00:13 JAMES GAMAGE, HOST:
Welcome to this episode of the Responsible Disruption Podcast. My name is James Gamage, Director of Innovation at the Social Impact Lab at United Way of Calgary and area. In today's episode, we will be taking an in-depth look at a new youth focused mental health initiative called Planet Youth that United Way of Calgary and Area is partnering with a number of local organisations to launch in Calgary. But what makes this initiative so special? Well, it is a based off an Icelandic model that relies on creating partnerships across relevant sectors to attack systems issues from multiple angles, and has had a massive success across the globe. I'm excited to have our two guests, Jason and Margret today to walk through this amazing new initiate. So let's introduce them. So Jason Lidberg is the director of the Planet Youth model under United Way of Calgary and area Jason has been working in the youth engagement and community development sector for 15 years, specifically working with youth, the Indigenous community and newcomers to Calgary. Jason has spent the majority of his career with YMCA Calgary, but is excited to be leading the implementation of Planet Youth as part of the United Way of Calgary and area. And I'm delighted to welcome all the way from Iceland, Margret Lilja Gudmundsdottir. Margret is the chief knowledge officer for Planet Youth International, working towards achieving Planet Youth, global strategy and objectives, and designing and implementing the Planet Youth knowledge transfer strategy. She holds a Masters degree in sociology from the University of Iceland, is a lecturer at the Reykjavik University Sports Science Department that has been one of the key players in developing the Icelandic prevention. So welcome to you both and and particularly to Margret. We've had a couple of international guests on responsible disruption, but rest assured, you are the first from Iceland. So welcome.
02:15 MARGRET LILJA GUDMUNDSDOTTIR, GUEST 1:
Thank you so much. It's our privilege and honor to be here with you today, all the way from Iceland.
02:21 JAMES: Thank you. So I am actually going to start with you, Margret. Getting into the question, so you're one of the founders of the Icelandic prevention model, what is now known as Planet Youth. Can you explain the history of Planet Youth and where the idea came from and how it works?
02:41 MARGRET: Easy question to begin with. First of all, I would like to say that the Icelandic prevention model is not some kind of a package that we can hand out and say here you go, here's the model. So when you say that I'm the founder of the Icelandic prevention model, it's actually more like a phrase what we've been using to describe the work in Iceland for well almost 25 years now. The history of Planet Youth, how it started, it was actually just due to demand we had in 2017 an article published in Mosaic with a quite arrogant title, Iceland knows how to stop the teenage substance abuse, but the rest of the world isn't listening. And it went wild around the world and Planet Youth was actually established by demand. The interest from abroad made it necessary for us to define what had happened in the Iceland, and to kind of create the process and describe what has been happening and going on and this led to the publication in 2020 of the five guiding principle of the Icelandic prevention model and then another one about the 10 steps of implementation which the work of Planet Youth is based on. And we often describe ourselves as a family, planet youth family, and we are a growing family worldwide. But it was mainly... we were kind of doing our work. I was teaching at the university and and gave a presentation about the results here in Iceland. But we saw that we needed to do something. We needed to create something to assist and help people to gain the same results that we have been seeing for the past 20 years here in Iceland.
04:34 JAMES: And tell us about 20 years ago, what was the reason you created the Icelandic prevention model?
04:41 MARGRET: Well, it's even more than 20 years ago. It was 97-99, and even back we could go all the way back to 92. When I was growing up... I'm middle-aged woman in Iceland. And I often say that I used to be the bad youth, but I was not bad. I was kind of normal youth behaving in a normal way. So we had quite high numbers when it came to substance use, alcohol, drinking of adolescents 15 to 16 year old. And it was a big shout out. It started within the Reykjavik city, led by women. Actually, I love to tell the story because they were kind of women in charge of Reykjavik City asking for all kinds of different approaches preschool maternity leave. You know, more supposed to family and and mothers and fathers, of course. So there was a big doubt that that something needed to be done. It was not normal to have a town full of drunk young people, mainly children, during the weekend. And we started to use survey data from survey or questionnaire that was handed out to the children and to look at the risk of protective factors in our children's life. So that's maybe the shortest answer. And I know I'm we are going to probably going to talk more about it here today.
06:08 JAMES: Of course. And so it's, as you mentioned already that it the model has scaled internationally. How many different communities have adopted the model now?
