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Housing Advocacy Field School

Housing Advocacy Field School

National Training Session

The 2026 Housing Advocacy Field School is a national training and mentorship program organized by the Centre for Urban Youth Research (CUYR) at Carleton University, bringing together young people across Canada to build skills in housing justice advocacy. In this final session, five regional participant teams will present the advocacy campaigns they developed through the program, sharing their community mapping work, campaign ideas, and next steps.

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Previous Events

Barely Making It: Low-income Renters, Public Housing and the Canada Housing Benefit

Barely Making It: Low-income Renters, Public Housing and the Canada Housing Benefit

Conference Presentation

Catherine Leviten-Reid and Aijia Deng presented together at the Canadian Association of Geographers Annual Meeting. Their presentation compared the affordability experiences of families receiving the Canada Housing Benefit with those living in public housing in Nova Scotia. Drawing on 126 interviews with 42 families, they showed that families receiving the CHB faced higher shelter-to-income ratios and ongoing struggles with rent, utilities, arrears, and subsidy insecurity. The presentation raised broader questions about affordability standards, tenant “choice,” and deservingness in housing policy.

Community Update and Co-Creation Workshop on Housing & Homelessness Research

Community Update and Co-Creation Workshop on Housing & Homelessness Research

Panel Presentation

On May 5, Red Dress Day, community members, researchers, people with lived experience, and partners gathered at Station 20 West in Saskatoon for a Community Update and Co-Creation Workshop on Housing and Homelessness Research. Designed by CUISR’s research team and the Lived Expert Advisory Council, the event honoured Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls, and 2SLGBTQI+ people while examining housing as a human right. Through visual research stations, short presentations, dialogue, and shared meals, participants explored the structural drivers of Saskatoon’s housing crisis, including evictions, financialized landlords, accessibility barriers, and links between housing, health, and economic well-being. Participants also mapped their own housing journeys and shared lived experiences. The workshop concluded with community-led recommendations and calls to action, which will inform a policy brief to be reviewed at a follow-up event in the fall.

Understanding Rent Variation in Canada: Insights from the Canadian Housing Survey

Understanding Rent Variation in Canada: Insights from the Canadian Housing Survey

Conference Presentation

Workshop – Interviewing Skills for Qualitative Data Collection

Workshop – Interviewing Skills for Qualitative Data Collection

National Training Session
Are you involved in a study that uses interviews with people to collect data about housing? Do you want to hone skills for interviewing tenants, housing providers, and more?
Jackie Kennelly, our Ottawa regional lead and expert qualitative researcher, will provide training to students and research assistants on using qualitative methods for affordable housing research.
This workshop will focus on interviewing as a form of data collection. You will learn practical skills and tips for conducting interviews with participants in studies focused on housing.
This is a workshop you wont want to miss!
To participate, contact Claire Maxwell at coordinator@cbu.ca to receive the Microsoft Teams meeting link.

YIMBY: Changing Hearts and Minds

YIMBY: Changing Hearts and Minds

National Training Session
In the context of affordable housing, we will learn practical methods for combatting NIMBY-ism, and strategies we can implement in 2025 to increase support of affordable housing projects in our communities. Max Haiven and Sarah Stein Lubrano of Sense and Solidarity will share their expertise on social movements, changing the narrative, and encouraging people to adopt new concepts. We will have the opportunity to ask Max and Sarah questions about ways to change hearts and minds and encourage our neighbors to say "Yes In My Backyard" in 2025. January 29th 2025, 1:00pm-3:00pm Atlantic Time. Learn more here. Contact Claire Maxwell at coordinator@cbu.ca to join.

Relations entre types de logement locatif et bien-être économique des ménages.

Relations entre types de logement locatif et bien-être économique des ménages.

Symposium Presentation 
Présentation dans le cadre de la journée d’études « Le Québec en mal de logement. Contribution de la recherche à la réflexion sur le logement au Québec » organisée par le CIRANO: Relations entre types de logement locatif et bien-être économique des ménages. Une étude à partir de l’Enquête canadienne sur le logement – cycle 1 (2018), Montréal, le 7 novembre 2024. (sur invitation).

How researchers can use library channels to access government documents, data, and information

How researchers can use library channels to access government documents, data, and information

National Training Session
Martin Chandler from Cape Breton University will be leading the session. Martin serves as the Liaison Librarian for the School of Arts and Social Sciences at CBU, and as the Data & GIS Services Librarian. His work supports student and faculty research and learning, along with mapping, data, and digital humanities work for the university and community. His research interests include: information searching behaviours in the arts, map and geospatial data work in libraries, and the history of libraries in Atlantic Canada.   During this session, Martin will be providing training on unique ways that libraries can be used to access government documents, information, and data for the purpose of research.   If you're interested in attending this training session, contact Claire Maxwell at coordinator@cbu.ca

NSCSW Mini-Conference: Understanding the Housing Crisis

NSCSW Mini-Conference: Understanding the Housing Crisis

Conference Presentation
Join NSCSW & NSACCW, online for a day of learning & advocacy around Nova Scotia's housing crisis. Catherine Leviten-Reid gives a talk on the topic of tenants' rights and the housing crisis in Nova Scotia.

Working with Lived Experts in Housing and Homelessness

Working with Lived Experts in Housing and Homelessness

National Training Session
In this edition of our National Training Series, we will be joined by two immensely experienced community-based housing professionals based in Saskatoon, SK, Deb McGraw and Colleen-Christopherson-Cote, who will facilitate a discussion around the topic of "working with lived experts in housing and homelessness". This is a session you don't want to miss—you will have the opportunity to talk with some of Canada's most experienced, on-the-ground housing experts. Contact project coordinator Claire Maxwell coordinator@cbu.ca to join the session.

Commons, Commoning, and Social Change Workshop

Commons, Commoning, and Social Change Workshop

Webinars
Brenda Parker, our GBA+ lead from the University of Chicago, will present her research on Feminist Commons: Addressing Intersectional Housing Disparities and Precarity? at this online workshop at 1pm Eastern Daylight Time. Zoom in here: https://umich.zoom.us/j/92001242990 (Passcode: 928347) or contact watkinsc@umich.edu for further inquiries. Presentation abstract: Around the world, capitalist, gendered, racist, and settler colonial policies have stripped indigenous, black, and other vulnerable populations of property, (re)instantiated patriarchal relations, and heightened housing as an asset for exchange rather than a right or part of broader infrastructure of care and commoning. This has resulted in burdens of housing precarity that are not evenly shared: gendered and intersectional disparities shape vulnerabilities and experiences around shelter and survival. These include uneven caring burdens, gender based violence, income and wealth inequality, health and disability differences, and unequal representation and political power. These longstanding disparities and related housing precarity have been amplified in recent years by financialization and a global pandemic. At the same time, a range of intersectional feminist commoning housing strategies have emerged many led by BIPOC women and communities. Others have endured over time. This paper examines the possibilities (and potential pitfalls) of intersectional feminist commons for mitigating disparities and housing precarities faced by marginalized women and for creating communities centered in collectivity, creativity, and care.

Housing Cooperatives

Housing Cooperatives

National Training Session
Recent MA grad and soon-to-be PhD student of our project grant, Isobel Araujo, will be leading the conversation about housing cooperatives in this edition of our national training series. Contact Claire Maxwell, our project coordinator at coordinator@cbu.ca to participate in this session or for more information.

Two-Eyed Seeing as a Framework for Tackling Indigenous Homelessness

Two-Eyed Seeing as a Framework for Tackling Indigenous Homelessness

Conference Presentation
Tiffany McDougall, MBA CED candidate (CBU), and Manitoba Regional Chief Cindy Woodhouse, Assembly of First Nations (AFN), presented together at the Canadian Rural and Remote Housing and Homelessness Symposium. Chief Woodhouse provided an overview of housing challenges faced in many Indigenous communities. Tiffany discussed how Etuaptmumk / Two-Eyed Seeing—originally developed by Mi’kmaq elders Albert and Murdena Marshall—can provide an effective framework for tackling Indigenous housing challenges by ensuring Indigenous values are implemented during policymaking and housing development. For inquiries, email Tiffany McDougall.

International Housing Policies Comparative Study

International Housing Policies Comparative Study

Conference Presentation
Jacqueline Kennelly of Carleton University (Ottawa, CA), Brenda Parker of University of Illinois (Chicago, USA) and Guy Johnson of RMIT University (Melbourne, AUS) work together to compare patterns in policy changes of three liberal democracies from the 1980s til today.

“It’s the difference between barely making it and not making it at all”: Housing as a human right, neoliberalism, and the new Canada Housing Benefit

“It’s the difference between barely making it and not making it at all”: Housing as a human right, neoliberalism, and the new Canada Housing Benefit

Conference Presentation
Can demand-side approaches to housing provision in Canada, such as rent subsidies and housing allowances, fulfill our governments' responsibility to adequate housing as a human right? We conducted interviews with tenants to discuss. This research provides one of the first empirical studies on housing allowances in the Canadian context. Read more in our Winter 2023 Newsletter.

Housing Rental Type and Economic Hardship in Canada

Housing Rental Type and Economic Hardship in Canada

Webinars
Xavier Leloup, a Co-Applicant on our research team based at INRS in Montréal, presented findings from our Canadian Housing Survey analysis as they relate to the economic hardship experienced by tenants living in different types of rental housing.

Community Engaged Research

Community Engaged Research

National Training Session
Community engaged research (CER) is the process of establishing research questions, collecting data, and disseminating information in partnership with members of the public and community organizations. We discussed the impacts that CER has had on research participants in the past, addressed examples of CER done poorly, and talked about the important benefits of CER when done well. We learned that CER functions best for all when done in meaningful partnership with the community; CER should be mutually beneficial for all involved, should engage the community that it intends to serve, should allow leadership opportunities among research participants, and should give back to the community by sharing results with participants upon completion of the project.

Equity Watch Webinar: Canada Housing Benefit

Equity Watch Webinar: Canada Housing Benefit

Webinars
Catherine Leviten-Reid shares results from Canada Housing Benefit research at a free online webinar.

Improving the National Housing Strategy to Better Adress Core Housing Needs

Improving the National Housing Strategy to Better Adress Core Housing Needs

Panel Presentation
As a panelist in a session organized for the National Housing Council on Improving the National Housing Strategy to Address Core Housing Need and Homelessness, Catherine Leviten-Reid reviewed early findings from her research on the new housing allowance program in Nova Scotia and recommended ways it can be improved to better support marginalized tenants. As part of the supply side of the problem, she also reviewed challenges faced by non-profit providers trying to build new affordable rental housing stock.

Pandemic Housing Precarity and Cooperative Solutions

Pandemic Housing Precarity and Cooperative Solutions

Conference Presentation
This presentation, held during the Canadian Association for Studies in Co-operation annual conference, discussed the amplified, gendered housing precarities that have exited prior to the pandemic but which were exacerbated by it, and presented housing cooperative examples as potential holistic solutions.

Developing a Housing System of Safety and Care: Addressing the Needs of those Transitioning from Systems

Developing a Housing System of Safety and Care: Addressing the Needs of those Transitioning from Systems

Conference Presentation
In an important case study on housing systems in the Saskatchewan context, this session, which was held as part of the Association for Non-profit and Social Economy Research conference, asked how well housing and other systems work together, and looked at the impact of systems exits on people’s housing precarity, exploitation, vulnerability, and criminalization and disproportionate disadvantage to Indigenous people and other vulnerable, marginalized groups in Saskatoon.

GBA+ is Life! Reflections and Recent Applications

GBA+ is Life! Reflections and Recent Applications

Panel Presentation
As part of a panel on GBA+ held during a CMHC research open house, Brenda Parker and Catherine Leviten-Reid reviewed how a GBA+ lens is being incorporated into different dimensions of the research team’s research and practice, as well as how housing precarity is gendered.

Freedom of Information Research for Housing and Tenant Justice

Freedom of Information Research for Housing and Tenant Justice

National Training Session
Andy Crosby shared his experiences on accessing information which he used during his research on Policing Indigenous Movements (Andy Crosby & Jeffery Monaghan), for which the dominant qualitative method was accessing internal government documents and policing records, and in research he has conducted on financialization and demoviction in Ottawa. This session provided opportunities to understand the process of access to information for housing research purposes.

