Girls / en Search for missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls hampered by police apathy: Researchers /news/search-missing-and-murdered-indigenous-women-and-girls-hampered-police-apathy-researchers <span class="field field--name-title field--type-string field--label-hidden">Search for missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls hampered by police apathy: Researchers</span> <div class="field field--name-field-featured-picture field--type-image field--label-hidden field__item"> <img loading="eager" srcset="/sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_370/public/2023-06/GettyImages-1247150393-crop.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=dsjfpIYy 370w, /sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_740/public/2023-06/GettyImages-1247150393-crop.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=K8IVETA4 740w, /sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_1110/public/2023-06/GettyImages-1247150393-crop.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=deIu54Hl 1110w" sizes="(min-width:1200px) 1110px, (max-width: 1199px) 80vw, (max-width: 767px) 90vw, (max-width: 575px) 95vw" width="740" height="494" src="/sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_370/public/2023-06/GettyImages-1247150393-crop.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=dsjfpIYy" alt="&quot;&quot;"> </div> <span class="field field--name-uid field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden"><span>Christopher.Sorensen</span></span> <span class="field field--name-created field--type-created field--label-hidden"><time datetime="2023-06-05T10:58:49-04:00" title="Monday, June 5, 2023 - 10:58" class="datetime">Mon, 06/05/2023 - 10:58</time> </span> <div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-field-cutline-long field--type-text-long field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Cutline</div> <div class="field__item"><p><em>Participants walk in the Women's Memorial March in Vancouver to remember missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls (photo by Liang Sen/Xinhua via Getty Images)</em></p> </div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-author-reporters field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/authors-reporters/kate-martin" hreflang="en">Kate Martin</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-story-tags field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/girls" hreflang="en">Girls</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/graduate-students" hreflang="en">Graduate Students</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/indigenous" hreflang="en">Indigenous</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/research-innovation" hreflang="en">Research &amp; Innovation</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/sociology" hreflang="en">Sociology</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/truth-and-reconciliation" hreflang="en">Truth and Reconciliation</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/u-t-mississauga" hreflang="en">Âé¶čֱȄapp Mississauga</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/women" hreflang="en">Women</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-subheadline field--type-string-long field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Subheadline</div> <div class="field__item">'The problem of Indigenous women being overpoliced and underprotected is all across Canada'</div> </div> <div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item"><p><em>Content warning: the following contains disturbing subject matter.</em></p> <p>In Canada, research shows Indigenous women are 400 per cent more likely than other Canadians to go missing. The problem is so pervasive that the Canadian government does not know how many Indigenous women are missing or have been murdered. Estimates suggest that around 4,000 Indigenous women and girls and 600 Indigenous men and boys have gone missing or been murdered between 1956 and 2016.</p> <p>To identify the barriers faced when searching for missing and murdered friends and family, <strong>Jerry Flores</strong>, an associate professor of sociology at the University of Toronto Mississauga, and graduate student&nbsp;<strong>Andrea RomĂĄn Alfaro</strong>&nbsp;set out to gather testimony from Indigenous women and Two-Spirit individuals.</p> <figure role="group" class="caption caption-drupal-media align-left"> <div> <div class="field field--name-field-media-image field--type-image field--label-hidden field__item"> <img loading="lazy" src="/sites/default/files/styles/scale_image_250_width_/public/2023-06/andrea%20roman%20alfaro.jpg?itok=XjNe_er3" width="250" height="333" alt="&quot;&quot;" class="image-style-scale-image-250-width-"> </div> </div> <figcaption><em>Andrea RomĂĄn Alfaro (supplied image)</em></figcaption> </figure> <p>Their findings are discussed in an article titled&nbsp;“Building the Settler Colonial Order: Police (In)Actions in Response to Violence Against Indigenous Women in ‘Canada,'”&nbsp;which was <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/08912432231171171">published in the journal </a><em><a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/08912432231171171">Gender &amp; Society</a>.</em></p> <p>While several studies have sought to identify why Indigenous Peoples continue to disappear, few have looked at the role of police in violence against Indigenous women, girls and 2SLGBTQ+&nbsp;people, says RomĂĄn Alfaro, a sixth-year PhD candidate in sociology.