Lawson Foundation

OPEN NOW: The Lawson Foundation 2012-13 Diabetes Funding Opportunity

2012-04-10T21:00:00Z

The 2012-13 diabetes funding opportunity is open for applications. Submission deadline: Monday, May 28, 2012 at 11:59 pm ET. HOW TO APPLY

The Foundation seeks to award $2,000,000 through a Canada-wide call for letters of intent. Ten (10) project grants will be awarded of $200,000 (maximum) payable over 2 years.

The 2012 round is the first of three rounds of funding to award $6,000,000 ($2,000,000/round) to projects using a Canada-wide call for letters of intent in 2012, 2014 and 2016.

Physical Activity in Early Childhood: Raising the Bar for High Quality Information

2012-02-17T17:10:27Z

Physical Activity in Early Childhood: The Encyclopedia on Early Childhood Development

I think this is a wonderful website that provides lots of information in a really clear, concise way that is easy to incorporate in programming I do with parents and children. It gets the key messages across and breaks it down in a way that is easy to understand and makes sense. I appreciate using these resources or recommending that parents check out the website as well when they have questions regarding the latest information on early childhood development. Great job!

Since its inception in 2001, the Centre of Excellence for Early Childhood Development (CEECD) has worked relentlessly to pursue its mission of providing parents, practitioners, service planners and policy makers the most relevant, high quality, scientifically-based information on early childhood development. In a little over a decade, the CEECD has published in its online Enc yclopedia on Early Childhood Development close to 400 papers on 47 different topics, while always insuring that the information was available in various formats and levels of language to meet the needs of a variety of readers.

With its priority to address topics that are relevant to its readers and to organizations that support its work, the CEECD was enthusiastic when The Lawson Foundation proposed and agreed to financially support the development of a new entry in the Encyclopedia focusing on physical activity in young children (0-5 years).

While there are increasing concerns over the rising prevalence of overweight, obesity and lack of physical activity among adults, adolescents and school children in Canada, there is a real dearth of knowledge concerning preschool children. In response to this worrying situation, and to provide the best scientific information, CEECD gathered and synthesized the latest international research on physical activity to inform and better equip parents, practitioners, service planners and policy makers with the most up-to-date information available.

With the support of The Lawson Foundation and a grant of $41,000, the CEECD was able to develop a high quality entry on physical activity in young children, release related resources and disseminate them to a variety of audiences.

Over a twelve-month period, using a thorough and rigorous process to identify the best international experts in the field, the CEECD published in its Encyclopedia six original papers on physical activity —all short syntheses of the most recent research— covering the most important aspects of the topic using a life-cycle approach to capture both the development and service perspectives. From these six experts’ papers, a three-page journalistic synthesis was written, answering three fundamental questions: How important is physical activity for young children? What do we know about it? And what can be done in term of services and policies to enhance and promote physical activity in young children? A bulletin and two leaflets, one for parents and practitioners and one for Aboriginal communities, were also developed, published and widely disseminated during the course of the project.

The process used to gather the best scientific information allowed us to capture the actual scientific consensus (importance, effects and guidelines) and to identify additional research activities that still need to be done in this area.

This project has had many positive outcomes for CEECD. Since the launch of this topic, readers have been providing very positive feedback and have already asked for numerous printed copies of the resources. Requests came from child care and early years centres, schools and school health networks, family resources programs, Regional Health Units, pediatricians, federal and provincial governments, midwives associations, Band Councils from many provinces and Aboriginal centres and associations.

Material gathered throughout this project has also offered the CEECD new opportunities to share its knowledge with groups of experts who are providing recommendations and guidance on public policies related to screen time for young children.

This project has helped to raise awareness and respond to a need for reliable information on the topic of physical activity in early childhood. CEECD believes that parents and those working closely with young children should have access to relevant and high quality information and we will continue to promote and share this knowledge with those who need it most.

10th Anniversary Celebration - Diabetes Workshop

2011-11-30T15:50:00Z

October 26, 2011 Lawson Diabetes Workshop – read the project presentations and presenters’ bios. An integral part of the diabetes funding strategy, the workshop brings our diabetes grantees together to share their work with each other and with leaders in the diabetes field. The October 2011 workshop celebrated the 10th year of the diabetes funding strategy and showcased 11 projects.

