Speaker Series : Featured Stories

Claire Nelson, publisher of our sister publication ModelD, joined us for our Speaker Series panel discussion in Toronto earlier this month. She wrote about her experience in the city and advancing the conversation on the power of play. Check out what she had to say in ModelD.

At the Yonge Street Speaker Series talk on the power of play, panelists explored ways to strengthen communities through play and games. As it turns out, our city's current efforts harken back to the social movement that created playgrounds, according to a social historian who attended the event.

At tomorrow's Yonge Talks panel, Rosalyn Morrison will discuss how Toronto's Playing For Keeps initiative is building communities and creating neighbourhood leaders through play and games. Here, she answers some of our early questions.

Tune into Just Rights Radio on CIUT 89.5 FM this Saturday at 8 a.m. to hear Yonge Street's Sheena Lyonnais talk about the significance of positive news in the media. She will discuss the differences between positive, breaking and fluff news -- as well as what Yonge Street brings to the Toronto media landscape.

At our January 17 Yonge Talks panel, Ajooni Sethi will share some of the secret ingredients that made a giant hopscotch course click with Detroit residents.

Yonge Street's next Yonge Talks panel explores the power of play to create community. Special guest Claire Nelson, publisher of our Detroit sister publication Model D and the creative director for Urban Innovation Exchange, will join Rosalyn Morrison of the Toronto Community Foundation in leading the discussion. Ajooni Sethi, one of the team members behind Hopscotch Detroit, will also participate. The Yonge Street Speakers Series is supported by Toronto Community Foundation.

Our Yonge Talks panel exploring the Toronto Community Foundation's new Vital Signs report led attendees to ideas about what could make our city a better place to live.

The Toronto Community Foundation's annual survey takes the city's pulse in areas ranging from health and the environment to culture and transportation. They're complex, intersecting issues. But following the money is as good a way as any to determine our civic health.

The vice president and managing director of New York's Municipal Art Society returns to her old stomping ground for our October 11 Yonge Talks panel on the Toronto Community Foundation's new Vital Signs report. We talked to her about the city's growth spurt and how she thinks Toronto can build on its success. 

Each year the Toronto Community Foundation releases its Vital Signs report, which provides a snapshot of the health of the city across 11 issue areas, ranging from safety and housing to health, wellness and the gap between rich and poor. The report flags both the progress Toronto has made on these issues and the challenges the city continues to face. At our free October 11 Yonge Talks event, sponsored by the Toronto Community Foundation, president and CEO Rahul Bhardwaj will present key Vital Signs findings and discuss them with special out-of-town guest Mary Rowe of the Municipal Art Society of New York.

After Yonge Street's two panels this summer on affordable housing, we asked attendee Kenneth Hale of the Advocacy Centre for Tenants-Ontario to write about the Charter challenge the group is making on behalf of people who are struggling to obtain adequate housing. Here's his argument.

In our second session on affordable housing, passionate thought leaders brainstormed how to improve the quantity—and quality—of affordable housing in Toronto.

At our June 21 event on affordable housing, panelists and attendees connected the dots between market forces, transit, and government and charitable contributions. There were no silver bullets, but lots of great ideas taking us into round #2.