Failure is for the Privileged
welcome
to the future
my name is katie hectobyte i’m a social
entrepreneur and innovator
three how are we doing today i just have
one question for you
how many times have you heard if you
just believe in yourself
you can do anything by a show of hands
in the audience
who genuinely believes a statement
aw only a few optimists in the room
for those of you who raise your hands
i’m not here to change your mind
i’m just here to change your mind set on
how you may view the stereotypical
unsuccessful individuals in this world
name is katie hegdeveet i’m founder of
social enterprise
bootcamps for change we facilitate
weekly in-shelter fitness programs for
youth experiencing homelessness in
canada
we also have a scholarship program the
sweatier for the better fund
where we pay for youth to become
certified personal trainers
hire them internally in the organization
in addition to connecting them with
local job
and mentorship opportunities in 2019
we impacted over a thousand youth in
2020
we’re on track to impacting over 5 000
youth
i’m a recent grad of ryerson
university’s nutrition and food program
with a certificate in food security and
this year i’ll be pursuing my masters of
management
innovation and entrepreneurship at
queen’s university
with boot camps for change as my project
when we think of the stereotypical
unsuccessful person
this is typically in regards to lacking
financial means
or social capital aka relationships
who would be the most extreme example of
this
the homeless not only without a dollar
to afford a roof over their head
but also not one person one friend
one family member acquaintance or loved
one that they can stay with
can you imagine anything more lonely
this is some pretty heavy stuff
so i want you to humor me for a second
close your eyes
imagine yourself walking down queen
street you see a homeless person
do you cross the street to avoid talking
to them
you won’t even make eye contact with
them let alone
interact with them but you’re already
making assumptions
about their story what is their story
you’re allowed to open your eyes now
perhaps you thought
they must have lived a life of violence
and crime
perhaps you thought they must just be an
addict
or perhaps you thought they must just be
lazy
so their situation must be their fault
and their fault only right
wrong these harmful assumptions could
not be further from the truth
and i’m here today to show you why
while everyone in this room juggles work
family
and financial obligations for low-income
or homeless individuals
these everyday decisions involve
constant agonizing trade-offs
should i fill this prescription or
should i buy food
should i pay rent or pay for my child’s
daycare
and the process of making these
decisions day after day
comes at a cognitive cost one
researchers say is equivalent to living
each day
as if you haven’t slept the night before
but when it comes to the poor we still
tend to blame them for their ill health
i’m sure you’ve heard it all before why
don’t they just get a job
why don’t they just stop drinking why
don’t they just stop
doing drugs or eating that junk however
a lot of interventions for these
populations
currently just focus on providing
education alone
since we’re failing to see the big
picture we like to believe that those
people just
knew these basic facts all the problems
in this population will be solved right
wrong the concept of self-efficacy
theorized by albert bandura as a social
learning theory
is described as one’s own perceived
ability to overcome the challenges
and obstacles presented to them because
i overcame an eating disorder as a young
child
i now have high self-efficacy meaning i
believe in my ability to overcome
any challenge that life throws me my way
i have a vision for my life
not as it is but as it could be do you
with this newfound self-efficacy i have
had the confidence to go after
opportunities that have really helped my
career
because not only do i believe in the
return on investment
but also i believe in my ability to
excel at finishing these qualifications
so failure is further privileged
what does she mean failures for the
privileged
compared to their lower income
counterparts well-off professionals are
way more likely to take a risk
that can result in a huge reward only
because they’re certain
if they were to fail they have the means
and ability to pick themselves back up
again
this is a luxury that low-income
individuals simply cannot afford
a well-off student can take an unpaid
internship in their field of choice
meeting all the right people to
completely propel and change the success
of their career
whereas a youth living in a shelter may
have no alternative
but to be working full-time in a field
unrelated to their career of choice
since they just need to make money to
support their siblings
i want you to think about this the next
time you want to put on your judgment
goggles
the concept of scarcity dubbed in the
book scarcity
why having too little means so much
explains why when one is in a state of
scarcity such as poverty or homelessness
they’re only able to focus on the
problem the thing that they lack
leaving them with less bandwidth to deal
with anything else
i don’t know if you’ve ever been on a
diet before but it’s almost impossible
to think of anything other than food
it’s also extremely difficult to think
about implementing healthy dietary
changes
when you don’t even know where your next
meal is coming from
as echoing green states current
programming
tackles symptoms not systems i
discovered this myself
when i designed a failed nutrition
education program for a local food bank
how effective could my health
intervention possibly be
when i’m suggesting six dollar
blueberries to a room full of
individuals who on average live on 735 a
day
and i’m failing to provide them with a
means to access when i’m preaching
i want you to think about this for a
second really put yourself in their
shoes
there is no worse feeling of self-shame
of knowing what you should be doing
for yourself your family and your health
and you actually want to do it but now
you know
you just simply can’t with little
funding available
shelters may have no alternative but to
sustain only basic survival needs for
the residents
such as heat water and electricity
rather than invest in programs that help
youth rise above poverty
rise above their circumstances and just
make them feel good about themselves
this is why programs like boot camps for
change are so important
but during my undergrad we were
constantly focused on how to solve the
ultimate issue
of growing rates of cardiovascular
disease diabetes and obesity
if a well-off professional is referred
to me by their doctor following a heart