06:18 MARGRET: We are now in five continents, 17 countries, and hundreds of municipality cities... and small towns all over the world. And we are growing fast. We want to make sure that we are not only growing fast, but we are growing well and slowly so we will be able to manage and... assist our partners. White... but this has really, in 2017 the article was published. Planet Youth was established in 2020, and it's... we often say it's a global. We are born global, so to speak. So... So this is what has been going on for the past few years.
07:00 JAMES: Exciting. Exciting. So Jason, that brings us to you and your role here in with Planet Youth in Calgary. So how did the model or how has the model taken route here in Calgary?
07:14 JASON LIDBERG, GUEST 2:
Yeah, that's a good question. I think it really started probably around that 2020 timeframe, maybe just a little bit before City of Calgary. The Calgary police were looking at some of the challenges that we were experiencing here in Calgary, particularly around the opioid crisis, and asking, what can we do for this? I think the quote that the chief of police used at that time was that we can't arrest our way out of this problem. We have to look at what we can do for our youth and young people to prevent problems from happening later on in life.
I think just at that time, that was right around when that article that Margret was talking about came out and said, hey, there could be a solution here where we could be looking at. Iceland has done this, has made real progress in preventing substance use amongst young people, and this is a model that we could look at here. So, you know, here in Cali, obviously COVID has had a huge effect on our speed of implementation, but really looking at the United Way's unique role in Calgary as a convener of different agencies, government institutions in our city that all contribute to the health and wellness of our city.
That was the unique role that we were able to play, bringing together partners who have a real desire to see youth and young people thrive in our communities. Bringing together the University of Calgary into this conversation, Alberta Health Services, the city of Calgary, and then a number of social agencies in the city that are all working with youth and have a vested interest in seeing our youth thrive. So we've worked together to begin the implementation of Planet Youth or the Icelandic prevention model here in Calgary.
09:06 JAMES: And which agencies are you actually collaborating with?
09:10 JASON: There's a large number of them, so I've already mentioned the City of Calgary police and Alberta Health Services. We're also working with the City of Calgary, the Calgary Public Library, CMH, a Calgary YMCA, Calgary Miskanawah, Trellis, Big Brothers and Big Sisters, Bridge Foundation, Calgary Sexual Health, and those are the ones that are coming to my mind right now, but it's a broad scale. Really intending to work with large organizations, large institutions that really contribute to the health and wellness of the community. But we also want to work with the smaller agencies and communities to really have a broad scale implementation. So we want to build communities that work for all Calgarians, youth. And so we want to make sure that we've got the voice of those youth being represented as the decision making tables as we go.
10:01 MARGRET: Yeah, I would like to comment on this. What Jason is saying, and I absolutely love how Calgary is approaching this because, you know, Planet Youth or Planet Youth guidance implementing the Icelandic prevention model is not about bringing Iceland to Calgary or Mexico or Australia or New Zealand. It's a primary prevention, you know, like a universal prevention. It's all about creating this team. It's not that you have to throw away everything you have been doing. It's more like, "Okay, now we are all going to aim in the same direction, go in the same direction." Like we often say, and bring to the table the strong coalition. That is hugely important and admitting that, "Okay, the stuff we have been doing before is maybe not the best thing. So we have to look for another way to do it, so to speak."
10:53 JAMES: Hmm, I'd love the concept of creating a team. This is clearly a systems level issue and response, so we need a lot of different players around the table so thank you for that.
11:08 JASON: Yeah. I was just gonna say for us it just goes to that... there's one that says, whose voices are being represented at the table in terms of our implementation.
11:08 JAMES: So, Margret, go on, Jason.
11:20 JASON: It has to be any solutions, any systems-level decisions that we make have to include the voices of the people that are being affected by it and representing the various communities that make up our city. But we also need to make sure that the right players are at the table, the institutions that are also making a lot of these systems-level decisions and so. If we can have, you know, the people and the system speaking to one another, I think we move a lot faster and then you... go into the work of the researchers and the experts in the field. You know, we can have this sort of virtuous cycle of people talking together that's all in service to our communities. We've got the expertise, we've got the community voice. We have the systems players and the policymakers, really in terms of making fundamental change in our communities.
12:08 JAMES: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So, Margret, I was looking at your website and the way that the model is constructed. And it's based on five principles that recognise as a person in four domains in their life, family, peer group, leisure, time, and school. So tell us about that and why you chose that path.
