Leong Centre Trainee Hub: Youth Engagement

DATE: March 18, 2026
TIME: 12:00 – 1:30pm (ET) 
METHOD: Virtual
REGISTRATION: https://forms.office.com/r/EJd1Y3L6un

SPEAKERS: 

Raissa Amany is a social activist, speaker, and consultant recognized for her work in youth engagement within health sectors. As the Executive Director of the Young Canadians Roundtable on Health, she leads a team of over 70 youth across Canada in national child health advocacy. In addition to her work in pediatrics, Raissa is a leading expert in child and youth mental health and addictions, serving on various national and provincial advisory boards and councils.

Alexa Petta is a Certified Child Life Specialist and Child and Youth Experience Specialist at The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids). In her role, she specializes in applying a developmental and psychosocial lens to advance child and youth experience and strengthen engagement practice across SickKids. Alexa holds an Honours Bachelor of Science from the University of Toronto and a Master of Science in Child Life & Pediatric Psychosocial Care from McMaster University. She is deeply committed to patient partnership and to creating safe, meaningful spaces where children and youth feel heard, supported, and empowered to shape change.

TITLE: Partnering with Youth Through Power-Sharing, Co-Design, and Recognition

DESCRIPTION: 

Meaningful youth engagement goes beyond participation. It involves sharing power, building trust, and working with youth to co-design research and make decisions together. It also requires treating youth partners as valued collaborators by recognizing their skills, contributions, and expertise.

In this presentation, Alexa Petta (Office of Engagement, SickKids) and youth partner Raissa Amany will explore how to partner with youth in respectful and equitable ways. Alexa will introduce key principles and practical guidance for youth engagement, including defining meaningful roles, sharing decision-making, and recognizing the full skill sets of youth partners. Raissa will share her experiences as a youth partner and provide real examples of what meaningful collaboration looks like in practice, including navigating authorship and compensation, and how youth want to be recognized and supported in research partnerships.

Participants will learn how to build equitable relationships with youth partners, avoid tokenism, and make sure that youth contributions are recognized, credited, and compensated appropriately. This session is ideal for trainees interested in youth-engaged, patient-oriented, and equity-focused research.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES:

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Describe principles of meaningful youth engagement, including power-sharing, co-design, and shared decision-making.
• Identify ways to recognize and support the full skills and contributions of youth partners, including meaningful roles across the research process.
• Explain the different considerations for authorship, compensation, and recognition when partnering with youth in research.
• Apply practical strategies to build equitable research partnerships with youth and avoid tokenistic engagement.