Early Years Study 3 reveals provinces are stepping up for young children

2011-11-25T19:16:38Z

TORONTO, Nov. 22, 2011 – The federal government may have ended the national child care plan in 2007 but that hasn’t stopped the provinces from making progress, a new report released today in Toronto and Montreal reveals. “Our report shows we may be developing a Canadian early learning and child care program one province at a time,” says the report’s co-author, the Honourable Margaret Norrie McCain.

Early Years Study 3 is the third in a trio of reports on the state of early childhood learning by Mrs. McCain and world leading scientist Dr. J. Fraser Mustard who died last week. The study provides the social, economic and scientific rationale for public investments in young children and recommends that all children be entitled to an early education from age two.

“Our contemporaries in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) have changed the discussion from the need to mind the children of working parents, to stimulating all children,” the report reads. “Driven by a massive body of research that points to the importance of the early years for future health, behavior and learning, they have invested heavily in early childhood programs, largely by including younger children in public education.”

The Early Years Study 3 introduces the Early Childhood Education Index, a tool that examines the state of early education across the provinces. “The index allows us to go beyond counting spaces and adding up dollars, to ask if public funding is being spent effectively to ensure the programs children attend are good,” says Kerry McCuaig, fellow in early childhood policy at the Atkinson Centre, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education and the third author on the report.

Three provinces passed the halfway mark on the Index’s 15-point scale. Quebec comes in first with 10 points, closely followed by Prince Edward Island with 9.5 and Manitoba with 7.5. The other provinces range between 1.5 and 6.5 points. “This represents progress,” Ms. McCuaig observed. “If the assessment was conducted as recently as three years ago, only Quebec would have stood on the podium.”

Today provinces spend over $7.5 billion on early education programs – a 100 percent increase over the last assessment the OECD did in 2004. Across Canada over 50 percent of 2 to 4-year-olds now regularly attend a program – more than twice as many as the OECD found in 2004. In addition provinces have taken steps to strengthen early education by rationalizing oversight, improving program quality and addressing the low wages of early childhood educators.

“The big story behind the Index is high-quality, publicly-funded preschool education for all 2- to 5-year-olds is not a utopian fantasy, particularly if it is built on the assets we already have in public education. Much of the groundwork has been laid, many of the tools have been developed and most provinces still have ambitious plans to put in place,” said Mrs. McCain.

EYS 3 and related documents are available at earlyyearsstudy.ca and pointsurlapetiteenfance.org.

For more information contact:

Toronto: Allison Black, Margaret and Wallace McCain Family Foundation, ablack@mwmccain.ca, 647.283.6403

Montreal: Jean Serge Grisé, Directeur, Communications et Affaires publiques, Fondation Lucie et André Chagnon, grisejs@fondationchagnon.org, 514.816.7520

For French language interviews outside Quebec, Linda Lowther, llowtherpei@gmail.com, 902.393.0679

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Building Connections: The Maestro Project

2011-11-24T16:03:00Z

Building Connections: The Maestro Project - helping to support Manitoba youth living with diabetes during the transition from pediatric to adult care

“The social events and newsletters are always encouraging. It’s good to talk to other diabetics. If it wasn’t for the project and its coffee club I may have never gone on the insulin pump. The project has made me interested in research and new product development. I have been attending the Bean Bags for over a year now – and I feel wonderful when I leave – it’s hard to explain. I love this project and I am very happy it is around.”

“It is difficult for anyone who is just starting out on their own to know where to find everything they need (medically speaking) especially in a city where there are few doctors taking new patients. It provides reliable, valuable information that fills a large gap in diabetes care.”

The Maestro Project is based on evidence that young adults with diabetes are a vulnerable group with high morbidity and mortality who require a unique age-appropriate system of health services delivery. Transfer to adult care comes at a time of intense social pressures in addition to physical and lifestyle changes. Young adults are faced with a transition that forces them to navigate an adult orientated health care system that differs in many ways from the pediatric system including philosophy, coordination of services and integration with physicians, diabetes educators, experts in psychosocial counselling and staffing levels. Defaulting from care is known to be associated with premature death and complications of diabetes that could have been prevented or delayed with timely access to treatment. Manitoba data from 2002 showed 25% of youth with type 1 diabetes and 35% with type 2 diabetes defaulting from medical surveillance within three years of leaving pediatric care. The vision of the Maestro Project is to provide coordinated case management by an administrative service navigator who can stay connected to young adults moving from pediatric to adult diabetes care to increase access to medical care and education and increase levels of support for maintenance of care connections.

