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The purpose of the show is to provide a critical examination of society and culture through the intersectional lens of race, gender, and class, more specifically it seeks to provide a COUNTER-NARRATIVE. The Show encourages a reflective assessment and critique of unique standpoints and their potential contribution to popular discourse.
Rasheem, Hello and welcome. This is Rasheem. This is the episode of the counter narrative. And tonight's focus is going to be looking at the politics of Social Work and asking the question, Do racialized social workers belong in policy development? Tonight we have a special guest, Candice. Katya Paul, I hope I said that. Right, candid, okay, great. Who has a master's in master's degree in social work, and I'm going to allow her to introduce herself and tell her tell us a little bit more about herself. So Candace, tell us who you are, tell us something that you're passionate about, and what is your particular interest in this topic?
Okay, so Hi everyone. I'm Candace cachepah. I live here in Toronto, Canada, and I just finished as Rasheem just said. I just finished my Master of Social Work. Just graduated two weeks ago, so I'm freshly minted, like I like to say, woo hoo. So something I'm really, really passionate about is changing the way things are, changing the status quo, and changing things, not necessarily from the outside, but from the inside, participating in change. That's what I'm really passionate about. And so my research now, the politics of Social Work, the racialized social workers belong in the practice space of public policy development is really about that. It's about social workers who do the frontline work on a day to day basis. You know, day in and day out you're you're out there advocating for your clients to get access to better services, to receiving resources that are available but closed off to certain groups of people. We know the ins and outs of the systems, and we know particularly the ins and outs of institutional or structural racism. So this research is all about, well, the fact that we know the ins and outs should lead us to want to participate and to want to engage in how policies are written, not just for our clients, but for society in general. So that's that's really the drive and the motivation for this research that I, that I undertook,
tell me about what exactly attracted you to the field of social work to begin with.
Um, when i i So I was born in in and lived in Jamaica for about 14 years before I came to Canada, and I just remember living in an impoverished conditions. I still was able to have dinner every night and and and go to school and and get access to, you know, the necessities of life. But I remember my neighborhood kids, my neighbors, they had it really, rough. And I just remember thinking, if I had the opportunity to make a change to the system how how resources were shared between, you know, the haves and the have nots, I would definitely take the opportunity to make that change. And so I think when I left Jamaica, I had that idea still in my head, but I wasn't sure how it would materialize. I wasn't sure what opportunities would present themselves so that I could make those changes. So I just kept thinking on that, on that belief that if there's a way to make a change, I need to, I need to be a part of the change. I need to be a part of that solution.
I totally understand that. So as we talk about, as we jump into this topic of the politics of social workers, and do racialized social workers belong in policy development, as we talk about that kind of set the frame up for us and tell us a little bit more about what is the issues, what are some of the issues around social work in general as a profession, what are some of the key issues or key challenges that are around it, and How having racialized social workers might improve that situation.
Well, when I started to do when I started to formulate a research question, I started to think about the education that I was receiving in the Canadian context, the social work education I was receiving, and part of the problem for me was the the construction of the curriculum itself. So I looked at three different descriptions of what social the mandate of Social Work and the principles, the ethical principles that social work is governed by from the International Federation. Of social workers, and from the American version, the National Association of Social Workers. And then I looked at the Canadian Association of Social Workers, and these are regulatory bodies in social work. And I looked at their description of how the practice is shaped and and how the education is based, is shaped based on the mandate of the governing bodies. And what I found was that there was a disjuncture between the priority of social work based on where you are. So if you're in Canada, you have a priority. Your priority focus is on direct practice, and direct practice means frontline social work, right? So your your one to one counseling, your community development, your community advocacy, but there there was no there was no fun, there was no focus on on structural issues, right? So how do social workers engage at the institutional level, or, you know, at the national or international level, where the broader context of discrimination and and human rights violations and and economic conditions, socio economic conditions, there was really no focus in the Canadian context, where, where social work is concerned. So, so I thought it necessary to look at how the social work education itself impacts where social workers generally choose to work, where social workers generally see themselves going. And what I recognize is that in the Canadian context, because there's so much emphasis on direct practice, social workers kind of get funneled or channeled into frontline positions only. And when you're channeled into frontline positions only, in employment, you pretty much you know, you go into the office, you deal with your caseload, and when the nine to five is over, you, you head home, and you start again tomorrow, right? And there's for me, I think, I think we're doing a disservice to the profession of Social Work by only having that one view of practice. That we can only, we can only go into the office and get what we need to get done and then leave. And that's, that's all we're responsible for. You know what I mean?
