Report

The Seasoned Spoon is a vegetarian cooperative café at Trent University that sells prepared food to the Trent community and a variety of services to students, staff and community members. Among these services are their nearly 20 workshops and events offered each academic year. The project was a four-month community-based research project to evaluate the workshops and events that the Seasoned Spoon offered for the 2017-2018 academic year.

This feasibility study is a tool that will be used to determine if an Anishnaabemowin Immersion Elementary School and Early Years Centre is feasible within the City of Peterborough. This study is designed to assist in the decision making process set out by the Nawewin Working Group.

This short document offers key findings and conclusions from research I carried out from 2015 to 2017 as part of my Master's degree at Trent University in Canadian and Indigenous Studies. The purpose of the research was to document an oral history of the New Canadians Centre and immigration to Peterborough, focusing on the period from 1979 to 1997. I have prepared this document as a summary of the full Master's thesis for research participants. In sharing this document, I invite participants to share their feedback on the research. I will incorporate participants' feedback as I prepare the final version of the thesis, to be submitted to Trent University in January 2018.

Community gardening is integral to the creation of sustainable local food systems, providing fresh, healthy, nutritious food, while fostering resilient community spaces. The purpose of this study is to build on existing knowledge about the social benefits of community gardens and explore their application in the context of Peterborough. This research is conducted on behalf of Nourish, a community organization actively working to address food issues. Through this research, the social values of community gardening in Peterborough will help inform Nourish programming, outreach, and future grant proposals. In Peterborough, the unique social benefits experienced by community gardeners revealed a health-conscious orientation, supported by evidence of social cohesion and enhanced food security.

This report is the culminating piece of a four-month evaluation of the Amigos school Program of Heads up for Inclusion. The project had two objectives: 1) Evaluate the success of the Amigos school program since its implementation in 2001 from the perspective of teachers, students and parents/guardians of the participants, and 2) To research and provide the host with best evaluation practices for the program in the future. A literature review of best practices for inclusion of similar programs around North America was completed prior to data collection, while primary data was gathered using semi-structured interviews conducted in February and March 2018. Three interviews were conducted with different stakeholders who are involved with or have been formerly involved with the implementation of the program.

This project was developed for the Northumberland Land Trust (NLT) to assess and determine the suitability of the Laurie Lawson Education Centre property in Cobourg; for possible salamander introduction. In the initial research for this project many experts and expert literature sources were consulted to develop methods of assessment and to layout our onsite research. From this research we established that there are many factors which might affect survival of salamanders in an established population, and that would affect the suitability of habitat for translocation of salamanders. The substantial number of vernal pools on the property was the main reason for the Northumberland Land Trust's request for research and an assessment into the property's suitability.

This report provides an analysis and evaluation of the Aspire program based out of the John Howard Society of Peterborough. This program aims at assisting youth ages 17-25 in achieving their personal career and training goals through mentor-based relationships. Methods of analysis include literature review and semi-structured interviews. A review of academic and grey literature on engaging young adults in positive development through mentoring relationships was completed. The semi- structured interview aspect of the research focused on identifying the aspects of successful mentoring relationships that have lasted more than three months and assessing the effectiveness of the Aspire program as it is currently practiced. Currently there are six mentoring matches at the John Howard Society which have exceeded three months in length. The researcher conducted semi-structured interviews with mentors and mentees involved in the program. The interviews focused on the participants' experiences in the program and were not life history type interviews. The data obtained was transcribed and analyzed using coding and grounded theory. The data collected suggests that that mentoring relationships can contribute to positive youth development. In particular, mentoring relationships that last a year or more tend to show increased signs of positive youth development. The report finds the prospects of the Aspire Program in its current position are positive, however implementation in some areas of the program could be improved. The areas of weakness require further investigation and action by the management of the program. However, these results are based on a small sample size so may not be generalizable to the program as a whole. The report also investigates the fact that the analysis conducted has limitations. Some of these limitations include; data limitations as a result of the small group of interviewees.

This paper examines provincial post-custody accommodation. The purpose of this research, was to investigate what is currently occurring in the Haliburton Kawartha Pine Ridge (HKPR) region and review any existing best practice or programs for post-custody accommodation. To achieve this goal, a grey literature review was conducted and a survey addressing post-custody accommodation was emailed to social service organizations in the HKPR region. The survey consisted of qualitative and quantitative questions. The organizations were asked if they provided any services or support for post-custody clients, if they directly operated housing for post-custody, what problems post-custody clients experience, any barriers and challenges to meeting accommodation needs, any services that should be implemented and if the federal mandated post-release planning should be implemented provincially. The research demonstrated that the biggest barrier was a lack of housing. In terms of services, housing support workers and long term permanent housing should be implemented. The research also alluded to organizations wanting to see similar post-release planning, as mandated at the federal level. Recommendations include: targeting organizations that directly operate post-custody accommodation, disperse yearly surveys, test other post-custody accommodation models and fight for adequate housing.

The purpose of this research was to determine what feedback the City of Peterborough should gather from recipients of its supplement programs, what survey structure can be implemented on an annual basis, what impact on quality of life financial support has had on tenants, and how the rent supplement has affected the recipients' living arrangements. The City of Peterborough rent supplement program provides rent subsidies to individuals of low income to reduce the amount that they have to allocate to rent. To accomplish the goals of this study, recipients of rent supplements participated in a survey and focus group. The survey consisted of quantitative and qualitative questions inquiring about the participants' experiences since receiving the supplement. The focus group expanded on the results from the survey. Grey literature research was conducted to determine what information other municipalities have gathered on residents' experiences with their rent supplement programs. The data shows that overall the quality of life and living arrangements have improved for individuals receiving a rent supplement. Residents can now afford healthier groceries and social activities. In order to conduct the survey on an annual basis the questions should be quantitative and responses collected on a scale of strongly agree to strongly disagree. This paper is a continuation of a project that is interested in the experiences of residents receiving supplements from the City of Peterborough. Part one of this research focused on geared-to-income programs. This part focuses on flat-rate rent supplements offered by the Housing Resource Centre.

Barriers Preventing Youth From Using Transportation in Peterborough was a community based research project that was completed in the 2017-2018 academic year at Trent University,Peterborough, Ontario, Canada. The purpose of the project was to expand on information previously obtained by the Peterborough Youth Council (the host organization of the project), being that the youth demographic of Peterborough experience issues when accessing the local pubic transit system. Specifically, this project illustrated the expansion of this information and through research it was identified that the perception of transit accessibility vary significantly across socioeconomic cohorts. Through performing a literature reviews and conducting interviews, several attributes were identified as having influence over transit accessibility including: frequency, overall route and network coverage, as well as user's proximity to transit stops. However it was noted that through research that different perspectives exists in regards to which attribute is considered the most important or most significant. Ultimately, these different perspectives present the suggestion that citizens from different life-stages and social statuses hold distinctive attitudes regarding transit accessibility. As result, several research tools were created with the intention of being used in further studies conducted by the Peterborough Youth Council that would be used to investigate the specific factors that lead to youth in Peterborough having issues and feelings of anxiety when accessing public transit. Furthermore, several strategies that could improve transit accessibility, by targeting specific attributes that were deemed as having significant influence over transit accessibility were suggested.