the global average; almost 1,200 Indigenous women are reported as missing or murdered; one in three […]
Dorothy said it best, “there is no place like home.” Home is our refugee, our castle…home sweet home. But what if you did not know how long you would have a place to stay, perhaps a day, a week or a few months? What if you were not sure what address to put on your […]
There are 16,802 children in Toronto currently on the waiting list for affordable child care. Many of their mothers make weekly phone calls, crossing their fingers and hoping that a space has finally opened up for their child. With their children in a secure and safe child care centre, women can get back to work, […]
Many of the women who walk through our doors at YWCA Toronto have firsthand experience with the realities of urban poverty, making them well informed to weigh in on the City of Toronto’s TOProsperity: Toronto Poverty Reduction Strategy, due to be released in late 2015. When the City asked YWCA Toronto for feedback on how to […]