So, so if I'm hearing you correctly, you're saying that a lot of the social workers are being educated and and brought into the profession and primarily to focus on direct services, helping them serve beyond the direct services of that what they're providing?
Exactly, yeah,
I want to let you know to two people want to are saying hi to you in the chat I sent through, says Hi, and events for three says, you're looking poised. I'm looking poised. Awesome.
Hi. Cynthia is, is a colleague of mine, and we did our MSW together. And her her research is very, very similar to mine. She looks at the placement process in in the MSW program. So Cynthia is a person that you might, you might consider. I
thought I was just saying she should inbox me. I'll definitely reach out.
Definitely, definitely, yeah, she's the person to talk to, too. And
as we get deeper, I don't want to assume that everyone who watches this later will know everything that we're talking about. So if you're just joining us now, or if you're watching this on replay, this is the counter narrative. This topic is the politics of social worker, of social work, and does or do racial or do racialized Social Work belong in policy development. And right now we're talking with Candace about that, and she's sharing some of her research that she's collected and done in her MSW studies. So one of the terms that I like that, I want us to make clear on that that you've used, is, could you? Could you give a in your own words, definition of what racialized means, because not everyone understands that term. And then also, could you define institutional racism and the impact that has on the field of social work,
for sure? So I, I had to, I had to kind of backtrack when I, when I use the term racialized, because a number of people asked me, What does that mean? And I realized this contextual, contextual, right? So here in Canada, racialized is understood to mean people of color. Here, right? I was speaking with with someone from from CSI, I think, as the Center for Social inclusion, and they're based in Seattle, and when I said the term racialized, they said, What do you mean by that? And and my my my reasoning for using that term was that it's, it's quite broad, right? So, but, but in the simplest of terms, it just means people who are non white, right? So it's inclusive of, of every, every, every person of color that belongs to whatever whatever category of race you want to place them, as long as you don't place them in the category of white.
Got it and institutional racism. Can you tell us a little bit more about what exactly that means, and what is the role that institutional racism might play in the field of social work.
So institutional racism, for me, means that in particular areas. So let's take the area of employment. Particular jobs are only open or they're reserved for for non racialized people. So in the context of of my research where I was looking at public policy development, we know that's that's dealing with the public sector right and public administration, and what I realized, based on the comments from my research participants was that even though legitimately, we had the capacity, we had the knowledge we had, we had, you know, the expertise and at to some extent, we had the experience to operate effectively in public policy and public administration because of systemic racism, right hiring practices, the education that social workers receive, we were excluded, or we didn't. We didn't, quote, unquote, match up to the expectations of or the qualifications it took to occupy certain spaces primarily or particularly in employment in the public sector. So institutionalized racism or institutional discrimination takes takes the shape of denial of access to particular participation in a specific area in society.
And one of the things too, that makes it to me, so significant for the field of social work in terms of institutional racism, is it impacts the political aspect of the institution, especially as it relates to the type of policies that are developed Absolutely. And then, if you are working as a direct service provider, then by the time, by the time something gets to you, there's already a policy. So you're at that point just carrying out a particular policy is absolutely, even if a person is doing direct service. Candace, I think what you provide and what you bring is so significant, because even if I do decide to go in direct service, and I'm not creating policy, it's good for me to have to be informed to know what policies are driving some of these decisions, exactly how that's working. Also, Pastor Maureen. Another person said, Hi, was pastor Maureen.
