First workshop launched with teenage girls in Pointe-aux-Trembles

News

14 November 2019

On November 14, Sarah-Maude Cossette (TRYSPACES intern) and Nathalie Boucher (R.E.S.P.I.R.E partner) hosted the first of four workshops at the Pointe-aux-Trembles youth centre to bring together local teenage girls about their experiences with parks and the transgressive practices that take place there.

The specific purpose of this first workshop was to raise awareness among adolescent girls of the challenges of public space planning and to encourage them to express themselves about their own experiences in the parks they frequent, their needs in terms of equipment and furniture and their recommendations to improve their experience in these parks.

The meeting took place in three stages: first, the results of the observation and interviews conducted in the summer of 2019 were presented, then the teenagers reacted and shared their own reality, and finally Amélie Boudot, a Master’s candidate in urban planning at the Université de Montréal, presented what she discovered during her field trip to Guadalajara, Mexico, on the experience of teenage girls in public spaces, which allowed the young girls to make comparisons with their experiences here.

Five teenage girls were present as well as Virginie Journeau (director of the Maison des jeunes), Mireille Hébert (doctoral student at INRS who works on teenage girls in public and digital spaces), Jessica Condemi (member of the Conseil Jeunesse de Montréal), René Rivest (development officer at Pointe de l’île) and Olivier Michel (street worker at Prévention Pointe de l’île).