MPP Michael Tibollo Visits the CCDMP

On November 8^th, 2024, the Centre for Child Development, Mental Health, and Policy (CCDMP) had the pleasure of welcoming Ontario’s Associate Minister of Mental Health and Addictions, Michael Tibollo, and his team. During their visit, our team shared the vision of the CCDMP, outlining how our research advances understanding of healthy development and the potential for kindness in every child. We also highlighted how we apply our research findings through our collaborative initiatives with community partners, designed to support children and families. 

To demonstrate our research in action, we invited Minister Tibollo and his team to participate in an activity the CCDMP developed to help children build essential skills in emotion recognition and regulation, which are key capacities that promote mental health. This game has been successfully incorporated into previous CCDMP community events. 

At the conclusion of our meeting, Minister Tibollo underscored the vital importance of research and initiatives, like those led by the CCDMP, in fostering healthy child development as a foundation for long-term mental health and well-being. 

As a takeaway, we created a policy brief for Minister Tibollo and his team, titled “Creating a Lasting Impact on Mental Health by Supporting Children’s Social-Emotional Development.” The policy brief emphasizes the importance of fostering strong social-emotional capacities (i.e., emotion regulation, empathy) during childhood, as they are critical in supporting lifelong mental health. These capacities are actively shaped by the experiences children have in their early environments, particularly through interactions with caregivers and educators. 

The brief highlights previous research at the CCDMP, which shows that community-based training initiatives can enhance the well-being of children, caregivers, and educators. These programs achieve this by deepening caregivers’ and educators’ understanding of social-emotional development and equipping them with strategies to build social-emotional capacities in both children and themselves. 

Based on these insights, the policy brief proposed four recommendations aimed at expanding knowledge of social-emotional development, with the ultimate goal of promoting healthy development and mental health among children across the province. 

Click here to read the policy brief and recommendations: “Creating a Lasting Impact on Mental Health by Supporting Children’s Social-Emotional Development”.

Along with the policy brief, we prepared a collection of resources for Minister Tibollo and his team, including work from several projects completed at the CCDMP within the last few years. This included: 

Research Resources:

• Development of Prosociality and the Effects of Adversity Article – review paper examining how adversity influences prosociality and human growth through a developmental-relational lens.
• RAISE Background and Objectives Infographic – background and objectives of RAISE, a community-based research project focused on fostering social-emotional capacity in the early years.
• RAISE Pilot Evaluation Infographic – evaluation results of the RAISE pilot training for caregivers and educators.
• R-BLISS Focus Group Report – results from focus groups conducted with Black caregivers of children ages 3 to 8 in Peel Region about their perspectives on social-emotional development.

Practice and Training Resources:

• L.O.V.E Strategy – strategy for educators and caregivers on how to be an effective emotion coach using the L.O.V.E strategy.
• The 3Es of Social-Emotional Development © – description for each of The 3Es (i.e., emotion regulation, empathy for the self, and empathy for others) and strategies for educators and caregivers to engage in them.