Hi, Pastor Maureen. She's She's one of my mentors. Oh,
fantastic. Yes, tell me. What are some of the trends that you're seeing in the field of social work?
Well, actually, it's quite interesting, because one before I did this research, I wasn't really tracking any kind of social work influence or engagement with any kind of policy activity. And then when I started to think about, think more, more deeply and seriously about this topic, I started to hear, you know, discussions about the importance of social work. Social workers being involved, being engaged, knowing the policy process, knowing how, when, when policies get legislated and they have to implement them, what impact it has on on the direct service user. So as as I continue to study a little bit more, I started to look not just on the Canadian and American context. I actually started to look over in to look. At information that was coming out of Israel, things that were coming out of the UK, you know, things were that were coming out of Australia. I started to look at all, all those things, and hear and listen to what people had to say. And what I realized is that, yes, social workers definitely have have the right, we have the expertise, we have the knowledge to participate. And actually it's meant it's mandatory for us to participate at the policy development level, because it's a part of of the expectation of the profession of social work to do that right. And so as I continue to do a little bit more research, what I realized also is that the socio economic conditions of black people, particularly, is taking center stage again. This, a lot of this is based on what is happening in the US with Black Lives Matter. And something that's happening now in in Toronto, mainly, but it's it's beginning to extend across Canada. Is the focus of anti black racism that's happening primarily in education, but there, there is a little bit more extent towards the interactions between black men, primarily, and the police, right?
Can you speak more to why? Oh, Echo, can you speak more to why exactly does having racialized social workers? Why does that matter? Why is that even important to have that
so an argument that I make about the why racialized social workers matter so much is that my I can speak to my of my experience myself as a black woman and black female Social Worker is that I came from a background of poverty. I understand what poverty looks like. I understand what housing insecurity looks like. I understand what, what not having enough money to, you know, pay your bills and do all that. I understand those things. And so when I sit in my office and I say, I'm seeing John today, and John is a black male who you know comes from this same or similar socio economic background that that I am presenting from, I can understand, and I can say, Oh, if I'm, if, if I'm accessing Ontario Works, which is a welfare safety net system here for low income individuals and families, if I'm seeing John and I, and John says to me, Look, I've been, I've been looking for work for six, seven months, and I haven't had any luck, you know. And and Ontario Works is telling me that the next job that that I go for an interview for I have to take it, or they're going to kick me off the the system. Hey, I know what you're going through. And for me as a social worker, I can maneuver through the system, and I can say, okay, here, you can access this support over here, if you go here, or if you word your application this way that you know, you'll be able to qualify for more support those things. So I'm bringing a level of expertise the job, but I'm also bringing personal experience, because as a racialized person, there are just some things within, within the broader political system, within the broader societal system, that that a non racialized person, a non person of color, you don't necessarily know that firsthand. You know what I mean? You don't necessarily understand what it what it means to, you know, drive around with $5 gas in your car, and hope that you know when you get to work you don't really have to go visit a client today, because you might not have the money to drive back home after you're done. You know what I mean. So, so those experiences that that racialized social workers share and and can can draw from when they're meeting with clients. I think it's absolutely vital to have that spin and to have that information included when we're writing policies. Because one of my one of my research participants, she's actually a non racialized person, and she's a policy advocate and a policy analyst. She said, The difficult thing about policy development right now is that the people who are writing them, particularly when we talk about social policy. Policies that deal with health care and education and housing and and all those things that that you know, the lower class, quote, unquote, low lower class people have to, you know, deal with on a on a regular basis. What she said was that the people who are writing social policies have no idea what social policies do for people. They have no idea the impact of how policies are written. If you're writing a social policy based on an austerity austerity measure, you have no idea what the implications and what the impacts have on, on, on people who have to live through, through the support systems.