</p> <p>“The problem of Indigenous women being overpoliced and underprotected is all across Canada,” she says, citing a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/amr20/003/2004/en/">2004 Amnesty International report</a>.&nbsp;</p> <p>For their article, Flores – RomĂĄn Alfaro’s PhD supervisor and a volunteer with several of Toronto’s Indigenous-led organizations – conducted close to 50 face-to-face interviews.</p> <p>When COVID-19 restrictions blocked their ability to do more in-person work, RomĂĄn Alfaro suggested including the 219 personal statements from the <a href="https://www.mmiwg-ffada.ca/">National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls</a>&nbsp;to expand their sample of respondents.</p> <p>“The testimony of the women at the inquiry allowed us to see that in their stories, the narratives are all very similar,” RomĂĄn Alfaro says. “Then we went looking for what is happening in society that lets this happen.”</p> <p>RomĂĄn Alfaro helped code the respondents’ stories to identify common themes. The team soon identified police indifference as a major thread, with 209 of 219 testimonies referring to negative interactions with police in the management of their missing person cases.</p> <p>The article highlights two major styles of behaviour that the woman said police employed: justifying violence and dismissing violence.</p> <p>The research found that Canadian police repeatedly use negative labels such as “runaways” along with slurs when responding to reported cases of violence against Indigenous women and girls.</p> <p>“There’s nothing we can do,” or “it’s inevitable,” people report hearing from police when trying to report an Indigenous woman missing, the article says.</p> <figure role="group" class="caption caption-drupal-media align-center"> <div> <div class="field field--name-field-media-image field--type-image field--label-hidden field__item"> <img loading="lazy" src="/sites/default/files/styles/scale_image_750_width_/public/2023-06/GettyImages-1240472112-crop.jpg?itok=D41SqrGq" width="750" height="536" alt="&quot;&quot;" class="image-style-scale-image-750-width-"> </div> </div> <figcaption><em>A participant in the 2022 annual Red Dress Day march in Edmonton holds up a sign (photo by Artur Widak/NurPhoto via Getty Images)</em></figcaption> </figure> <p>The testimonies include complaints that loved ones were provided little or no information on their cases and that police gave up quickly in the search for bodies or culprits. In some cases, police suggested a missing person’s report should be done no earlier than two or three months after a disappearance.</p> <p>Respondents also noted indifferent attitudes, stereotyping and the blaming of poverty, mental health issues and lifestyle choices. Respondents said these responses instilled in them doubt, shame and fear of the police.</p> <p>Born in Peru,&nbsp;RomĂĄn Alfaro&nbsp;wasn’t aware of the Indigenous experience in Canada when she was growing up, but says the themes are familiar.</p> <p>“I had done a lot of work around violence and victims of violence, marginalized groups, state violence and low-income women in Peru&nbsp;– so I came in with that knowledge,” she says. “I didn’t grow up knowing about Indigenous life on Turtle Island, but this situation, of a culture of women being disappeared and murdered, was not foreign to me.”</p> <p>Flores is now writing a book using the data, which he hopes to publish by the end of the year. RomĂĄn Alfaro, whose own field of research includes how people respond to and resist violence, says she also wants to delve further into the findings.</p> <p>“I would like to do more work on how a community heals from this violence,” she says. “Red Dress Day, Orange T-shirt Day – these are ways to keep people remembering this issue and those people who exist in these communities, and how they can reconcile with such a tragedy.”</p> <p>RomĂĄn Alfaro says she would like to talk to police about their perceptions of interactions with Indigenous Peoples and find out whether efforts are being made to improve relations.</p> <p>“The families and friends (of the missing and murdered women) want information, they want to know something is being done, to be involved in the process or to know someone is looking for their loved ones,” RomĂĄn Alfaro says. “That’s one very big gap in all this: how to deal with the families. They want to know what happened&nbsp;– they need to know what happened.”</p> <p>Flores and RomĂĄn Alfaro believe their article’s findings have important implications for future research and policy.</p> <p>While the&nbsp;Calls for Justice of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls&nbsp;include demands for decolonial education and training for officers, RomĂĄn Alfaro says their research has identified a need to look for alternatives to the police for state-provided victim support.</p> <p>“There is still a lot of work to do from the Truth and Reconciliation recommendations,” RomĂĄn Alfaro says.</p> <p>“It’s a long way from saying what the problem is,&nbsp;to doing something about it.”</p> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-home-page-banner field--type-boolean field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">News home page banner</div> <div class="field__item">Off</div> </div> Mon, 05 Jun 2023 14:58:49 +0000 Christopher.Sorensen 301888 at International Women’s Day: Âé¶čֱȄapp leads the conversation on girls and women in STEM and sports /news/international-women-s-day-u-t-leads-conversation-girls-and-women-stem-and-sports <span class="field field--name-title field--type-string field--label-hidden">International Women’s Day: Âé¶čֱȄapp leads the conversation on girls and women in STEM and sports</span> <div class="field field--name-field-featured-picture field--type-image field--label-hidden field__item"> <img loading="eager" srcset="/sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_370/public/2017-03-08-glee-iwd.