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This case study of Covenant House, an emergency shelter for street kids in downtown Toronto, focuses on the experiences that draw kids into youth shelters and that drive them out. The analysis stresses the importance to street kids of feeling "cared for". Street kids were drawn to Covenant House because they felt cared for there by its open intake policy, appealing facilities (clean surroundings and good food), and staff who listened to and were interested in their problems. But residents were rather swiftly turned off by its rigidly enforced, elaborate and "uncaring' rule structure, and either walked out or got kicked out. Given the limited alternatives in Toronto's "shelter world", however, Covenant House has become the preferred choice for street kids who find themselves in a cycle of entering, leaving and returning.

This qualitative study examines sixteen women's understanding of their experiences in community organizing in a northern urban context. While most front-line community organizing is done by women, there is a paucity of research giving voice to their particular realities. Similarly, there is little information describing community organizing in a northern urban context. The study's conceptual frameworks draw on theory and research from rural and northern social work, activist mothering, feminist social policy, diversity and exclusion, and the social construction of identities. It follows a feminist research paradigm. The study illustrates women community organizers' sense of place and their perceptions of the politics of language, cultural and linguistic tensions, and the influences of northern economic and geographic realities. The research findings demonstrate the processes of community organizing in a northern setting, community organizers' demoralization because of increasingly less generous social policy environments, and the challenges of racial and linguistic divisions in community organizing. The study challenges the urban lens dominating social work education and highlights the legitimacy of community organizing within social work education. It discusses future research possibilities for cross-cultural community organizing involving minority francophone and ethnocultural populations as well as the relativity of notions of oppression within francophone spheres.

Thesis (D. Min.)--Trinity International University, 2005. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 114-117).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--York University, 2005. Graduate Programme in Environmental Studies. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 242-265). Also available on the Internet. MODE OF ACCESS via web browser by entering the following URL: http://gateway.proquest.com/openurl?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&res_dat=xri:pqdiss&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:dissertation&rft_dat=xri:pqdiss:NR19834

Thesis (D.W.S.)--Institute for Worship Studies, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (D.W.S.)--Institute for Worship Studies, 2006. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 93-99).

Thesis (D. Min.)--Catholic Theological Union at Chicago, 2007. / Abstract and vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 277-289).

Thesis (M.App.Sc.) - Carleton University, / Includes bibliographical references (p. 109-112). Also available in electronic format on the Internet.