Right? Like the point that you bring up feeling like, if I lean back, it'll stop echoing so much. I point that you bring up about how your experience experiences are value, sources of valuable sources of information. And you speak a little bit, I mean, even though you didn't use the terminology you speak a little bit about black woman, it's epistemology, that your experiences as a black woman are valid sources of information, and you are writing a policy. You may understand and know policy, but you don't know these particular experiences and the impacts that they have. So sometimes policies don't match up with what the desired outcome is, absolutely a little bit to what are some of the misconceptions that are surround these different areas. For one, what are some of the misconceptions that surround social work, misconceptions that surround policy and what are some of the misconceptions that surround policy development?
So, first and foremost, social work. I argue that social work is a marginalized profession itself, right? Um so, why? Why I feel that that argument is valid is because, partly it's to blame social work itself, because, um, for, for whatever reason, we've drifted away as a profession. We've drifted away from the inclusive aspect of direct practice, and, um, the structural approach to social work, right? So the structure, structural approach, meaning we're partnering with governments and non governmental organizations to say, hey, when we're dealing with foreign policy, when we're dealing with immigration, when we're dealing with economics taxation, when we're dealing with health care, when we're dealing with all these things, we need to include social work, Because social workers generally see all these people in different categories and different chapters of their life, right? When we consider globalization and what that how that has impacted, you know, third world countries and third world developing countries, let's say that and developed countries. When we see the interaction between, you know, people who are leaving poorer countries to come to, you know, come to Western countries, and the living conditions are different. You know, the the work experience is different when you when you have to, when you have to match up your qualifications that you had when you were home based on when you come to Canada or you come to the US, your qualifications don't match up when we consider all those things. Social Work has such a huge part to play in resettlement, in making sure that, you know, there's, there's equity. Now I have to, I have to qualify what I'm saying by saying this, I have to put in a disclaimer that I'm not preaching that social by by social workers being involved in the policy development process that is going to solve all the issues that we have in society. This is not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is is that social work because we have our hands in all these different facets of society. It's important for us to be at the discussion table. It's important for us to have an input in the services that are going to that we as direct care workers are going to be implementing. Right when I said that social work is marginalized as a profession itself, if we think on of an on the lines of ideological approaches from a professional standpoint, social work does not is not considered an elite person. Profession, right? It's not considered at the level of law or medicine, or, you know, or economics or anything like that, social work. It's kind of, it's been downgraded. And it's, it's, it's the level of respect that you get from professional respect that you get. You don't necessarily see it in in social work. Now, you know, in in the academic portion of social work there, there are, of course, you know, renowned researchers and scholars who who have done, you know, great work and receive the acclaim for their work, but those generally, are one offs, right? You don't, you don't hear a lot of a lot of names out there saying, Hey, do you know this social worker? Do you know you know what I mean? Do you know what they've done for society, kind of thing? So, so that's what I mean when I say social work itself is a marginalized profession, right?
And they're so in Social Work borrow.
What can I do about this sound?
So there's something in
software, again, that's borrowing from other sciences, and there's so many times where you may go into an organization you're in, there are a lot of social workers, but social workers aren't playing leadership roles. Social workers aren't the directors or the managers. They are the people who are working in the field, they are providing the care. They're the case workers, but they're not in managing positions. Which goes to your point Candace of further marginalized, marginalizing that profession where we have a sea of social workers, but we hire an MBA to come in and run our organization Absolutely, which happens so often you actually have a question, and that question is, What recommendations would you suggest to support racialized social workers entry slash development and policy practice? So what advice would you suggest to support racialized social workers and at the entry level of policy practice,
that's a great question. So first and foremost, I'm going to plug myself here. So in the process of do, of doing my, my MSW research, I did. I did a supervised course, right? I developed a five week policy practice, training workshop, workshop that I that I've piloted at at York University. So the whole the goal behind this course is to introduce social workers to the policy development process and how they can engage with the policy development process. The thinking also behind this is when I did my undergrad, there was, there was, of course there was, there was some courses that had to deal with the history of social work, how social work came to be and and in some courses, you learned about, you know, policy, social policies. You learned about, you know, the child welfare system, you learned about education system, you learned about, you know some of the really bad situations that happen, primarily in child welfare, right? You know the unfortunate cases of children, you know, dying in care prior to being removed from their homes, some really, you know, atrocious things that happened. And when I think, when I think about that, I think, Why? Why are we so retroactive? Why are why aren't we being proactive and and why are we sitting back and waiting for things to happen so that that's when we