Community Organizers-in-Residence
The QTRL Community Organizer-In- Residence is designed for individuals who have demonstrated leadership in community-serving and non-profit organizations and have experience with grassroots organizing and practice. The program will provide 1-2 year-long residencies to community leaders and activists working on social and political problems affecting LGBTQ2S+ and BIPOC lives and communities. The residents will work on a project of their choice that addresses social inequality in LGBTQ2S+ QTBIPOC communities. Successful applicants will also actively participate in a variety of events, such as presentations, class visits, workshops, panels, and meetings at the Mark S. Bonham Centre for Sexual Diversity Studies. While we understand that many who participate in community building projects are also employed by academic institutions, priority will be given to applicants who do not have full-time academic positions in the global north.
Goals of the Community Organizer-In- Residence
- Provide activists and community leaders the opportunity to sustain their work and help strengthen the infrastructure of social transformation by providing leaders/activists with the time and space to improve the lives of people in their/our communities.
- Support the development of grassroots organizing
- Encourage mutual learning between activists, students, and scholars to create new models of public scholarship and engagement.
This year’s Community Leaders in Residence are Theodore Walker Robinson and Yousef Alhammadi . Learn more about them below:
Theodore Walker Robinson (they/them) is a Black, queer, low-vision, hard-of-hearing, nonbinary broadcaster, singer, textile artist, and creative consultant based in Toronto, whose focus is on providing recommendations to arts and culture agencies on accessibility for people with disabilities based on lived experience and strategic Human Resources practices. They are the Artistic Director of LOOM REVOLUTION, a community weaving textile arts studio and social research lab for Afro-Caribbean and Black communities based in Regent Park Daniels Spectrum. The mission of their studio practice is to train and engage Afro-Caribbean and Black communities in the making of woven textile works in response to critical social, ecological and political issues. Their art practice explores West African heritage fabrics and Blind/Low Vision methodologies and pedagogical practice. The focus of their community organizing work has been with Afro-Caribbean communities living with or at risk of HIV, engaged in sex work, those of Queer and Trans experience, newcomers to Canada and those formerly incarcerated. The mission of LOOM REVOLUTION is to weave a radically inclusive social fabric through a process Robinson calls Social Weaving, a practice that works toward capacity building in arts leadership for historically underrepresented groups – specifically Black, Disabled, Queer and Trans people. While with the QTRL, Robinson will continue this work through a co-created, community-based body project titled “The Red Tapestry Project,” which will host a series of programs, workshops, and events throughout the year. “As a member of the demographics this project studies and serves, my community organizing work aims to equip communities with artistic tools for storytelling and truth-telling on topics related to social, economic, political issues and to connect people of similar lived experience in an environment of peer support, social connection and artistic creation.”
Yousef Alhammadi (he/him) is an Arab trans man, community organizer, and refugee newcomer based in Toronto. Since his arrival, he has dedicated himself to building support systems for queer newcomers and refugees from Southwest Asian and North African (SWANA) communities, even while navigating his own settlement and transition. He is the founder of Abjad.TO, a grassroots digital platform providing peer support, cultural education, storytelling, and resource navigation for queer SWANA individuals in Canada. The initiative emerged directly from his frontline experience supporting queer refugees at airport arrivals and his recognition that existing systems help people escape persecution but rarely help them survive and thrive afterward. As a Co-Researcher and Media Producer with the YSMENA Trans Photovoice Study, a first-of-its-kind exhibition in Canada amplifying the lived experiences of transgender and gender-diverse Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) newcomer youth, he collaborated with Dr. Roula Hawa of Western University on participatory research exploring sexual health, identity, and wellbeing among trans and gender-diverse youth. He has served as a peer support volunteer with LGBT YouthLine, presented at the OCASI Conference on behalf of Family Service Toronto’s Arriving Together 2SLGBTQ+ program, and advocated for queer youth at Toronto City Hall’s youth homelessness conference. His work sits at the intersection of lived experience, grassroots organizing, and public scholarship, grounded in the belief that knowledge only matters when it reaches the people who need it most. During his residency with the QTRL, Alhammadi will 1) continue his work on Abjad.TO, building it into a fully interactive, multilingual website combining culturally specific education on queer identity and history, peer storytelling and connection, and practical resource navigation for housing, healthcare, legal support, mental and sexual health services; 2) develop an interactive digital exhibition that translates the physical Trans Photovoice exhibition into an immersive, participant-centred storytelling platform designed to hold its participants experiences with care, making research on SWANA trans youth sexual health accessible far beyond the walls of any conference or institution.
Previous Community Organizers-in-Residence
2025-26:
2024-25:
2023-24:
2022-23:
Alphonso King Jr. (AKA Jade Elektra or DJ Relentless)
2021-22: