The opening session welcomed participants to the Annual Symposium and focused on the people and places of the Mental Health Promotion Innovation Fund (MHP-IF). Words of welcome were offered on behalf of the KDE Hub as the symposium host; the…
The KDE Hub Annual Symposium is an opportunity to gather, to learn, to share, and work together for mental health promotion in Canada. These gatherings:
- Create supportive connections within and between the project communities that the Hub supports and those with shared interests
- Increase knowledge and build skills in selective areas that are relevant and timely for mental health promotion and mental illness prevention
- Inspire a shared vision for how learnings from projects can contribute to mental health promotion in Canada
Annual Symposium 2021
The Mental Health Promotion Innovation Fund in Context: People, Positioning, Pandemic, Potential
The KDE Hub hosted the first annual symposium January 25-27, 2021. This symposium was a short, yet concentrated window of time during which those involved in the MHP-IF were invited to explore relevant and varied contexts influencing their work, and contexts they can influence. Speakers, discussants and guests from beyond the MHP-IF enriched the exploration and learning. Participants explored:- people and places of the Mental Health Promotion Innovation Fund (MHP-IF),
- positioning of the program on international through local levels,
- influence of the pandemic, and
- the potential to advance child and youth mental health promotion in Canada.
Child and Youth Mental Health Promotion in an International Context
One of the hallmarks of the Mental Health Promotion Innovation Fund (MHP-IF) is a focus on upstream determinants of mental health for children and youth: building protective factors and reducing risk factors at the individual, community, and structural levels. Yet…
Child and Youth Mental Health Promotion in the Canadian Context
How are we doing in Canada at improving the underlying determinants of positive mental health for children and youth? How can the MHP-IF contribute to advancing mental health promotion? This session considered the Canadian context in relation to the international…
Child and Youth Mental Health Promotion in Your Context
Preceded by sessions that explored mental health promotion within the international and national contexts, this interactive session used the iceberg systems model to help symposium participants explore the contexts, landscapes, and systems in which they work. The tip of the…
The Pandemic Context
The COVID-19 pandemic context began early in 2020 and continues to evolve. Pivots, adaptations, re-thinking, and uncertainty are new norms. How are these norms playing out in the field of child and youth mental health promotion? Who is impacted and…
Discussing Considerations for Sustainability and Scale Up
Next phases of the MHP-IF and the desired future for many projects is scale up. But how do we get there? How do we ensure that interventions are scalable and that the groundwork for sustaining and scaling promising approaches is…
Context-Sensitive Approaches to Sustaining and Scaling Up Social Innovations and Impact
This session provided a pre-recorded primer on scaling up social innovations and impact. The presentation explored how to create conditions for success by taking short-term actions in the context of long-term plans. It highlighted that considering possible futures needs to…
Context-Sensitive Planning for the Short-Term: Hub Supports
The MHP-IF is approaching the final year of phase 1. In this session, the Hub provided an opportunity for all participants to shape Hub priorities for the next year. A short presentation from the Hub highlighted selective findings from a…
Closing Celebration
Many good journeys are circular. The closing session returned to where we started, with the people and places of the Mental Health Promotion Innovation Fund (MHP-IF), and with our intentions to explore these and other contexts that influence and are…