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=Pk6K2q4m 370w, /sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_740/public/2017-03-08-glee-iwd.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=4Ztcy_cP 740w, /sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_1110/public/2017-03-08-glee-iwd.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=VPRFSdII 1110w" sizes="(min-width:1200px) 1110px, (max-width: 1199px) 80vw, (max-width: 767px) 90vw, (max-width: 575px) 95vw" width="740" height="494" src="/sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_370/public/2017-03-08-glee-iwd.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=Pk6K2q4m" alt="Photo of GLEE"> </div> <span class="field field--name-uid field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden"><span>ullahnor</span></span> <span class="field field--name-created field--type-created field--label-hidden"><time datetime="2017-03-08T11:15:30-05:00" title="Wednesday, March 8, 2017 - 11:15" class="datetime">Wed, 03/08/2017 - 11:15</time> </span> <div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-field-cutline-long field--type-text-long field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Cutline</div> <div class="field__item">One of the many ways Âé¶čֱȄapp promotes women in STEM is through Girls Leadership in Engineering Experience, an annual event hosted in May by the Faculty of Applied Science &amp; Engineering to welcome female high school students to the engineering community</div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-topic field--type-entity-reference field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Topic</div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/topics/global-lens" hreflang="en">Global Lens</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-story-tags field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/international-women-s-day" hreflang="en">International Women's Day</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/girls" hreflang="en">Girls</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/women" hreflang="en">Women</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/education" hreflang="en">Education</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/stem" hreflang="en">STEM</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/sports" hreflang="en">Sports</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/oise" hreflang="en">OISE</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/u-t-scarborough" hreflang="en">Âé¶čֱȄapp Scarborough</a></div> </div> <div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item"><p>Âé¶čֱȄapp marked International Women's Day&nbsp;across its three campuses with advocacy&nbsp;and new initiatives promoting&nbsp;girls and women.</p> <p>The annual rally&nbsp;kicks off at Âé¶čֱȄapp's King's College Circle on Saturday – and,&nbsp;on March 8,&nbsp;faculties and scholars used the day to talk about how to encourage more girls and&nbsp;women to take up and then stick with&nbsp;careers in&nbsp;STEM and sports.&nbsp;</p> <p><img alt class="media-image attr__typeof__foaf:Image img__fid__3722 img__view_mode__media_large attr__format__media_large" src="/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/2017-03-08-mary-reid.jpg?itok=XCp1XWzV" style="width: 200px; height: 200px; margin: 10px; float: left;" typeof="foaf:Image">A big part of inspiring girls and women to pursue science, technology, engineering and math, is teaching future teachers how to teach math, says&nbsp;<strong>Mary Reid</strong>, assistant professor, teaching stream&nbsp;at the Ontario&nbsp;Institute for Studies in Education.</p> <p>She says mentoring future teachers to inspire female students&nbsp;will help boost the number of women in STEM.</p> <p>“Studies show that from a young age, girls are more anxious about math and have lower confidence in their math abilities compared to boys,” she said. “It’s critical that teachers help diminish that anxiety in young female students and give them confidence at an early age.”</p> <p>Another crucial step towards STEM gender equity is to engage girls at a young age, she says.</p> <p>“New parents, child-care workers&nbsp;and kindergarten teachers can spark the interest of STEM-related concepts for young girls.”</p> <h3><a href="http://www.oise.utoronto.ca/oise/About_OISE/Mary_Reid_aims_to_inspire_change_and_help_bridge_gender_gap_in_STEM_related_careers.html">Read more about Reid's reflection&nbsp;on STEM&nbsp;education</a></h3> <p>At Âé¶čֱȄapp's Faculty of Applied Science &amp; Engineering, efforts to encourage more women to pursue careers in engineering have paid off.</p> <p>This fall, the proportion of women in the faculty's first-year class reached&nbsp;40.1 per cent, the highest figure among Ontario engineering programs. This brings the overall proportion of women across all undergraduate programs over 30 per cent.</p> <p>“Diversity accelerates innovation, enhances the student experience and enriches the profession with different perspectives and ideas,” said Dean <strong>Cristina Amon</strong>. “In the Faculty of Applied Science &amp; Engineering, we are deeply invested in advancing diversity and fostering inclusivity within Engineering and beyond. These numbers show our tremendous progress, but there remains work to be done.”</p> <p>The faculty hosts&nbsp;many outreach programs throughout the year to inspire girls and young women, including hands-on programs for girls from grades 3 to 10, a program for girls to learn about the world of coding and software development, and the&nbsp;Girls’ Leadership in Engineering Experience weekend for&nbsp;female high-school students who have been offered admission to Âé¶čֱȄapp Engineering.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p> <p><img alt class="media-image attr__typeof__foaf:Image img__fid__3726 img__view_mode__media_original attr__format__media_original" src="/sites/default/files/ElsieMacGill.jpg" style="width: 750px; height: 500px;" typeof="foaf:Image"></p> <h3><a href="/news/women-make-more-40-cent-u-t-engineering-s-first-year-class">Read more about Âé¶čֱȄapp Engineering's efforts</a></h3> <p>In the world of sports, Professor <strong>Bruce Kidd</strong> and his colleague Professor<strong> Peter Donnelly</strong>&nbsp;have been tracking participation and leadership by girls and women in university and international sport at Âé¶čֱȄapp’s Centre for Sport Policy Studies.</p> <p>The Âé¶čֱȄapp Scarborough Principal, who is a former Olympian, says in a recent blog post that more must be done&nbsp;to show girls interested in sports at a young age that there are career opportunities available for them as mentors and leaders.</p> <p><img alt class="media-image attr__typeof__foaf:Image img__fid__3728 img__view_mode__media_large attr__format__media_large" src="/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/2017-03-08-kidd.jpg?itok=szrMpLjc" style="width: 200px; height: 200px; margin: 10px; float: right;" typeof="foaf:Image">“It isn’t that women drop out,” Kidd writes. “Many don’t even have a chance to think about a career in sports. Promoting women as coaches, executives, officials, even sportscasters, is important for the culture of sport. We need to change the mindset about women and sports so girls can play the sports they love when they’re young, and continue playing – and becoming mentors and leaders – later.”</p> <p>On Wednesday, Premier <strong>Kathleen Wynne</strong> and Tourism, Culture and Sport Minister Eleanor McMahon were at University of Toronto's Varsity Centre to announce&nbsp;increased&nbsp;opportunities for women and girls in sport, including initiatives for&nbsp;equal access to programs, training and coaching.</p> <p>The government wants to provide&nbsp;funding for the Coaches Association of Ontario to recruit and train 250 women coaches and 90 women mentors, and they're hoping to develop&nbsp;a provincial action plan for equal opportunity in sport.</p> <p>Kidd says that strong female leadership is needed to increase participation in sport by girls and young women in all communities – a lesson, he says, he learned from his&nbsp;feminist teammates and sisters. He says Ontario took “a giant leap” with today's announcement.</p> <p>“Girls and women are participating in sports in record numbers,” he says. “Canadian women have earned Olympic berths in roughly the same numbers as men for more than 20 years, and bring home even more medals. There isn’t a sport that girls and women do not play, excel at or enjoy as spectators. But Canadian girls and women still do not participate in sports in the same percentages as boys and men and they are woefully under-represented in coaching or in leadership.</p> <p>“The Ontario government gets it: If Canadian sport is to fully reflect Canadian society, we need to bring more voices, rhythms, and traditions into the field – especially those of female leaders.”</p> <h3><a href="http://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/aboutus/blog/2017/03/08/keeping-score">Read more of Kidd's blog post</a></h3> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-home-page-banner field--type-boolean field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">News home page banner</div> <div class="field__item">Off</div> </div> Wed, 08 Mar 2017 16:15:30 +0000 ullahnor 105512 at Black Girls Magazine: Âé¶čֱȄapp PhD student inspired to make a difference /news/black-girls-magazine-u-t-phd-student-inspired-make-difference <span class="field field--name-title field--type-string field--label-hidden">Black Girls Magazine: Âé¶čֱȄapp PhD student inspired to make a difference</span> <div class="field field--name-field-featured-picture field--type-image field--label-hidden field__item"> <img loading="eager" srcset="/sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_370/public/2017-02-21-black%20girls%20magazine.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=vbCtiYdf 370w, /sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_740/public/2017-02-21-black%20girls%20magazine.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=qytXIz3C 740w, /sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_1110/public/2017-02-21-black%20girls%20magazine.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=nfvzKxEh 1110w" sizes="(min-width:1200px) 1110px, (max-width: 1199px) 80vw, (max-width: 767px) 90vw, (max-width: 575px) 95vw" width="740" height="494" src="/sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_370/public/2017-02-21-black%20girls%20magazine.