Early support with a $75,000 grant from The Lawson Foundation facilitated the initial 2-year piloting of the Maestro model 2003-2004. “The Maestro” systems navigator, functions much like a conductor in an orchestra – working with attention paid to hearing the unique voices of all in the ensemble to identify strengths and address barriers to help keep youth connected to health services. The Maestro service involved voluntary participation, frequent (telephone, email, social media) contact, a project website at, newsletters, coffee groups, access to peer-mentors, evening dinner events with guest speakers and a trade show component, and voluntary participation in annual community fundraising events such as the Canadian Diabetes Association Run/Walk for Diabetes. Results from the evaluation of the 2-year pilot were extremely positive showing a reduction in the default rate from 25 to 11% and with 94% of participants reporting a need for the project to continue.

In the ensuing years the project has provided assistance in transition to adult care and support to over 1300 young adults 16-25 yrs of age living with diabetes in Manitoba, and has made hundreds of referrals and re-referrals to health care providers and community programs for hundreds of participants. The project has worked to create a nationally known and internationally recognized community for young adults with type 1 diabetes. It works with stakeholders and an ad hoc steering committee, to advocate for the development of increased services for this population. In 2006 a new young adult type 1 specific evening clinic was created in collaboration with community partners. Overall, this innovative service delivery model has resulted in enhanced patient access to services and decreased default rates and stakeholders have become more responsive to the unique needs of the young adult population. In-house quality assurance audits and participant surveys show that young adults are better connected to their care teams, more satisfied with the care they are receiving and attend appointments more regularly than when the project began. The project’s approach was shown to be feasible and effective and in 2009 the Maestro Project became a permanently funded program within the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority, Department of Pediatrics and Child Health at the Winnipeg Children’s Hospital.

Recently, the Maestro Project has embraced a new direction in focusing attention on young adults with type 2 diabetes transitioning to adult care. This chapter in the Maestro Project story is still being written, but it is with much gratitude for The Lawson Foundation’s early championing and belief in us that we can in turn, hope to empower young adults to believe in themselves.

Active Healthy Kids Canada releases the Ontario Supplement

2011-10-20T19:49:56Z

Active Healthy Kids Canada releases the Ontario Supplement to the 2011 Report Card on Physical Activity for Children and Youth

TORONTO, Oct. 14, 2011 /CNW/ - The results are in on the first-ever Ontario Supplement to the 2011 Report Card on Physical Activity for Children and Youth (Ontario Report Card), and the province has just squeaked by with a passing grade. The Report Card was released yesterday by Active Healthy Kids Canada and its partners, Ophea, the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO) Research Institute - Healthy Active Living and Obesity Research Group (HALO) and ParticipACTION.

Production of the Report Card is possible through financial support from The Lawson Foundation, George Weston Limited, the Public Health Agency of Canada, Kellogg's, Interprovincial Sport and Recreation Council, and the Heart and Stroke Foundation.

UBC receives $1.2 million to monitor child development across Canada

2011-10-05T19:30:53Z

The University of British Columbia today announced a $1.2 million gift from The Lawson Foundation to develop a system to monitor differences in child development across Canada.

Read the full story here.

2011 Report Card Overview

2011-10-05T19:25:02Z

The 2011 Report Card Overview from Active Healthy Kids Canada has been released and it has some interesting information for parents and kids alike. Read the full story here.

Two Lawson grantees win prestigious 2010 CIHR Awards

2011-09-23T00:58:50Z

In November, Clyde Hertzman and Kahnawage Schools Diabetes Prevention Project were presented with prestigious 2010 CIHR Awards.

CEECD International Conference: Models of Early Chilhood Services

2011-09-07T14:53:45Z

Join us in Montreal June 5-6, 2012 for this conference on the various challenges faced while implementing best ECD practices in the world. How should services be organized? How can best practices be provided on a large scale? How can these programs be funded?

Click here for more information.