12:33 MARGRET: We saw it right from the beginning, and the risk and protective factors easily drew up this picture of the main family, peer groups, and leisure time. We have to remember that 20-30 years ago, the focus was a lot on the child itself—just say no. We have to empower our children to say no to drugs and substances. Well, we always say it's our responsibility as grown-ups, as a society, to create and ensure a really good environment for our children. It's our responsibility to provide them with a healthy upbringing without substances. The first guiding principle is that society is the patient. So, we are applying a primary prevention approach that focuses on developing an organized system. We are creating a system that we can work with to ensure a positive environment for our children.
Meaningful connection is also a treatment, and that's how we focus on connections between children, their families, peers, schools, community, and adults by creating a team of adults responsible for this new way of thinking. Schools are crucial, and we focus a lot on schools because they are our hub to collect data and often the hub in the neighborhood. The school community is important, but it's not the problem of the school. It's more like they are our hub, and we think it's crucial to create a dialogue between all the four domains within the Planet Youth Guidance. We have to engage and empower community members to make practical decisions, and that's the guiding principle now. Number three is all about using data-driven decision-making community-wide communication. It's about creating a dialogue. Perhaps the biggest challenge for us in implementing the Planet Youth Guidance program worldwide is to shift people away from thinking in terms of short-term projects or contracts. We make contracts with our partners for five years because even after five years, you might start to see changes, but you've begun to create a dialogue and set your focus.
Institutional-level capacity for leadership and problem-solving is crucial. We have to match the scope of the solution to the scope of the problem. When we collect data using our core questionnaire, the Planet Youth Core Questionnaire, we can see different things that need to be tackled depending on where we are. For example, we may not always see the preventive factor of organized activity. It's essential to look at it like a living thing, not a project—an ongoing process for at least five years. Another important aspect to keep in mind is that we are sharing more than 20 years of work with the world. We haven't performed any magic in Iceland, and we still deal with various issues that we need to tackle—new challenges that arise in our children's lives. It's an ongoing, never-ending story, much like raising a child.
17:07 JAMES: Yeah, yeah, certainly do so. You've talked about the importance of data collection and the school surveys, Jason. Can I talk to you about the data collection that we're embarking upon here in Calgary and how that's going to play out?
17:26 JASON: I think, very similar to what Margret's been describing, we've established really good relationships with both the Catholic and public English school boards here in Calgary. We're working with them to adapt the core survey from the Planet Youth guidance team into something more familiar in a Canadian context—specifically, our Calgary context—and relevant to the lives of Calgary youth. We aim to address what we see as some of the big issues here in Calgary. We'll collaborate with our schools to administer the survey, and, much like Margret described, closely analyze the data, focusing on risks and protective factors. This approach empowers our local communities to design solutions that make the most sense in building a healthy society for youth. One of the unique aspects we have in Calgary is our work within the indigenous community. We are passionate about doing things in a good way with the indigenous community, and we see Planet Youth as another tool or step in the process of truth and reconciliation, implementing the recommendations from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. To that end, we recognize the need to adapt our data collection process to make it meaningful and relevant within an indigenous worldview. So, we've developed a plan to collaborate with indigenous researchers to obtain similar information and data from indigenous youth in a culturally relevant and safe manner for their participation.
19:04 JAMES: Yeah, I mean, obviously we're in Calgary at United, but we're all well aware of the real importance we place on the Indigenous parallel for everything that we do. So yeah, that's great that we're thinking about it in that context. So Margret, when you think about the model and data is obviously a vital importance. And there's an interplay between the community and dialogue, and the data collection. How does that work in practice? Is the data collected annually or how regularly is it collected? How does the data then come into the community to create the right kind of dialogue to make changes or implement new solutions?