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=vbCtiYdf" alt="Photo of Annette Bazira-Okafor"> </div> <span class="field field--name-uid field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden"><span>ullahnor</span></span> <span class="field field--name-created field--type-created field--label-hidden"><time datetime="2017-02-21T14:13:49-05:00" title="Tuesday, February 21, 2017 - 14:13" class="datetime">Tue, 02/21/2017 - 14:13</time> </span> <div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-field-cutline-long field--type-text-long field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Cutline</div> <div class="field__item">Âé¶čֱȄapp PhD student Annette Bazira-Okafor (left) with some of the young contributors of "Black Girls Magazine"</div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-author-reporters field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/authors-reporters/lindsey-craig" hreflang="en">Lindsey Craig</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-author-legacy field--type-string field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Author legacy</div> <div class="field__item">Lindsey Craig</div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-topic field--type-entity-reference field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Topic</div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/topics/city-culture" hreflang="en">City &amp; Culture</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-story-tags field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/black" hreflang="en">Black</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/girls" hreflang="en">Girls</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/oise" hreflang="en">OISE</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/education" hreflang="en">Education</a></div> </div> <div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item"><p>When <strong>Annette Bazira-Okafor</strong>, a PhD student at Âé¶čֱȄapp's&nbsp;Ontario Institute for Studies in Education,&nbsp;saw the magazines and apps her daughter and her friends were using, she knew something was missing – representation of the girls themselves.</p> <p>“They just are not there. The way they do their hair, their skin tone –&nbsp;it’s not represented,” she said.</p> <p>“It sends a message that they’re not part of the norm. It’s not right,” she continued. “It’s important for them to have a voice.”</p> <p>So, Bazira-Okafor decided to give them one.</p> <p><iframe allowfullscreen frameborder="0" height="500" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Fk6yzMY_GJ4" width="750"></iframe></p> <p>One Friday evening, she got the girls together&nbsp;and asked them to share their experiences in written stories, images, cartoons –&nbsp;whichever way they wanted to express themselves.</p> <p>The result was far beyond what Bazira-Okafor had ever dreamed.</p> <p>“I just thought, ‘Why would we keep this [for ourselves] and not have other people look at it?’” she said.</p> <p>And so, with that, <em>Black Girls Magazine</em> was born.</p> <p>Using her own resources, Bazira-Okafor had the first issue printed.</p> <p>It wasn’t long before word began to spread among friends and families. Soon after, schools and libraries too, wanted the magazine on their shelves.</p> <p>“People loved it. They really embraced it. And I think that was really important for the girls to see – that their work was important, that they were important. It validated them,” Bazira-Okafor said.&nbsp;</p> <p>Content in the magazine ranges from running for school council president&nbsp;to “weird questions people ask me about my hair,”&nbsp;to family trips abroad and a comic strip.</p> <p>The girls say the chance to talk about their real-life experiences helps fight stereotypes of how black girls are often portrayed.</p> <p>“At my school, there’s a lot of black people. But then&nbsp;the white people [at the school]&nbsp;always assume that black people&nbsp;live in the hood, and they’re all very poor,” said Morgan, 13. “So I feel like if we show that we’re something greater...then I feel that that will help us a lot in breaking the stereotype.”</p> <p>In one issue, Taylor, 12, was inspired to write about her impressions of the Disney movie <em>Queen of Katwe</em>, a film about a Ugandan girl who becomes a top chess competitor.</p> <p>“I love <em>Black Girls Magazine</em> because it represents us, and the things that we like to do,” Taylor said.</p> <p>“We need to show other black girls in the world that they don’t have to keep quiet, and they don’t have to conform to what the world thinks you should be,” said Mbabazi, 13, who creates caricatures of girls in the magazine.</p> <p>As for what inspired her to create the magazine, Bazira-Okafor said her studies at OISE have been empowering.</p> <p>“It’s made me think about the world differently, and it gave me confidence to be able to boldly say what I want to say,” she said.</p> <p><em>Black Girls Magazine</em> is published twice a year&nbsp;with all publishing and printing costs covered by Bazira-Okafor. Those looking to help sponsor Black Girls Magazine can contact Bazira-Okafor at <a href="http://blackgirlsmagazine.ca/">blackgirlsmagazine.ca</a>. Girls who wish to contribute features to <em>Black Girls Magazine</em> can email: <a href="mailto:blackgirlsmagazine@gmail.com">blackgirlsmagazine@gmail.com</a>.</p> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-home-page-banner field--type-boolean field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">News home page banner</div> <div class="field__item">Off</div> </div> Tue, 21 Feb 2017 19:13:49 +0000 ullahnor 105095 at