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This article draws on the findings of diversity audit study done at the East Area Office of the City of Calgary, in Canada. It identifies existing strengths and gaps in addressing diversity and social inclusion within the office staff and in the program planning, design and delivery to the diverse communities in the east of Calgary. • Findings: Although staff of the area office feel a strong sense of belong in the workplace and work collaboratively with each other in different streams, it was identified that more collaboration needs to be established between the community social workers and community recreation coordinators. It was also found that almost all staff in the area office have no knowledge for procedures to report discrimination in the work place. On the other hand, the community consultations have identified that East Area Office needs to develop close relationship with gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered communities, which at the time of the study were not specifically targeted with programs by the office. • Application: Building from the disconnect between program planning, design and delivery on the one hand, and the inclusion of all the diverse communities on the other hand, the authors present opportunities for dialogue and partnership development to enhance collaborative work between the communities and the East Area Office. Through this collaboration, programs will be planned, designed and delivered with appropriate cultural sensitivity. As well, the authors emphasize the need to strengthen collaborative work between the community social workers (CSWs) and the community recreation coordinators (CRCs), which are the two staff streams working in East Area Office so that their efforts can complement each other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is a collective interpretive record of a graduate course in Social Work on participatory action research (PAR) offered during the winter of 2007. It is written by 14 individuals including the instructor. It was inspired by the image of a chickadee bird borrowed from Jonathan Lear's (2006) book Radical Hope. The chickadee is a powerful metaphor for aboriginal peoples of Western Canada as she thrives in the bitter winters despite her tiny frame. She does so because she is gifted with deep listening in her environment wherein lies all she needs to know. The class of 14 met in a circle, read articles, kept learning journals, argued, ate together, practised popular education techniques and presented our emerging knowledge in multi-media forms. We related our experience to recent articles in EAR and to other PAR literature. The chickadee facilitated our deep listening to writings and to our own stories. Collective power emerged from our relationships and our diversity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]