19:51 MARGRET: In the Planet Youth Guidance program, we collect data annually. The process involves staffing with data, conducting surveys, and using questionnaires to interview children. However, it's important to note that the questionnaire is not the end goal; it's a starting point. We organize training sessions with our partners, covering pre-data and pre-data training. During this, we set the focus for data delivery, emphasizing the creation of dissemination and action plans based on the results. Our reports, stemming from the questionnaire, are designed to be concise and impactful, mainly consisting of graphics, infographics, and key findings. We ensure that the data reaches the community 6 to 8 weeks after collection, emphasizing its freshness and local relevance. While data collection is crucial, our primary focus is on working with the results. We emphasize the importance of actively engaging with the data rather than producing lengthy reports that may go unread. When presenting results to the community, it's not necessary to have all the answers. Instead, we initiate a dialogue, asking questions like "What do you think about it?" and encouraging discussions within teams and coalitions. We highlight the critical role of parents in the Icelandic prevention model and stress the importance of educating parents about their role in their children's lives. The data is a tool for creating dialogue between various stakeholders, including those working in the field, parents, and politicians. It serves as guidance for upcoming work rather than being a conclusion. What I find most encouraging is seeing how our partners are increasingly bringing the results, or parts of them, to the youth. They allow children and adolescents to reflect on aspects such as safety in school or lack of opportunities in their neighborhoods. Partners facilitate discussions and focus groups with youth, empowering them to contribute to and have an impact on the solutions.
23:18 JAMES: Yeah, you make a great point about involving youth and I know Jason, in Planet Youth, there is a danger in any of these initiatives that they could be designed by adults with not enough youth involvement. How have we here in Calgary addressed that issue in the development to date and how are we thinking about that going forward around once we implement the model?
23:45 JASON: Yeah, that's a really good question. And I want to echo what Margret said. First of all, we recognize the responsibility that adults have to act on the results that we're getting from the surveys. This is what youth are telling us about their lives in the community and their experiences in different domains like family, peer group, schools, and leisure time. So we have a responsibility to act on that. But one thing we've been thinking a lot about is that we can't just make an implementation or a plan without understanding the perspective of youth beyond just what the survey says. In our design of Planet Youth, we've spent a lot of time thinking through and engaging with youth to ask, does this make sense to you? Does the idea of Planet Youth, the way primary prevention and the development of communities are talked about, make sense to you, and how do you reflect on that? So in 2020 and 2021, we've done a lot of reflection on that. We've also engaged within the indigenous community, bringing together youth circles to get young indigenous people's perspective on Planet Youth. Is this a model that makes sense from an indigenous perspective, and what do you, as a young indigenous person, think about your life and your community and how you relate to the broader indigenous community here in Calgary? So we spent a lot of time talking with youth on the lead-up to Planet Youth and adjusting some of our plans and our implementation based on what the youth have said to us.
So one of the big ones has been around thinking that Planet Youth, the core of it is the substance use prevention program. But the youth have really said to us you can't look at substance use without talking about our mental health and how that relates back to substance use. So we've spent a lot of time thinking about how this has to be connected to mental health and youth wellness and the community and societal factors that lead to youth having good mental health and living a good life. I think next to that is thinking about, once we have the survey results back, how are we going to share this back with youth and get their perspective on it and the nuance on it? So in the last year or so, we've seen a large increase in the number of Ukrainian refugees that have moved into Calgary. And thinking about what would a young Ukrainian's perspective be on their community and their mental health, their interaction with substances? We would want to have some sessions where we would talk with those youth, find out their perspective, and there might be some things that we think about, right? So, you know, broader in the community, access to recreation opportunities might be really important. But if I'm a young refugee youth, I might have some other things that are really important to me. So we hope that we can tailor some of our solutions to some of the members of the community that may not be represented in the broad youth community members. So just thinking about how that youth engagement is going to be really vital for us so that we can make sure that we've got a plan that includes all of Calgary's.
27:03 JAMES: I think when we spoke a short while ago about this, I think Margret used the phrase nothing about us without us. And I love that with youth and this is clearly a youth focused initiative and youth leadership really needs to be a strong part of this. And so I love that sentiment.
27:21 MARGRET: Yeah, it's a big and common phrase here in Iceland, especially after the Convention of Rights of the Child. Despite what I mentioned in the beginning, it's our responsibility. It's not their responsibility to wake up really happy each and every morning. It's our responsibility to create this environment and society where they at least have the opportunity to live a good, healthy life. I love what Reason is saying regarding substance. You cannot talk about substance use without talking about mental health, physical health, or any other opportunity. If you look at the four domains of the Icelandic prevention model, it has nothing to do with substance. What we are saying is if you have strong preventive factors within the life of our children, they are far less likely to start using substances. It's not like you wake up Monday morning freaking out of happiness and say, "Okay, today I'm going to start to drink." We see it in the past decades. If we look at children who are using substances, there is something broken within. The four domains don't have to be in each and every domain, but there is something. There is a lack of support, warmth, or guidelines from the family. Maybe they are not doing well in school or not participating in organized activities with high quality. So it's like something is broken, as I often say. Then you could have peer pressure that would lead to something they are not supposed to do. So it's more about how can we prevent any kind of risk behavior? And the focus has to be on the four domains. Yeah. Sorry, James was an add-on.