The Pandemic, Evictions and Access to Justice for Tenants in Saskatchewan

The Pandemic, Evictions and Access to Justice for Tenants in Saskatchewan

National Training Session
Sarah Buhler discussed her recent research on the Saskatoon Housing Law Tribunal and shared her insights on tenant experiences with housing and the law.

Alternative Research Methods (Photo and Video-based) and Knowledge Mobilization

Alternative Research Methods (Photo and Video-based) and Knowledge Mobilization

National Training Session
This training session presented the basics of alternative methods such as photovoice as a qualitative research tool, and gave some examples of photovoice used in the housing context.

Workshop on Conducting Rapid Synthesis to Inform Pressing Policy Decisions

Workshop on Conducting Rapid Synthesis to Inform Pressing Policy Decisions

National Training Session
Michael Wilson reviewed different ways of organizing findings, giving our research assistants some ideas for how to approach their own topics. This session focused on how to undertake a systematic and transparent process in order to conduct rapid syntheses to address policy issues.

Can We Build or Not? Experiences of Canadian Third Sector Housing Providers in Securing Funding for New Affordable Rental Housing

Can We Build or Not? Experiences of Canadian Third Sector Housing Providers in Securing Funding for New Affordable Rental Housing

Conference Presentation
Led by Aijia Deng and presented at the Association for Non-profit and Social Economy Research conference, this session focused on the opportunities and challenges experienced by non-profit housing organizations as they have worked to secure support for new housing development from different levels of government, and in the three regions involved in our partnership grant (Cape Breton Regional Municipality, Ottawa, and Saskatoon).

Uncaring Infrastructures: Intersectionality and Housing Precarity

Uncaring Infrastructures: Intersectionality and Housing Precarity

Conference Presentation
Delivered at the 2022 Annual Meeting of the American Association of Geographers, this presentation discussed caring overloads, gender-based violence, income and wealth inequalities, health and well-being, and lack of diverse representation in governance and leadership, all as they relate to and impact housing and homelessness.

Security of Tenure and the Right to Counsel for Tenants Facing Eviction

Security of Tenure and the Right to Counsel for Tenants Facing Eviction

Symposium Presentation 
Sarah Buhler presented at the Symposium on Security of Tenure, hosted by the Office of the Federal Housing Advocate. Her presentation included information on eviction laws and procedures, access to justice on the part of landlords and tenants, and the impacts of legal representation in eviction hearings.

NVIVO, Thematic Analysis Software Session

NVIVO, Thematic Analysis Software Session

National Training Session
Judy Senecal gave an introduction to common thematic research tools (NVIVO) and covered some of the key functions of these programs.

Membertou First Nation Community Economic Development (CED) and Housing

Membertou First Nation Community Economic Development (CED) and Housing

National Training Session
During this session, Melissa MacDonald shared her research on housing options and development in Membertou. This session also allowed Melissa to share her insights on how affordable housing is different in First Nations communities, particularly in Membertou.

Community-University Partnerships During the Pandemic

Community-University Partnerships During the Pandemic

Panel Presentation
At a Community Campus Engage Canada meeting called Seizing the Moment, William Roy discussed the challenges and opportunities of doing partnered housing research in Nova Scotia during COVID-19, drawing on experiences from our partnership grant.

Feminist Sensibilities: Theory, Content, Epistemology, Methods and Application

Feminist Sensibilities: Theory, Content, Epistemology, Methods and Application

National Training Session
This session was a discussion-based meeting about applying an intersectional gender lens to our research domains. Discussion topics included: 1) How does gender play into the issues identified in different housing domains? 2) Do these (sample) research questions leave room for intersectional gender inequities? What are some specific questions that should be asked? 3) What are persistent blind spots in the literature with regards to gender intersectionality? What are your general recommendations for conducting research that is sensitive to gender intersectionality?

Research Tool Highlight – Zotero

Research Tool Highlight – Zotero

National Training Session
During this session, participants went over the common uses of Zotero such as citation management (in text, and in bibliography creation). The ability to extract a list of published abstracts, as well as to set up Zotero for use with Microsoft word, was also reviewed.

Data Management Plans

Data Management Plans

National Training Session
We discussed the data management plan for the partnership grant, as well as general practices to be used in research projects (such as naming conventions and backing up data).

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