TeachingCity Oshawa highlights educational and research accomplishments in Snapshot

TeachingCity Oshawa’s annual Snapshot was released this week, detailing accomplishments from the City of Oshawa and its four educational and research partners.

TeachingCity Oshawa, now in its seventh year, is a partnership between the City and Durham College, Ontario Tech University, Trent University Durham GTA and the University of Toronto’s Department of Civil and Mineral Engineering.

The partners collaborate on research and curriculum-based projects to try and address urban issues through innovation, collaboration, applied research and shared experiential learning opportunities. The goal of TeachingCity Oshawa is to position Oshawa as a local, national and global community of urban research and learning.

Projects featured in this year’s Snapshot include:

• Celebrating Oshawa’s Centennial – Durham College contributed to two centennial projects in 2024, creating a collaborative opportunity for local students to honour and celebrate Oshawa’s history.  A temporary public art installation celebrating Oshawa was created by Fine Art students and is displayed on the windows of 1 Mary Street North. In honour of International Women’s Day, Journalism students created a series of story maps spotlighting Oshawa’s trailblazing women – both past and present.
• Inclusive Community– Ontario Tech University students have been busy working with City staff on a variety of projects that contribute to making Oshawa more inclusive. Social Science and Humanities students enrolled in the Issues in Diversity course developed diversity and equity lenses to conduct evaluations of a variety of locations, policies, programs, recruitment and communications, and make recommendations. Health Science students from the Perspectives in Aging course researched how older adults attain local community information. The class also considered demographic data and Oshawa’s Age Friendly Strategy and created a series of infographic summaries with recommendations City staff could implement to ensure older adults can access information about community programs and services.
• Dungeons, Dragons, and Neurodiversity – John Smith, a student from Trent University Durham GTA’s Department of Child and Youth Studies, piloted a new Dungeons & Dragons Club at the Oshawa Civic Recreation Complex. This unique program provides neurodiverse youth with an opportunity to collaborate with their peers, socialize, and ‘slay dragons’ to achieve collective goals. The program helped foster meaningful friendships for neurodiverse youth in the Oshawa community.
• Student Placements– The City provided more than 38 work-integrated learning opportunities for TeachingCity students through placement, practicum or co-op opportunities. Students developed real-life applied skills while bringing new ideas and fresh perspectives to City Departments to help support the achievement of City initiatives.

Learn more about TeachingCity at teachingcityoshawa.ca and follow #OshTeachingCity on Twitter and Instagram.