29:09 JAMES: No, no, no, that's good. We like that. It just struck me actually, when you were talking, Jason, we actually haven't talked about the implementation here in Calgary because I know we're going into a pilot phase, but where is the Planet Youth model being implemented and why did you choose those locations?
29:30 JASON: Yeah, that's a really good question. So we are piloting Planet Youth in four communities in Calgary. The first reason is the most practical – there are a lot of youth living in these communities. We didn't want to go to a community where there weren't many youth. The second reason is that we have existing work in these communities, making it more practical to collaborate with our various partners. There are recreational facilities and other programs we can leverage to support Planet Youth. The final reason is that these four communities are somewhat representative of the rest of Calgary. As we achieve success in these communities, we believe it will be replicable in other parts of the city. The four communities are spread around the city like a clock – Saddle Ridge in the northeast, Forest Lawn in the southeast, Shaughnessy in the southwest, and Thorncliffe/Huntington Hills in the north-central area. These communities have a significant youth population, representativeness, and existing infrastructure that we can utilize and build upon. As we test and find success in these communities, we can then implement similar strategies in other communities throughout Calgary.
31:02 JAMES: Thank you. And let's understand where we are in the development in those communities. The survey hasn't been undertaken yet, but are we setting up structures or community groups to be able to deal with that?
31:15 JASON: That's exactly right. Yeah. So, as part of the Icelandic prevention model, we're in the process of establishing our local coalitions. When we conduct the survey, we understand that there needs to be a body that will receive the survey, organize its dissemination back to the community, and help design solutions. Currently, we are assembling these local committees or coalitions that will receive the survey and guide its implementation in the local community. We've been working closely with our partners at Miskanawah, A trellis, and YMCA Calgary. They have representation in each of their communities. I should also note that we have a fifth community, which is within the indigenous community here in Calgary. Miskanawah is implementing in that community, and we'll have specific indigenous activities in each of our communities. Additionally, there will be more centralized, indigenous-specific implementation happening.
32:24 JAMES: And will that happen out of Miskanawah itself or?
32:27 JASON: We think so. They've moved to a new location that's really accessible via transit. So excited about the potential that we have in terms of our outreach to youth.
32:39 JAMES: Good. Well obviously it's an exciting time, but just thinking about the pilots and obviously Margret, quite rightly mentioned that we need to consider this as a sort of a long term program, five years plus. And I know when we were starting out, people were talking about... we need to consider this as a 25 year program. Yeah, so how? How will those communities develop? I mean, when will we see the whole of Calgary or all Calgary communities involved in Planet Youth.
33:10 JASON: Yeah, I think that's a really good question. And James, it's really hard for me to answer that question, to be honest, because one of the first things I did when I came into my role was look at, like you did, the Planet Youth website and take a look at the materials that they produced. And I think one of the things that really struck out to me was that it took maybe 10 years before you could really, really see the impact of the Icelandic prevention model in terms of the graph and the reduction in substance use rates. So I think the hardest thing that we're going to have to contend with is getting people's mentality to think about we're in it for the long haul and having to take a long-term look at things, which I don't think in Calgary, we tend to do. We're looking for that short-term success, those quick wins. And I'm not sure that this is the kind of project that we're going to jump out immediately. Our hope is that we demonstrate some meaningful progress within five years and that we're able to secure funding for our next five-year scale-up of the project and then our five-year scale-up after that. It's going to take time to demonstrate success, take time to build the right relationships not just with other agencies, but also with different levels of government so they see the success that Planet Youth brings and the possibilities that exist with that. You know, it's going to take time. My time in the sector, we don't do a lot of work with parents of young people. Most of my experience has been with the YMCA and a little bit more. So I would say on the recreation side of things. And you know, in that world, we don't spend a lot of time working with parents, but we really need to find a model of how we can work with parents and how we can bring them along in the process and how parents can feel supported in this as well, but also have the autonomy to make decisions about and to think about how they are interacting with their kids really goes to like, isn't just contained within the home, but is interconnected and builds, is part of building that healthy society.
