diversity : Featured Stories

Toronto-based director Katerina Cizek breaks new ground in the documentary format with Out My Window, a multi-media National Film Board project about the highrises we call home here in Toronto and around the world. Already the city-building project is nominated for an award at the Sheffield Doc Fest, and will be presented in installation form at the International Documentary Festival Amsterdam this month.

The BizStart entrepreneur training program helps young creative types root their ideas in a business-minded reality as they start their first companies and venture into the world of self-employment.

Part of our series on neighbourhood strips and informal community centres, take a tour of the diverse and busy Peanut Plaza with Yonge Street's Bert Archer and Tanja Tiziana in both words and pictures.

A personal tragedy led Torontonian Halim Amini to start his own mental health and help industry, complete with radio and TV shows, and a non-profit counseling centre serving the growing Afghan community in Toronto and around the world.

Adding to Toronto's mix of ethnic neighbourhoods is Little Tibet, a relatively new addition to the Parkdale street scene. In this video, the Valunbisitsang family keeps both Tibetan food and music alive.

Beneath our gleaming glass towers and spiraling condos lies the remnants of another history, one thousands of years old, but often overlooked. With the Canadian Native Centre's "Great Indian Bus Tours" and the Indigenous Knowledge Network run out of St. Michael's Hospital, this is changing.

What would it take to change hiring practices around the world and bring the most disadvantaged, at risk populations back into the workforce? Ten years ago, Bill Young, then a highly successful CEO, started to wonder that question. The result is Social Capital Partners, which in its short life has already greatly changed the world of work.

Toronto's Steam Whistle Brewing has an unusual hiring policy: choose the best person for the job, with or without Canadian experience. In doing so, they say they've made their company and brand stronger.

With researchers from 37 countries, the Xerox Research Centre of Canada's "diversity of thought" strategy, adopted in 2004, has resulted in a 17 per cent year-over-year increase in the number of its patent ideas.

The founder of multicultural Toronto-based and internationally successful film distribution company Mongrel Media is a practical idealist whose newest feature, Score, will open the Toronto International Film Festival next month.

Wexford used to be a village and though now found in the middle of Scarborough, it still is, but it might not look like you expect it to. Part of our series on neighbourhood strips, take a tour of a Wexford stripmall with Yonge Street's Bert Archer and Tanja Tiziana in words and pictures.

After years of serving western style food to please their customers, a Markham chef wows the city with his traditional "la main" noodles, and passes on the thousand-year tradition. Pacific Mall, an informal incubator for new immigrant businesses, is a perfect location.

Toronto is tapping into its skilled immigrant talent by, in part, training human resources professionals to recognize and hire from this neglected pool of smart and ready-to-work people.

A Different Booklist is one independent bookstore that's flourishing by being a community centre for Toronto's Caribbean diaspora.