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Library Youth Hub provides safe space for teens, even in pandemic

| juliatramontin
Entrance of brick building with wooden door that says "Weston Public Library"
Outside of Weston Public Library in Toronto on Nov. 10. Weston Library added a new Youth Hub for teens to its services on Nov. 16. (RSJ/Julia Tramontin)

A new Youth Hub opened at Weston Public Library on Nov. 16, which library staff said will have a positive impact on youth in the community.

“Youth Hubs are a space for teens ages 13 to 19 where they can come and actively engage with their peers, join a program or workshop to learn something new. It’s a space for teens to get homework help and tutoring and get a healthy snack, although a lot of these services are pre-COVID,” said Mohamed Abdullahi, a Youth Hub Librarian at Weston Public Library. “It’s a space where we support their development and it’s a safe space for them.”

Abdullahi said that the space reserved for teens is fairly new, with Youth Hubs starting to become available four years ago.  

According to the Toronto Public Library website, youth will have access to a drop-in study space and technology, such as laptops. Abdullahi said that the Hub will be receiving equipment, such as a new TV, over the course of the next few weeks.

 “There are currently 20 Youth Hubs and there will be 23 by Nov. 23,” Lisa Heggum, the Youth Services Manager of Toronto Public Library, wrote in an email. According to Heggum, the Weston Youth Hub is one of ten being added to libraries throughout 2020.

Library staff said that the Youth Hub will be situated in the historical part of the Weston Library building. The library is undergoing shelving changes to create a separate space for teens to take part in the new service.

A 2017 report from Social Planning Toronto found that about 40 per cent of children under the age of 18 populating the Weston area live in poverty. As stated in the 2019 Operating Budget Briefing, Youth Hubs are situated in or near Neighbourhood Improvement Areas (NIAs) as part of Toronto’s Poverty Reduction Strategy with the aim to provide access to programs for children and teens and support the growth of programs outside of school for youth outside.

“This service is standardized across the entire city,” said Sheldon Hood, who is also a Youth Hub Librarian at Weston. “Weston deals with a lot of economic and racial disparity, but the service you’re getting at the Youth Hub here is going to be the same service as any other Youth Hub.”

The Toronto Public Library Youth Services Strategy Report describes its alignment with the Toronto Youth Equity Strategy (TYES). According to this report, the library joins this strategy in focusing on vulnerable youth who “need improved access to opportunities to reach their potential” and states that services provided by the library, such as Youth Hubs, address barriers for youth including safe spaces, education, and employment.

Christina Paschakis, the Weston Library Branch Head, said during an in-person interview that pre-COVID, the library would see upwards of 40 to 50 teens coming to the library per day to hang out. “The youth hub will have a lasting impact because we’re going to be able to provide them a better space that’s actually a proper space for them,” said Paschakis. “Children will also see the teens in the space and they’re going to be more likely to join when they become a teen, rather than being out on the street.”

“I think it’s a good idea,” said Latisha Taylor, the Children’s Program Coordinator at Frontlines— a children and youth specific centre located in Weston. “Sometimes home is not enough. Having places like the Youth Hub where you can go and you know that somebody is always going to be there is very important to youth.”

“This is not something I had as a teen. If it was something me and my peers had, it would have had such a positive impact,” said Abdullahi, who grew up in the Weston neighbourhood.  “It’s going to be fantastic for everybody.”

Life during COVID-19: A story in five photographs

| juliatramontin

From online classes and working from home to constantly wearing masks, life during the pandemic has changed how everyday tasks are done. Living in Toronto, public transportation has always been a large part of my family’s life. The TTC has been especially important for my mother, Katherine Godfrey, who does not have a driver’s license and relies on public transport to get to appointments and go shopping. In the midst of the pandemic, protocols on the TTC have changed drastically, which I have attempted to show through photographs of what my mom, the subject, experiences.

This assignment is meant to demonstrate the use of five different shots to tell a compelling story, as well as practice photojournalism and composition techniques. Throughout the shoot, I experienced several different challenges. Taking photographs in a moving vehicle meant that some of my pictures were blurry and moving around to get a specific shot was difficult, so I took hundreds of pictures and chose the best ones. In addition, I had to keep in mind ethical standards when shooting in a public space. For this reason, this collection of photographs only focuses on my mom and does not include other people. This photo gallery illustrates what it is like for my mom to travel on the TTC during COVID-19.

Backshot of a women walking into front doors of empty subway station on rainy day.
Scene-setter: Katherine Godfrey entering the nearly empty Royal York Subway Station in Etobicoke on Oct. 22. (RSJ/Julia Tramontin)
Women stepping on pedal of disinfecting station on the wall of a subway station with hand held out for hand sanitizer
Detail shot: Katherine Godfrey using sanitizer at Royal York Station on Oct. 22. Hand sanitizer is now provided by the TTC as a new COVID-19 protocol. (RSJ/Julia Tramontin)
Woman approaches opening doors of subway on left. Platform she walks away from is empty.
Action shot: Katherine Godfrey walks through opening subway doors at Royal York Station in Etobicoke on afternoon of Oct. 22. The subway platform she is leaving is empty. (RSJ/Julia Tramontin).
Katherine Godfrey
Portrait: Katherine Godfrey wearing a surgical mask by the doors of a Toronto subway car on Oct. 22. Masks are now mandatory on the TTC(RSJ/Julia Tramontin)
Woman wearing mask sitting on subway seat next to closed subway doors. The seats beside her are empty and there is a sign above her saying to keep the TTC clean.
Medium shot: Katherine Godfrey sitting on Toronto subway car surrounded by empty seats on Oct. 22. The seat beside her bears a notice saying it is restricted due to COVID-19. (RSJ/Julia Tramontin)

Three verification tools put to the test

| juliatramontin

I was scrolling through Twitter the other day when I came across an article from an alleged doctor claiming that masks are not effective in preventing COVID-19. At a time where wearing masks is the protocol for most establishments, this article contradicts most medical advice out there. As most people are well aware, fake news can easily spread throughout social media (like the viral picture of a shark swimming on a highway that turned out to be a photoshopped picture of a shark in the ocean). So how trustworthy is this post? Let’s find out.