attack
i can sit them down and give them all
the information they may need
and how to implement an effective
exercise routine
dietary changes as well as a stress
management plan
in addition to my fee everything that
i’m going to be recommending is going to
cost more than 700
a week clearly this is inaccessible to
most
so if they can afford it and they’re
just unmotivated or unwilling to change
and end up becoming one of those
statistics that we tend to focus on so
much
this is not where the real social
problem lies
harsh but true susceptibility to chronic
illness
is directly related to bigger themes
surrounding income and homelessness
income determines one’s living
conditions including access to safe
neighborhoods
but also nutritious foods you guessed it
i want you to think about this
the next time you want to put your
judgment goggles on
so if you have the means to access as
much healthy food as you want or all
these services
and you’re just choosing not to use them
hey
i don’t make judgments we should all be
able to live our lives
how we best see fit so my work in
program
isn’t for just telling people what they
should do i’m in the business of showing
people what they can do
even though there are some youth that
may not use these programs for a variety
of reasons
maybe they’re having a tough day
mentally or they’re dealing with an
invisible injury that we know nothing
about
our programs alone are encouraging them
they do have value in society
but through my work in my life i’ve
learned that you simply cannot make
someone do
what they don’t want to do poor or not
but if they don’t have a choice to work
at something this is where my moral
obligation to
do something comes in it’s like a fire
in me and i want to ignite that fire in
you
a friend of mine forced to abstain from
alcohol during a 30-day rehab stint
he came out and drank why
because he wanted to it’s only when he
decided
himself that he had a problem that he
wanted to fix
he was able to voluntarily use the
resources around him
on his own accord so when i saw that
funding was cut for health programs for
the homeless
took me right back to when i was a 12
year old girl dealing with
issues i was dealing with at that time
without exercise
or roof over my head i honestly don’t
think i’d be here today
so every youth deserves these
opportunities regardless of financial
means
when i saw youth were doing way better
at the workouts than i was
we started the scholarship program
specifically to hire these youth
so we can dismantle harmful stereotypes
that actually perpetrate
self-stigmatization
in the population that we work with
according to albert bandura can you tell
i like this guy seeing people
similar to oneself succeeding also
raises these observers beliefs
that they too possess the capabilities
to succeed our scholarship recipients
have not
only inspired our peers and shelters but
also our sponsors
at-risk youth do want to succeed and
they can succeed
they just need to have an opportunity
when you imagined homelessness earlier
is this what you pictured
these are some of the most kind generous
hard-working people i know not lazy
definitely never living a life a crime
literally wouldn’t hurt a fly
they just needed an opportunity to help
them realize their full potential
the gentleman standing beside me hashima
hebshi
recently came to canada from yemen he
ended up at one of the shelters we work
at
horizons for youth and i was teaching a
class there last february
without me even asking he began
encouraging his peers on the sidelines
and adjusting their form i suggested
that he should become a personal trainer
less than a year later he’s now
completed four fitness certifications
with our mentorship
does that sound like laziness to you
this is more than i have
he now says a few words about his
experience working with me
and boot camps for change please enjoy
during my time on the show one day i
came back from the gym i went downstairs
i sat down i looked at people and
some of them they were doing the workout
wrong so i jumped in i started like
adjust their position and stuff
and ask them like okay this how you do
it this this this is wrong you want to
avoid this because you want to get
injured
and then she saw that katie saw that and
she told me
you’re natural in this you know that and
she asked me have you thought about
being a personal trainer and she shocked
me because my response was
not really because i’m definitely sure
that
it’s expensive and you had to to get a
degree or something and you have to pay
for it or a certificate
she thought i’m like you know what don’t
worry about that we’re gonna pay
everything for you just gonna show up
are you ready for it and i said like i’m
definitely down for it i would love that
i took the exam and
i got certified that day and i cannot
explain how happy i was i felt great i
felt like you know what
that’s what i want to do that’s what i’m
really going to enjoy
this may or may not come as a surprise
to you but before i started this program
i had multiple people question me do you
actually think the homeless can work
do you actually think the homeless want
to work scholarship recipients are in
full-time positions
at gyms like good life and la fitness
exiting the shelter system and living
independently
my dream mentor leila jana stated talent
is equally distributed but opportunity
is not
clearly opportunities like education
have the ability to change lives but not
everyone has the same access
to the same opportunities so let’s do
something about that
our programs have a huge importance for
youth in the shelter system
by improving physical health by
preventing disease youth experiencing
homelessness face so much adversity in
their daily lives
and my program provides them with a
healthy way to relieve that stress
physical health is intertwined with
mental health
as those who experience less stress get
sick less often
and in turn are more productive at work
by taking less sick days
avoiding financial difficulty breaking
the cycle of poverty through exercise
two years after i started this program
i’m viewed as a peer to the youth
rather than an outsider in a privileged
situation just coming in
telling them how to move and how to eat
by sharing and developing this trust
the youth are not only more likely to
participate in our programming
but are also sharing valuable feedback
with us so we can continuously evaluate
and therefore improve our programming so
vulnerability
makes leaders stronger let’s include
youth voices
and how we approach complex problems
such as poverty
that’s my vision for 2020 youth
inclusion
because youth are not the leaders of
tomorrow we’re the leaders of today
thank you very much
you