bring attention to it? So for me, when I, when I started to think about this course, I thought, I think I have to take it to a basic level. I have to because, again, a disservice that's happening in education is that, is that, you know, the Education Policy has taken out an important and integral topic, which is civic engagement, right? So whether, whether it's at the high school level or the college or university level, unless it's something that you are going to practice in your career, it's not something that's offered on a, on a on a regular day to day kind of subject basis, right? You. So when I created this course, I thought, I want to make it general enough that, first and foremost, it's not going to exclude any social workers. First and foremost, so everyone who's interested, it's an elective. It's it's being piloted right now, not as an elective, but as an add on to a policy frameworks course, and I have to thank Dr Luanne good game good Gingrich, who gave me the opportunity to she shared part of her class with me for the fall session to allow me to to introduce this policy practice workshop. And so right now I'm actually getting feedback from a lot of the students who are asking the question, you know, this is my first experience with the policy development process, with engagement. I don't know what I'm doing. I have no idea. And so that validates to me that this is something that's very important. And as a social worker, it's it's vital for us to know what we're implementing, how it's impacting our clients, how it's impacting us as workers, and how it's impacting our economy and our society in general.
Absolutely And
sorry, and to the to the point of, how do I help racialized social workers? For me, again, it's about getting out there. It's about being visible, and it's about being open, so that people can see that, you know, that people are doing this work, racialized people are doing this work. People of Color are doing this work, and we're, you know, we're not just out there, unreachable. We're not just, you know, in a bubble, and it's just because, you know, I happen to be in a privileged position, and I only retain this opportunity and this privilege for myself. No, I want to be able to to be open to everyone who's interested. I don't mind sharing my contact information. I don't mind getting getting contacts or connections from people to say, hey, I'm interested in what you're doing. How do how do we build this thing, and how do we continue this work? I'm definitely open to that.
What are some of the things that you found in some of the research that you've done that has possibly surprised you about the practice of Social Work and and about the level to which it is inclusive in terms of people that are hired education or what have you. And I also want to then after that, I want us to kind of end on a note of what's next for it. What what are some like, where does social work go from here, type of but first, I want to know what have you found in your research that has possibly informed you? And also, where does so? Where does the practice of Social Work go from here around increasing racialized social workers, increasing, not just racialized social workers, but social workers and marginalized populations. So get more social workers from LGBT or even just from trans communities. How do we are social workers that are my you know, that are numerical minorities that are handy, capable, like, how do we enhance the field?
Okay, so your first question about, you know, what has surprised me, or what informs my continued focus on this topic? One of the things that one of the data sources that you know kind of continue to fuel my drive to pursue this topic was a report that came out from the Wesley Wellesley Institute in 2011 and it came from Sheila block and Grace Edward gala Bucha. And what they looked at there, they titled their report Canada's color coded labor market. And what that report stated was a breakdown of where racialized people or people of color were mostly employed right, and where they were mostly employed were service sector positions, right, and it was also broken down by gender. So, so what the report stated was that for for black men and black women who were seeking to pursue employment in public administration position and management roles, the percentage was four point 4.0 for men and. 4.1 for women who are seeking to be employed in public administrative positions. And when I, when I thought about that. Now, this was in 2011 right? And all the sources that I read prior to that, I read another article from from Johnson in 2006 and her report, so this is five years prior to the color coded labor market. And her report was similar. It was one in 33 people, one in 33 minority people. Was was employed in the public sector. Hm. So the fact is, is that it doesn't matter how educated black people or people of color are. It doesn't really matter if you're seeking to be employed in service in the service industry, then you're there's an over representation if you were seeking to be employed in public sector spaces, pretty much what the data is saying is that there are significant barriers, and the barriers are based on race, not anything else, right? There's also other reports that say that you are screened out in the application process based on your postal code, or, you know, in the American context, based on your zip code, right? And so those things continues to drive me, like, Why? Why are these things? Why are these things the way they are? Why do we have the data to support the argument? But yet, very little is changing. You know what I mean? That suggests to me that we have to move beyond doing advocacy outside of government. We have to move from the place of there's no interaction between government and social service agencies. There's no interaction between activists and government and lobbyists and and activists and all that. We have to move beyond that place, because the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results, right? So I argue that we have to present a multifaceted approach. And the only way to present a multifaceted approach is to have advocates on the outside, for sure, who you know, are bringing attention to the issues, but also having activists on the inside working in government, who are, you know, saying, hey, sounding the alarm. This is what's happening here. How do we change what's happening like we're not okay with the status quo. We need we need a change. We need to see things differently. Okay?