The Story

The article appears on Dr. Joseph Mercola’s website, which is allegedly the “#1 Natural Health Website.” The headline claims More Evidence Masks Don’t Work to Prevent COVID-19. According to the article, there is mounting evidence from sources, such as the British deputy chief medical officer, the White House coronavirus task force coordinator, and a working paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research, to suggest that wearing a mask to prevent COVID is not as effective as it might seem. Mercola details how he believes mask-wearing to be “psychological manipulation” in order to get more people to vaccinate when it becomes possible.

The Source

The original article was published on the Mercola website and was written by Dr. Joseph Mercola, an osteopathic physician, which can be found by clicking here. The article was also shared in a post on Dr. Mercola’s Twitter account on Sept. 11:

The Reach

According to Twitter, at the time of writing this, the post has 152 likes and 95 retweets. This also includes about 10 comments with mixed reactions from other twitter users- some claiming that Mercola is right and the government is “lying and bombarding the public with misinformation”, while others strongly disagree. One person went so far as to call the publication “garbage”. It’s important to note that while the number of likes seems minimal, Dr. Mercola has over 289, 000 followers, so there’s no telling just how many people saw the tweet. The article was also published on the Mercola website and has about 80 comments.

Verification Tools

The tool: Linkedin

I first wanted to investigate Dr. Joseph Mercola’s credentials to see if he has any expertise in what he claims. Linkedin is an online platform that showcases an individual’s professional experience, career milestones, and skills or interests.

The Findings

According to Dr. Jospeh Mercola’s Linkedin, he graduated from medical school in 1982. He founded his own brand, Mercola, and his specialties are claimed to be “natural medicine and physician journalist”. He also states in his About section that his main goal is to “catalyze a complete transformation of the fatally flawed health care system that is responsible for prematurely killing thousands of people every day.” Dr. Mercola is indeed a true doctor, however, he is invested in natural medicine, rather than scientific research that COVID-19 is based on. In addition, I noticed the tone of his goal is very negative towards the healthcare system and could come across as radical.

The tool: Snopes.com

I then used snopes.cpm to investigate the actual claims in the article. Snopes.com is an online fact-checking website that reliably validates or debunks specific facts.

The Findings

To find out more about whether the actual information in the article is credible, I turned to snopes.com. I wanted to find out how effective mask-wearing actually is. I looked up phrases such as “how effective is wearing masks” to come up with some search results. Every source that came up describes just how effective wearing a mask is. In Mercola’s article, he describes how cloth masks are useless. In one article found on Snopes called Why wear face masks in up public? Here’s what the research shows actually says that while cloth masks are not as effective as surgical masks, a study by the National Library of Medicine illustrated that masks “did reduce droplets and were better than no protection at all”. Another article found on Snopes also proves the scientific value of wearing a mask. In Masks help stop the spread of coronavirus- the science is simple, the author (a data scientist) uses several studies to show the effectiveness of wearing a mask. This includes a study from the National Institutes of Health illustrating how wearing a cloth mask prevents nearly all saliva droplets from reaching the person wearing the mask. This information clearly contradicts the few studies that Mercola cites in his article.

The tool: Google search

While this seems like a very basic tool, it is effective in bringing up multiple sources at once while using specific keywords to concentrate your searches on a specific topic.

The Findings

I used keywords including “Dr. Mercola”, “COVID-19”, and “effective” to pull up results. The first few websites that came up claimed that other information spread by Mercola has come up as fake, with headlines such as “Alleged COVID-19 Treatment Claims Land Doc in Hot Water” and “Chart of Illegal Claims Pertaining to Mercola Group Products” popping up below the search bar. The next search, using keywords “Joseph Mercola”, “claims”, and “trustworthy” brings up even more dubious headlines claiming Mercola’s false assertions. One article by McGill University even describes Mercola as an “osteopathic physician whose practice is now limited to offering mostly iffy medical advice on his website and selling a variety of questionable products.” With such adverse headlines popping up first in multiple Google searches, the information provided in Mercola’s article is clearly not as trustworthy as one might think.

The Verdict

So is this article trustworthy? I would say no. Overall, Mercola is not a credible source. Using these tools, I was able to effectively look at Dr. Joseph Mercola’s credentials, use Snopes.com to fact-check his claims, and see the most relevant information when Googling Dr. Mercola, by searching keywords on Google. This ultimately led to confirming that trusting information from this source is not only doubtful but also problematic. By confirming his “natural medicine” approach, as well as finding multiple articles detailing his questionable methods, it’s clear that Mercola is not new to the term “fake news”. Then, by searching for specific facts that turn out to disprove what Mercola says using scientific proof, I was able to conclude that this article is misinformation.

While Dr. Mercola is a real doctor and there may be at least some truth to his claims, this is no match to all the scientific evidence that proves otherwise. The ultimate assertion that masks are ineffective is not just “fake news”, it’s also biased and dangerous to tweet in the midst of a pandemic. Some people following his Twitter account radically agree with his views based on politics rather than fact and would not follow government health protocols. This can lead to people not following COVID protocols, possibly making other people sick. In conclusion- definitely consult other medical journals before taking Mercola’s claims to heart and, yes, wear a mask.