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Our Community Blogs share stories from across our work with equity-deserving communities, highlighting AHC programs, partnerships, and community-led initiatives in action. Through reflections, updates, and success stories, we showcase how culturally responsive programming and inclusive service delivery support individuals and groups to strengthen wellbeing and build capacity.
Alongside program insights, you’ll find community success stories and testimonials that reflect the impact of collaboration, participation, and grassroots leadership. Together, these blogs offer a practical and people-first look at how communities are advancing their own wellbeing and prosperity, with AHC walking alongside them as a partner.
Our Arabic speaking women group met on January 26th & 27th, at C5 hub, in order to learn how to obtain a class 7 license. On our regular meetings with the Arabic speaking women group, they discussed some ideas to help them progress and achieve empowerment tools. This workshop series of 8 classes was one of the needs that they felt was paramount to feel independent
As a result, we started a women and youth driving instruction for class 7 specifically for women who are struggling to learn and pass this course to be able to get class 7 driver’s license. We included their 14 years and older daughters to attend as well for a complete learning of the laws and regulations of driving in Alberta.
On Friday, August 2nd - participants of AHC's various Learning English of Daily Life (L.E.D) classes joined together are Borden Park for fun, activities and a multicultural potluck. The L.E.D program is designed to help adult newcomers to Canada fulfill their needs to overcome the language barrier so they feel comfortable and confident to communicate in their new homeland. The program is currently offered in seven locations throughout the city.
Program Objectives:
For more information on this program, contact Abida Tahir at: (780) 944-4687 ext. 222
View images from the event below.
On Saturday, April 6, EAC/AHC artist in residence Luciana Erregue hosted an art workshop for kids at AHC. The theme was Edmonton’s street art. Each child made a large piece of graffiti-inspired artwork to take home. Grafitti with its use of words and images is an excellent tool to teach early literacy. View the images below.
On Thursday, March 28th, the Networking Empowerment of Women Program coordinated by Joelle Kacou and facilitated by Ninfa Castellanos, visited the Art Gallery of Alberta. There they met with Edmonton Art Council and AHC's Artist in Residence Luciana Erregue-Sacchi, who works at the AGA. The gallery was packed and all sorts of events were taking place. It was a pleasure to exchange impressions on the modern building built by Randall Stout in 2010. Luciana walked the group through the different exhibitions, sharing in her knowledge of the works on display and inviting the women to partake in two tours run by Gallery Attendant Rita Neyer and Curator Danielle Siemens. The objective of the visit was to spark creativity and dialog around the art in our city. The AGA is FREE to students and seniors, and is FREE on Thursdays between 5:00 and 8:00 PM.
On Saturday March 30, the same group took part in a writing workshop also coordinated by Luciana. The workshop in question was on writing creatively exploring the women's own past, present and future, aided by the words and images in the vision boards they created in previous sessions under Ninfa and Joelle. Luciana has invited the workshop participants to share with the wider community the writing they produced and is looking forward to working with them to edit their pieces towards publication in an anthology, her final artistic project assignment here at A4HC. View images from the gatheirng below.
City TV News Edmonton, July 2019
Edmonton Journal, July 2019
Luciana was selected the 2019 Artist in Residence through a partnership between AHC and the Edmonton Arts Council. Luciana is a Canadian-Argentinian multilingual poet (Spanish-English-Italian), art historian (MA 2016, University of Alberta), and educator. She will be with us as an Artist in Residence until October 1st, 2019.
Luciana is joining our team to support existing projects and share some of her many talents and community connections with the community members we serve. She is looking forward to meeting with our team and explore opportunities to participate in existing programs, or simply bounce off ideas on how she can best contribute to strengthen the aims of AHC.
Her poems have appeared on online international magazines, (Reflex Fiction, The Write Launch, Your Impossible Voice), in the anthologies Home Connecting Us All (2018), edited by Tololwa Mollel, Looking Back, Moving Forward, edited by Julie C. Robinson, (Mawenzi House, 2019), and in The PolyglotMultilingual Magazine. She guest edited Can Lit: Curating our Canons (The Polyglot, Spring 2018). In 2018 she took part of the Writers Guild of Alberta Borderlines Writers Circle and Margaret Christakos Canopy Project at the University of Alberta (2018) and run the memory and art workshop My Marvellous Museum at University of Alberta's International Week. She has performed at the Edmonton Poetry Festival (2017, 2018), CJSR, and Lit Fest 2018. She has volunteered at the Centre for Family Literacy (2016-2018), and also sits in the Editorial Board of The Polyglot Multilingual Magazine. When she is not leading tours at the Art Gallery of Alberta, she enjoys roaming the city of Edmonton to write poetic responses to art and life in her blog, https://spectatorcurator.wordpress.com/.
When asked about her story she states "Like the clients you serve and some of the people who work here, I was once a newcomer, speaking mostly Spanish since I was born in Argentina. As years went by I completed my undergraduate and graduate education (BA and MA Art History) at the University of Alberta, raised two children, Federico and Bianca who are now university graduates themselves, and began work as a Gallery Assistant at the Art Gallery of Alberta. I also began to write poetry mixing English and Spanish and became acquainted with the Edmonton arts community through my participation in the Borderlines Writers' Group at the Writers Guild of Alberta and as a performer and event organizer at the Edmonton Poetry Festival. What I want to say is that, far from forgetting about my mother tongue, these days it is more present than ever, when I realize that what makes Edmonton a vibrant city is this Babel, this variety of languages heard throughout every place in the city. During my time here I want to allow the community around A4HC to express themselves in their mother tongue, and in English simultaneously, by engaging with the images that surround us, our Art Gallery, our downtown, our public art, writing about those experiences of looking around, grounding themselves in this new place, in whatever language they decide they wish to write."
