Our learning community
IYS is growing across Canada, giving organizations, youth, families, and other partners a chance to work together and share what they know. Various initiatives and regional champions are driving the effort to share knowledge, expertise and experiences about IYS practice and implementation in the country.
The Federation of Integrated Youth Services Networks (FIYSN)
Formed in late 2021 with funding from Health Canada and the Bell-Graham Boeckh Foundation partnership, FIYSN is a community where members share experiences, challenges, and ideas about building and supporting networks of IYS centres/ hubs across Canada.
FIYSN has members from all 13 provinces and territories, including existing, emerging and proposed IYS networks. The group’s vision is to be leaders in improving young people’s access to quality health and social services across the country.
Over the years, FIYSN has found many ways to support collaboration and learning, such as:
Creating groups on specific topics
Helping members connect based on their specific needs
Planning online and in-person meetings
Creating webinars, videos and resources together
At the heart of these efforts is creating braver spaces, where members can be open and where trust and curiosity can flourish.
Together, FIYSN members are working towards the same goal — a future where every young person in Canada has access to the support they need.
The FIYSN 2021–2024 Report highlights the network’s progress and learnings over the last three years.
See what IYS providers operating in your region are offering
IYS knowledge sharing
In Canada, IYS knowledge is shared through a Learning Health System (LHS). In this system, everyone shares what they learn from data and research, guided by the lived and living expertise of youth and families. This teamwork and sharing of knowledge help to make services and support for young people better.
The learning cycle
In an LHS, practice, data and knowledge keep connecting in a cycle.
Practice to data
Each IYS network gathers the same data, like who is using the services, what kind of help they get, who is giving the support and how well does it work.
Data to knowledge
This data helps us learn new things, like which groups are not finding support, how many staff are needed and which ways of helping youth are working best.
Knowledge to practice
New learnings are used to improve services and to give staff more training. The improvements could include making access to services and outcomes more equitable and providing more culturally appropriate and culturally-specific services.