Now, that reminds me when you say, when you mentioned the aspect of a advocate on the outside and advocate on the inside. Remember? It reminds me of something that Patricia Hill Collins refers to as kind of the outsider within people like you, possibly even people like me working in certain institutions, are those advocates. So one of the arguments, too, that I hear that you making so so very well is if you have more advocates on the inside, if you have more marginalized populations working within these institutions, not only do does that increase the chances of them possibly rising higher in the ranks, but They can also advocate for for participants that receive services at certain institutions, absolutely. Now, another thing that that I see it seems like in the profession, is that there are challenges. There are things like institutional racism that does exist. But as a person, one of the questions to that that that I'm reminded of this from the question that Cynthia asked, if you are working within an institution that is racist, that is also paying your paycheck, you know, how much is a person actually going to buck the system or push back? And what I've been able to see is people who have not found their place within the institution to be able to rise to their potential or even advocate, have then gone out and started their own nonprofit organization. They've taken up another approach. So my question to you is one, if you're in and you're in and or part of an oppressive system. What are there any strategies that you recommend around navigating that and, or is the option to lean toward to start looking to getting more to see if we could get more jobs in the public sector, or even. Starting our own practices.
I can, I can recall about, I would say, maybe two years ago now, where I was working in an agency where I absolutely did not agree with some of their policies, and the policies were primarily dealing with frontline staff. And as most of us know, who do frontline work, who you know, who are social workers, and we do or social service workers, and we do frontline work, we know that a lot of our clients, a lot of the people that we provide services to, are quite abusive. You know, there's opportunities for trauma. There's a lot of things that us as workers go through, and compounded by, you know, the general abuse that we that we sometimes receive based on the agency that we're working in, is the fact that that extra layer of disadvantage in that we are people of color, right? And in reality, sometimes our clients are very, very racist, right? And this example that I remember is that, you know, I was working with another black female and and the white client came in and she said,
you know, she she did a little jingle,
you know, Eeny meeny, miny moe, catch a nigger by the toe kind of thing. And, and I was so taken aback. But at the same time, you know, organizations tend to bury that kind of thing by saying, hey, you know, when you're coming to work, these are things that you know people will say to you, and you need to figure out how to, how to, you know, make it not impact you. You basically don't take it personally, right? Yeah, and I just remember not being necessarily upset with the client, because at the time, this person, you know, your mental state is we can negotiate that conversation. Let's just say that. But I remember the thing that really impacted me was the response of my supervisor and of the clinical staff. And I remember at that point saying, How can you say that you you have the clients well being in mind when the staff who are providing the surface the service to the clients, our well being is not being considered at all, right? You can't have a healthy service user if the service provider is not healthy, right, right? So what materialized from that is, you know, however it happened, I was, I was asked to to engage in changing the support procedure for staff when they are involved in traumatic experiences. And from that one document that I had a I had a part in drafting, there were other from from the agency policy writer, she sent out an email to all the frontline staff, saying, Hey, this is an opportunity for you to have a say in how we support you and how how we support you in providing services to our clients. So So I took that as as the first opportunity to say, You know what, we are not powerless in this situation, even as workers. You might feel like, oh, I don't want to go go up against the establishment. You don't have to. Everything that you do doesn't have to be overt and, you know, going with, with this raised and guns blazing and all that you don't have to do, all that you know, small changes, incremental changes, you know. You know, putting in a word here and there, when you when you have your your your staff meeting, saying, hey, this, you need to pay attention to this, because it's impacting the quality of service that that I that I'm able to provide, just saying those things, you know, and not necessarily coming off as being boisterous. Sometimes you have to be strategic, right? And to be real at the end of the day. Sometimes you have to leave. You know what I mean? Sometimes it's, it's that it's that toxic of an environment and you have to leave. And when you do decide to leave, don't feel like you know, I failed as a worker. I failed as a person. No seek out other partnerships or other people who are doing a. Or who are of a similar mindset, who are doing the same work, and you feel that your work is or your abilities are complementary to what they're doing, and find that way to re engage, you know what I mean? And at the end of the day, it's not bad to own your own business. It's not a thing. You know what I mean. Because the more of us out there who are doing the work, and the more of us who are supportive of of each other doing doing this work, the better it is for everyone.
