A charitable organization based in Toronto, StepStones For Youth is dedicated to addressing the critical and unmet needs of marginalized children and youth aged 10-25 who are involved in Ontario’s Child Protection Services and have significant histories of trauma, abuse, and unstable guardian care. It is also one of the organizations participating in Capacity Canada’s Human-Centred Design Thinking Program – Capacity by Design.
The mandate of the organization is to change the trajectories of young people in and transitioning out of the foster care system through increased educational achievement, improving mental and physical health, securing safe and long-term housing, and building strong networks of supportive adults to increase their sense of belonging and connections to culture and community.
Through innovative and impact-driven programming and vision, StepStones actively strives to remove systemic barriers for racialized and marginalized youth over-represented in child protection services.
As a participant in Capacity Canada’s design program, StepStones is keen on comprehending the Human-Centered Design approach to tackle challenges confronting marginalized youth. The organization aims to learn best practices for bringing key stakeholders together and prioritize youth with lived experience in foster care to develop innovative solutions that will improve the poor outcomes they face.
Stepstones hopes to learn how it can draw on its collective expertise and network of relationships to engage in design thinking to achieve better outcomes for marginalized youth.
Capacity by Design is founded on a human-centered design approach, which incorporates the perspectives of stakeholders when making a change or considering new directions of an organization. Approaching challenges in collaboration with stakeholders means that organizations are ‘solving with’ the people whose lives they impact.
