Wellesley Institute, Canada’s leading urban health institute, is focused on improving health equity through applied research, community engagement, public policy and social innovation. This year Wellesley celebrates its 10th Anniversary as the successor organization to the Wellesley Hospital which had served Toronto for 90 years before closing its doors, a consequence of the Hospital restructuring program of the mid-1990s.
Over the past decade Wellesley Institute has emerged as a champion for communities in the areas of housing and homelessness, immigrant health, healthcare reform and social innovation. It was amongst the first not for profit organizations to truly embrace the social determinants of health (SDOH) which provided the lens by which Wellesley launched innovative and entrepreneurial initiatives in urban health.
Eligibility
The award has been developed to recognize the “unsung” heroes that have made a significant contribution to the health of urban communities in the GTA from 1998-2008.The award wishes to recognize those teams or groups of people who tend to “fly under the radar”; that is they are not the usual large service providers and agencies that tend to be prominent in the public eye.
We wish to celebrate those groups that have shown leadership, innovation, collaboration and impact within an urban health and social determinants of health context (i.e. housing, immigrant health, continuum of care services, poverty reduction, food security, etc)
Hence we expect nominations of grassroots teams or groups which have:
- Provided leadership to reduce the SDOH gap between those who are disadvantaged and those who are not. (i.e. working in poverty reduction, income distribution, healthcare reform, housing and homelessness, etc).
- Increased collaboration and partnerships to be a catalyst for social change.
- Led with innovation.
- Created a positive impact for its constituents through program and/or policy change.
Nominations and recognition process
Nominations may be submitted by the group/team or by an independent party to the Wellesley Institute to the attention of Rick Blickstead, CEO. These should be no longer than one single spaced typed page and should be received no later than Sept. 15. They will be judged by an independent party and the award winners will be recognized by the WI at the Oct 2 Tenth Anniversary Event. A cash donation will be made to each award winner.
To get more information on the nomination process visit our “10 in 10” Urban Health award nomination form page.
If you have any questions please e-mail Peter Marques at the Wellesley Institute.