35:20 JAMES: And Margret, is there any best practice around whether it's kids or parents or other partners keeping them incentivised and motivated through the long term? And what works to do that?
35:36 MARGRET: There are many good examples, and I'd like to reflect a bit on what Jason said regarding the results. Results could also be, when we start to think in a different way, especially when approaching parents with young children and discussing the importance of a good night's sleep. It involves not allowing them to spend too much time on social media. The question arises: how can we educate and train parents to be ready for the teenage years? What I love when looking through planned youth work worldwide is, first of all, seeing people who are willing to do their best and are open to changing the way they think and work today. Another thing I appreciate, a personal favorite, is my focus over the past 20 years on talking to parents, empowering them, and educating them. Here in Iceland, a prevalent concern revolves around excessive screen time, lack of sleep, and compromised mental health, especially after COVID. So, when we start to talk to parents and caregivers, it's crucial not to assume they should already know everything. Instead, we approach them with the intent of sharing what we know based on reason. For instance, we know that talking about sleep in a nice way with your child when they're young increases the likelihood of having a teenager with good sleep habits.
It's about changing the way we all think and focusing on empowering those who care. We already have groups of parents worldwide who want the best for their children, but sometimes they think it's being nice parents if they allow late nights or early access to social media. Empowering them involves setting rules and guidelines, ensuring that they act as parents. When I hear parents say, "My daughter and I are best friends," I say, no, please don't use that phrase. You're not supposed to be the best friend; you're supposed to be the parent. That's one of the keys. For example, the folks in Mexico focus on love and spending time with their children. Our partner in Ireland has been emphasizing good mental health and the importance of sleep.
I could continue to mention more examples. So, the focus should be initially on perhaps changing our perspective, like putting on different glasses, you know, or altering the way we think. Another noteworthy example pertains to sports in Iceland and its role in the Icelandic prevention model. This emphasis on sports is due to its significance in Iceland, and we are performing quite well, especially considering our relatively small population. It's important to note that the prevention factor concerning substance abuse isn't inherently embedded in the Icelandic prevention model. This is something we deliberately introduced. We started concentrating on coaches—educating them about their role. In the same way, sports can have an additional preventive factor, as can be done with a violin teacher or the YMCA. By educating coaches about their impact on children's lives, they suddenly realize, "Okay, I have something extra to contribute." We shouldn't tell sports coaches, YMCA staff, or violin teachers that there's a clear lack of preventive work in their role in children's lives. Instead, we need to ensure they understand how crucial they are and how they can approach it. This serves as another excellent example of how we impart knowledge to our partners and communities, offering ideas about good practices to enhance their existing systemic efforts.
40:23 JASON: Yeah, we're pretty excited. I was gonna say we're just pretty excited about when we look at leisure time opportunities for young people in the city, like how we could build a network of opportunities for young people. And like Margret was saying, talking about having some consistency so that, you know, parents can expect a certain level of quality because no one wants to drop their kid. I'm a parent myself, and I don't want to drop my kids off at an activity, violin lessons, for instance. At the end of it, I want my kid to be able to play violin, and my kids want that as well. But two, you want a certain level of quality from the instruction they get, not just in terms of the base skill, but you also want them to be a caring adult that recognizes, like Margret was saying, the importance that they have. So I think about math tutoring, you know, it is just math tutoring, but a really good math tutor recognizes that if you build confidence around math, you're also helping a young person build confidence in other areas of their life. And if you do that same with sports or with music or with art, these are all, you know, that a coach or an instructor can help a young person be a guide and a mentor for them as well and support the work of the family.
41:41 JAMES: What you're both speaking to there are sort of measurement is concerned, a very long term slow, slow outcomes. I mean, which is not wrong, but it, I think from our partners and our, you know, our donors and all our partners, we need to universally understand that this is gonna take time. And what we're doing probably initially is setting these baseline behaviors and small solutions with the kids within the family within the community. And over time, those will bring outcomes that will be incredibly profound and important. But it's gonna take time, so that's really...
42:30 MARGRET: It's similar to raising a child. It not only takes time. It's an ongoing work and you are acting constantly. And what I love and what Jason has been describing here today is how you are creating this strong team and just by creating this strong team, making sure that people are from different institutions and NGOs are coming to the table, starting to talk in this way. That's a huge achievement. That's really big. Yeah, life should never be a quick fix. We want everything to be a quick fix, show it to me now. But we know it's not like that.