So with that, tell us what's next in the field of social work. And, you know, like, kind of like a little bit of where we go from here, and I think you kind of hit on that with some some things that people can do. What is something that people can do? And I really like the piece that you said about the self care, because being a social worker, you take a lot of your mental, your emotional, your all of this is put into this, and then when you talk about this whole aspect of coming from marginalized population, or numerical minority population, that could take even even more, because you are tapping into some personal experiences, sometimes to help you certain people. So one of the things I want you to leave us with is what is a good self self care practice for social workers out there doing worse racialized work, what is a good way for a person to get engaged? Just one way that a person could get more engaged in policy, policy development. And lastly, and definitely not least, I want you to let people know. How can they get in contact with you? Stay connected, follow you, tweet you, Facebook, you like you, fringy, all that good stuff. So the first question is self care. The second one is how to engage in policy, and the third one is, how can we be friends?
Okay, so, self care. Self Care is a topic that I think it's uniquely individual. You know, yes, we might all experience the same thing. We're all working at the same agency, and we know that, hey, we got to work 12 hours for three days this week, and that means, you know, by the by the time, by the time you're done, you don't, you can't even think. You know what I mean. How I would approach self care is entirely different than how you would what I would suggest is find the thing that works for you. You know what I mean, if, if it's sleep. Hey, there's nothing wrong with that. Get some sleep. You know what I mean? If, for me, it's, it's, I'm a conversational type of person, so and I'm also a thinker, so while I'm experiencing an issue, if I have a person who's there to listen to me while I'm going through, while I'm processing what's happening to me, it helps me to problem solve at the same time. So it's not necessarily that I have to physically, you know, go to the gym and work out or, you know, you know, get a play a video game or something. It's, it's a conversational type of reinforcement that I need to help me feel better and feel like, okay, what I'm saying makes sense. What I'm saying doesn't make sense. You know what I mean. How do I how do I fix this? It's it's communal. For me, it's conversational. So that might not be it for everybody. You know what I mean? That might seem very simple and doesn't seem like it's something that will help help other people, but that's what helps me. So, you know, figure out what works best for you, figure out what you're comfortable with and do that thing that you're comfortable with. You know what I mean, as long as it's as long as it's something productive and helpful and healthy for you. You know what I mean? Because self care is necessary when, when there's moderation to it also right? And you know least, least and most of all is recognize that you know what work is work, that's it's called work for a reason, and you have to be able to disengage at some point and say, You know what? I'm not taking this home with me anymore, because it's impacting me, it's impacting my family, and it's not healthy. I can't provide the best quality of care to my clients if I'm taking work home and bringing it back to work,
right? And how can people get started to get involved in policy? Um,
you know what? Something as simple as writing a petition? Or signing a petition, something that you're passionate about. You know, pay attention to news reports, try, try not to, you know, pay too much attention to the gossip stuff, but things that have validity to them. You know what I mean, like we have right now, we have the anti black racism movement in education, that's that's sweeping across Ontario right now, and I believe that it's going to sweep across Canada very, very soon. And think about the legitimacy of the people who are participating. You know what I mean, like you want to get involved in things where, where the people are of note or of reputation, you know what I mean, and, and you're not getting involved in something that's going to put a spin on you, that is going to, you know, close, close career