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Grant Charles

Location: Vancouver, B.C., Canada

Biography
My first job in the field was when I was 17. I had dropped out of high school and moved to London, England from London, Canada. Both of my parents were English immigrants so I guess I went to find my roots although that sounds more planned than my life was at the time. A cousin got me a job working with people on the streets. I was way over my head although I learned a lot about people and myself. When I returned to Canada I managed to get into Fanshawe College in London, Ontario. I wasn’t really qualified as I hadn’t finished high school but I guess they saw something in me they liked. It was a great experience for me being around instructors who believed in me. I was fortunate like people who go to college can be when they have great instructors. I am forever thankful to my instructors there. They changed my life.

Since then I have worked in a number of residential and community programmes. I have worked for governments and non-profit agencies. I have been a front line worker, a manager and director, a college instructor, a therapist, a researcher, a trainer and consultant. I currently teach at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. I have completed three degrees including my Ph.D. at the School of Child and Youth Care at the University of Victoria.

I really think it has been a privilege for me to have had the opportunity to have worked in this field for so long. I have met and count as my friends many amazing people. There really are many great people in our field. I have also worked with many amazing young people and their families. I hope I have been able to give my colleagues and clients something. I know they have given me more than I can ever repay.

How I came to be in this field
As you can tell from my biography I came to this field by accident. It wasn’t planned but it did feel like home when I got there.

A favorite saying
I have two sayings posted on my office door at the university.

The first is by Tommy Douglas who was a Canadian politician. He helped bring about many positive changes in Canada (and as an aside is the grandfather of Keifer Sutherland):

“Courage my friends, ‘tis not too late to build a better world”

The second is by Maggie Kuhn. I didn’t know who she was when I came across the quote but it turns out she was an American activist who worked in her later life with older people.

“Speak your mind even if your voice shakes

Favourite website
CYC-Net. What else can I say?

Last thing I read, watched, heard, which I would recommend to others
My favourite book of all time is a very, very short story called The Boy who Breathed on the Glass in the British Museum by H.M. Bateman. It really sums up my view of life. It also kind of reminds me of some of my favourite people in child and youth care.

Other things to read
Really anything by Carol Stuart, Jack Phelan, Gerry Fewster or Thom Garfat. You can’t go wrong with anything they have written. I can’t say I have always agreed with everything they have to say but they do make me think.

A favorite Child and Youth Care experience
I went on a six day hike once on the West Coast Trail on Vancouver Island with a group of young people. It is a beautiful hike but hard. There is lots of climbing and descending and slippery sections in the rain forest. There was three staff. All of us were senior managers in the agency. All very experienced working with young people but none of us had been front line workers for a number of years. It was a put together group of young people none of whom really knew each other or us. No relationships in this group. Anyway without going in to detail, it was in many ways the trip from hell. The young people couldn’t be described as being highly motivated to do the hike although I thought that they were quite motivated in terms of being oppositional. In fact, high marks for them in this area. There were among the finest I have seen. The best times were when they were telling us how much they hated us, the trip, the food and so on. The worst times were, well, really as bad as you can imagine when you are in tough situations with kids you don’t know and who don’t know you. On the last night of the trip I was exhausted. I just wanted to go home. I made myself a cup of tea after dinner and retreated to the shoreline where I sat on a rock and watched the sun go done over the ocean. I lost myself in the beauty of the moment so much so that I hadn’t realized at first that two of the young people had struggled up to me on either side like kids do with an adult they like. The three of us sat there for the longest time with the closeness that people can have at a special moment. Nothing was said. No one moved. We just sat there soaking in the beauty of the moment. Then, suddenly, they both seemed to realize that they were sitting with the ‘enemy’. They shook themselves out of the moment, one of told me to ‘f..off” and they scurried away. This to me was one of the highlights of my career. Tough times, a shared moment and being told to ‘f...off”. What a profession! I wouldn’t give it up for the world.

A few thoughts for those starting out

Take risks.

Be open to letting the young people and families you work with care about you. Relationship is not just a one way street.

Never, never, never, take yourself too seriously. Our work is serious but always remember the power of being playful.

The best way for us to support our peers is to challenge them and let them challenge us.

Make mistakes. Be comfortable in not being perfect.

Become a storyteller. People listen to and learn from good stories but most importantly to be a good storyteller you really have to pay attention to life.

Always be aware of the honour you are receiving when the young people and families you work with let you into their lives.

Influences on my work
There have been so many influences on my work over the years. I think though my sense of social justice and much of my understanding of the world comes from some experiences my dad had as a young man. He came to Canada as a young adolescent from Yorkshire in England. His parents were dead and he came over on one of the orphan boats. Kids like him are now known as Home Children or Children of the Empire. They were poor kids, often but not always orphans, who were shipped to Canada and other countries to “give them a better life”. This was considered ‘best practices’ by helpers in those days. They were placed with families who were supposed to give them a loving home. Really though many were just indentured farm hands and servants. In another time they might have been called slaves. Whatever you call it they were exploited. My dad, this young urban kid raised as an Anglican from a poor family in Northern England was placed with an Irish Catholic family on a farm in the heart of French speaking Quebec. Talk about a cultural disconnect. He never really talked about why but he ran away from that family and, on his own, found another family to take care of him. These people accepted him into their home because they thought it was the right thing to do. That is, they thought that people should support kids in need. They didn’t have much themselves but they shared what they had with him. There have been so many lessons for me over the years in his story. I won’t go in to them here. However, I can’t help but be outraged with what was done to these kids by well meaning helpers, how resourceful many of the kids had to be to survive and how generous people can be to others. These lessons and others continue to guide me.

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