Luciana will facilitate a number of readings and workshops during her residency with AHC. Details for her first two upcoming events are below, Having gone through the immigration experience, Luciana will fuse creative expression, multilingualism and the immigrant experience in order to provide newcomers with a "creative outlet" to come to terms with their new Canadian home, without leaving behind their roots.
View the activities which Luciana facilitated during her tenure with AHC:
To help our communities get ready for AI, on Saturday, November 23, 2019, AHC held a community leadership training workshop on “The Impacts of Artificial Intelligence on our Life”. The purpose of this leadership training workshop is to educate our community leaders as pioneers to recognize, acknowledge, and fully embrace how AI can transform the way we will live and work.
Sponsored by the City of Edmonton, in partnership with Alberta Artificial Intelligence Association, the workshop achieved a big success. Near 300 participants, including volunteers, AI demo presenters, and performers attended our event. We invited five professors from the University of Alberta and experts in the field to provide training to our audiences. The topics were very comprehensive and holistic, including mental health, physical health, economy, education, multimedia and business. Participants reported that it was a very knowledgeable, innovative and successful leadership workshop. The speakers provided a holistic picture of how AI would impact our lives in the near future. Participants also stated that through the workshop they have learned some basic knowledge about AI and raised their awareness of AI. Meanwhile, they enjoyed the AI demos, performances, food, socializing and had a lot of fun as well. CBC Edmonton and Diversity Magazine came and covered the event. This is the first leadership training on AI awareness and readiness at the community level in Edmonton. We believe it will help Edmontonians adapt to the age of AI.
View images of the event below!
On Saturday, December 22, 2018, AHC hosted an indoor Youth Soccer Tournament at Commonwealth Stadium Recreation Centre. We had over than 70 youth participate, represented by 12 teams from different communities. The youth enjoyed playing their favourite sport, shared a snack together, made new friends, and shared their experiences. Additionally, some teachers from different schools joined their students at the event to watch the games as motivation.
AHC's indoor youth soccer is a continuation of its regular outdoor season and provides youth with the opportunity to continue staying active while playing their favourite sport all year-round. For more information on AHC's other youth club avtivities click here.
View images from the tournament below.
On September 26, 2019 from 12-1 pm Luciana Erregue performed her final poetry reading titled, "Knowledge Translation" a series of lyric essays and poems about office work, her final poetry reading as she wraps up her tenure as Edmonton Arts Council Artist in Residence at Action for Healthy Communities.
Luciana was selected as the 2019 Artist in Residence through a partnership between AHC and the Edmonton Arts Council. Luciana is a Canadian-Argentinian multilingual poet (Spanish-English-Italian), art historian (MA 2016, University of Alberta), and educator. She will be with us as an Artist in Residence until October 1st, 2019.
During her time at AHC she has hosted a number of spoken word and poetry reading, facilitated art workshops for children and youth, and provided guided tours at the Alberta art gallery for our program participants. We enjoyed having Luciana share her love for art and poetry with our team and look forward to following her journey.
View pictures from the event below.
On Thursday, September 19th from 4-7 pm AHC held it's 7th Annual Diversity Health Fair at Kingsway Shopping Centre in collaboration with Alberta Health Services. Staff and volunteers engaged with individuals and groups to continue the reflection and learning to sustain actions that create community health and well-being.
Our generous supporters this year were Sobeys, Shoppers Drug Mart, and Alberta Transportation Office of Traffic Safety. We hold this annual health fair to improve access to, and orientate, community members & newcomers to health and emergency services available in Edmonton.
Poor access to health services means that an individual is less likely to participate in preventive care, and more likely to delay medical treatment. A Health Provider- managed health fair that targets the community’s needs will help fill the health access gap for vulnerable and underserved populations who often experience health inequities.
There were children's activities provided onsite including a balloon artist. Participants were able to obtain information on injury prevention, pregnancy, dental health, optometry, HIV/Std's, blood typing, diabetes and blood pressure testing, Child car seat safety, nutrition and more! Participants also had opportunities to win door prizes and gift baskets courtesy of Westmount Dental. This event allowed people to connect and have the opportunity to reach out to the diverse communities in our great city in the hopes to create awareness about Alberta Healthcare System and to enhance a healthier lifestyle. Much appreciation for the continuous support goes to our community businesses for their generous donations: Cedar Sweets, Safadi, Sun Bake, Paradiso, Mediterranean Pita, Pizza Hut, Pizza 73 and Arbonne gifts from dear Sandra Fayyad, Buster's Pizza (10640-116 street) Hado Akl, Amal Monzer, Spasation Gift Certificate from Mr. Yehia Assaf, in addition to the many volunteers who helped brignt this event to life!
View images from this event below!
AHC team members participated in some office fun this Halloween through fun costumes and treats! view images of the team below.
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