doors or career advancing doors. You want to make sure that what you're saying makes sense to to your audience as well, and it's something that you can easily get support off of, right? So, right now, there's, there's a petition circulating. It's, it's in, it's at, at the second reading stage of in the policy process about the student loans policy, right? So there's about there's about us. I believe at this point there's about 60,000 signatures already assigned to this, this petition, we need about 75,000 to really make a stamp to say, Hey, this is something you need to pay attention to our government. You know your budget said you were going to do this. Here are, you know, an additional 75,000 people saying, yes, it's great what you did, but you need to do some more. Right? And the first stage, if you don't even know how to, how to sign a petition, whatever, visit your member of Parliament's office, your constituent their constituency office, your elected officials are there. They you elected them. So you have the right to go and speak to them, and you they have. You have the right for them, you know, however busy they are, you have the right to speak to them, even for 10 minutes, right? So walk in, you can walk into their office. You know, you have to them so you have access to them.
Okay, no, that's a good point. And how can people get in contact and stay engaged with you?
All right, the best way to connect with me is on Facebook. Just if you just get on Candace on Facebook, you'll find me on LinkedIn. You just type in my name. You'll find me on Twitter. Let me just pull it up real quick.
Tell us. Tell me I'm typing it in the chat. How do you spell your first and last name so that they can type it in and go check you out?
Okay, on Facebook, my first name is C, a n, d, I, E, S, and my last name is K, O, T, C, H, A, P, A, W. On Twitter, I'll just pull it up right now. It's at Candace Koch up one at c, a, n, d, I, E, S, K, O, T, C, H, A, P, number one, that's where you can find me. Awesome,
awesome, awesome. Well, thank you so much for sharing your time and your talent with us. This has been addition of the counter narrative, where we have discussed the politics of Social Work. Do racialized social workers belong in policy development? And we've been talking to Candice, and she's been sharing her work in her research as a MSW on racialized social workers. If you want to get in contact with her, make sure, if you're here live, then make sure just go over to the chat and her name is spelled there, and you can check her out on Facebook. And if you're watching the replay and you can't see the chat, her name is spelled C, A, n, d, I, E, S, last name is spelled K, O, T, C, H, A, P, A, W, Did I spell it right? Gold star for me, alright, and if you want to get more of these shows, remember the counter narrative airs every Saturday night at 9:30pm Eastern Time. The next show is going to be on ebony faces and ivory towers, so black women in academia at predominantly white institutions, that's going to be two there's going to be two editions. There's going to be a part one and a part two. So that's going to be on, actually, Saturday and Sunday, 9:30pm Eastern time. Thank you for everyone who has engaged with us in the chat. Shout out to Benjamin. Shout out to. To send through set out to pastor Maureen and everyone else who didn't feel like necessarily posting their name. But remember, if you don't post your name, if you don't say hi, then I don't get to see you and shout you out. And if you have not subscribed already, please do click below and subscribe. Candice, do you have a final thought you want to say before we close out? I
just want to thank you, Rasheem, for the opportunity to to speak with you on this topic. I do recognize that that you're busy with your own work and and we're just trying to get by at the same time, you know. So I really wanted to express my gratitude for you taking the time and considering me to be on your program and and for the opportunity to engage with with people on social media, because, you know, this topic is, is something that's very important. So I appreciate you for that. And I also want to thank everyone for who decided and was able to log in and and participate that way too? I do appreciate all your participation.
Absolutely. My pleasure having you. Thank you again for watching the counter narratives. This is Rasheem. Have a good night.
Bye, everyone. Bye.