43:15 JAMES: Yeah, yeah. I mean it is.
43:16 JASON: Well, I think, you know, the two things, the sort of two phrases I think about right within the indigenous community in Canada, there's been, you know, there is talk about making decisions that are in the benefit of the seven generations that follow you or there's like another saying that goes. A society grows great when old people plant trees whose shade they'll never sit under, right, like. And that's the type of thinking that we need to think about. We need to think about the next 7 generations. We need to think about doing things today that maybe I personally don't benefit, but my children or my grandchildren or my great-grandchildren are going to benefit. From and having that long term view in our society, I mean, there's so many problems in our world today that could probably be solved by thinking about having that long term view about not just my generation but the generations that follow me.
44:08 MARGRET: Really, I echo that and I would like to add another phrase. It takes a village to raise a child, so when you bring all those three together...
44:19 JAMES: Well, it's been incredibly interesting chat with both of you this morning and we're gonna have to draw it to a close, but I'm gonna ask one last question, which is have we missed anything? Is there anything else that you think our listeners would like to hear about Planet Youth or the model or the implementation here in Calgary, Jason or Margret?
44:42 MARGRET: I'm sure we missed a lot now. Yeah, I'm definitely sure there was so much more and maybe I want to make it absolutely clear that we are not bringing Iceland to Calgary even though we are a nice country and quite frankly it's all about you finding your own way to create this long term thinking. Primary prevention approach and I also want to make sure that if people want to know more, don't hesitate to contact me. We can easily be found on our website. And then we are all part of our work among our partners is to do the training, offer all kinds of webinars. We are constantly trying to add more things that we can offer to our partners because we are packed with knowledge and not only the staff of planned youth but also people that have been working in this area in Iceland for the past 20, 25, 30 years, whatever. Also, we look at it like a Planet Youth family and for someone it may seem a little bit too romantic a phrase or whatever, but it's like that. And I think. Like I always said, and I've already mentioned here today, we are in this together and it's our responsibility because we are constantly seeing something in our children's life and society that we don't like, and that's probably the reason why we all started doing our work.
46:19 JAMES: OK. Absolutely. Thank you. And we can put the website in the show notes for those listeners.
46:29 MARGRET: What did we forget, Jason?
46:32 JASON: Yeah. I think from Calgary's perspective, it's really about this idea that we want to help build healthy communities, thriving communities. We can't do it without the people who live in the communities. They have to have ownership of this. This isn't a bunch of experts coming in outside of the community who are going to tell people what to do or how to do it right. We want to be there to support and empower communities to make good decisions and to really take a look at the lives of the youth. And to make sure that the youth have an opportunity to say what they need out of their communities to make their lives good, to have a good, healthy life. What do they need, and that we want to bring together caring people who are passionate about their youth, that are in their neighborhoods, in their communities, and want to make a difference and will accept that responsibility that they have to both support youth. But also to empower the parents to make good decisions. So, you know, we're also committed to the long haul, long haul United Way has been convening. Convening work around serious community issues for a long time now, and we're committed to continuing our efforts to be able to support Calgary and Calgary's youth for the long haul. And I think that's really important that we're not in it for just this five year cycle, but we're committed beyond the five year cycle, whatever this looks like to continue bringing people together to support the youth of our city.
48:04 JAMES: And thanks, Jason. And we'll make sure that we also put details of the Calgary launch in the show notes as well. So that's great. So thank you both. Thanks Margret and Jason for your time today. It was wonderful to hear about Planet Youth, the Iceland Atlantic prevention and your passion that you have for the initiative. So we're really excited to see how it unfolds here in Calgary. And Margret, we must have you over here in sunny Calgary at some stage.
48:33 MARGRET: Yeah, absolutely, yes.
48:36 JAMES: Hopefully in the summer, rather than the winter, though, you'll probably be used to the winter once it launches in the next short while. So thank you to you both. Thank you to our listeners as usual for choosing to spend time with us again this week and we know you have a choice of what you listen to and we really appreciate you joining us on a weekly basis to hear the wisdom that we have to share. So until next time, goodbye.
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That's all for today's episode of Responsible Disruption. Thank you for tuning in and we hope you found the conversation valuable. If you did, don't forget to follow, rate, and share wherever you get your podcasts. To stay up to date on future episodes and show notes, visit our website at socialimpactlab.com or follow us on social and until next time, keep on designing a better world.
