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Publication Date: 2019
This paper is based on the analysis of data collected from the National Canadian Homeless Youth Survey and addresses the question: why do some youth who received support from social service agencies that cater to the needs of homeless youth self-identify as being homeless while others do not? According to self-report survey data obtained from 1103 young people from over 50 youth homeless service centres from across Canada, findings show that yout...
Organization: Canadian Observatory on Homelessness; A Way Home Canada; National Learning Community on Youth Homelessness
Publication Date: 2016
Youth homelessness continues to be a seemingly intractable problem in Canada. We believe there are solutions, and that means leveraging the best knowledge we have to do things differently.
The Without a Home study is the first pan-Canadian study of young people who experience homelessness. With 1,103 respondents from 47 different communities across 10 provinces and territories, this study’s sample size has enabled us to conduct detailed analyses...
Organization: A Way Home Canada, The Canadian Observatory on Homelessness
Publication Date: 2017
With the release of Without a Home: The National Youth Homelessness Survey (2016), we now have robust national data on the links between youth homelessness and child welfare involvement. Without a Home, conducted by the Canadian Observatory on Homelessness in partnership with A Way Home Canada, surveyed 1,103 youth experiencing homelessness across Canada. Youth in 42 different communities and nine of the 10 Canadian provinces, as well as Nuna...
Organization: Canadian Observatory on Homelessness; A Way Home Canada; Centre for Addiction and Mental Health
Publication Date: 2017
With the release of Without a Home: The National Youth Homelessness Survey (2016), we now have national data on youth homelessness for the first time in Canada. The mental health findings of this report are startling:
85.4% of homeless youth were experiencing a mental health crisis
42% of homeless youth reported at least one suicide attempt
35.2% of homeless youth reported having at least one drug overdose requiring hospitalization
Youth experien...
Publication Date: 1998
The squeegee study, reported in Security Journal, found that of a group of 107 homeless Toronto youths, less than one-quarter (24 per cent) engaged in theft under $50, versus 75 per cent of non-squeegee youth. Less than half of squeegee kids sell drugs, compared with 66 per cent of non-squeegee kids. Squeegee kids feel depressed often or always 28 per cent of the time and suicidal 12 per cent of the time, versus 58 per cent and 33 per cent respec...
Publication Date: 2002
Three hundred and sixty homeless youth in Toronto, Canada were asked to report how they made money in order to survive. Income generation among this marginal population was conceptualized by fusing theory and research in the fields of the informal economy and the "underclass" and sociological criminology. While economic activity was found to be flexible, our analysis also reveals that work on the street is stratified on the basis of worker backgr...
Organization: Canadian Observatory on Homelessness
Publication Date: 2011
Homelessness, and its visibility, is back in the news in Toronto. Concerns about the scourge of panhandling have once again surfaced in local media with city councillors regularly weighing in on the ‘problem’. With little evidence that there is a dramatic increase in the numbers of people sleeping in parks or ‘aggressively’ panhandling on sidewalks, calls are once again being made for a law and order response to address this highly visible manife...
Publisher: Knowledge Mobilization at York University, ResearchImpact
Publication Date: 2010
The public often sees homeless youth as criminals who use crime, violence, and intimidation as a way to make money and support drug habits. In reality, homeless youth use flexible economic strategies that include a number of legal, deviant, and illegal activities to meet basic needs of food, shelter, and clothing. Most homeless youth prefer a stable job, but are forced to turn to crime for their income.
Publisher: York University's Knowledge Mobilization Unit
Publication Date: 2010
Compared to youth who have homes, street youth are much more likely to be victims of crime. Young homeless women are particularly vulnerable.
Click here to read the full report.
Organization: Canadian Observatory on Homelessness
Publication Date: 2010
Any parent would be outraged if their child was exposed to violence and crime. Any community would consider this to be unacceptable. Should we be concerned about the risks that young people who are homeless face? In our report, “Surviving Crime and Violence”, we explore the relationship between youth homelessness and criminal victimization. Our research highlights the degree to which the lives of young people who are homeless are characterized by...
Organization: The Homeless Hub
Publication Date: 2010
Bill O’Grady teaches in the Criminal Justice and Public Policy Program at the University of Guelph.
His research interests focus on street-involved youth, crime and social exclusion.
Where are you from and where did you study?
I am from Ottawa originally and I did my BA and MA at Carleton University. I was a pre-doctorate fellow at the Memorial University in St. John’s NF and then I did my PhD in Sociology at the University of Toronto.
What area...
Publisher: Canadian Observatory on Homelessness
Publication Date: 2009
What is the nature of discharge planning in provincial correctional facilities in Ontario and British Columbia? What are the key similarities and differences between the prison population and the homeless? How is discharge planning experienced by inmates and releasees? This chapter seeks to answer these questions, drawing on interviews with inmates, recently released ex-prisoners (housed, underhoused, or homeless), and those responsible for disch...
Publisher: Canadian Observatory on Homelessness
Publication Date: 2009
This chapter explores how income creation among homeless youth from Toronto varies according to gender. Using questionnaire and interview data, the authors show that, in relative terms, young men are involved in the more financially lucrative sectors of the street economy compared to young women. The authors frame the analysis of the findings in terms of broader discussion of how homelessness is gendered within the spaces and places homeless yout...
Publication Date: 2004
Research on employment segregation & women's lower earnings has predominantly focused on labour-market participants. Marginal groups such as the homeless have therefore been excluded from theory & research on work-related gender segregation. In order to fill this void, this paper explores how income creation among homeless youth from Toronto, Canada varies according to gender. Based on questionnaire and interview data our results...
Organization: The Shout Clinic
Publication Date: 1999
In our report, Making Money The Shout Clinic Report on Homeless Youth and Employment, we are bringing into focus the issues of homeless youth. In 1999, we conducted an "action research" project in which we surveyed 360 homeless youth in Toronto (in addition, 20 taped interviews). Our goal was to determine the needs and capacities of street youth with regards to employment. That is, to understand their current patterns of making money, to assess t...
Organization: HRSDC-HPS
Publication Date: 2006
The objective of this research was to provide a preliminary assessment, based on data collected in Ontario and British Columbia, of the relationship between incarceration, prison re-entry and homelessness. Independently, these issues have been explored in previous Canadian research, yet this is one of the first studies to look at the interconnections among these realms.