Title: Disrupting neoliberal notions of choice: COVID-19 and back to school in Ontario
Sydney Chapados is an SSHRC Doctoral Fellow at Carleton University in Sociology studying child poverty and how it is represented in policy. She graduated from the Master of Arts in Sociology at the University of Windsor in 2020. Sydney is committed to understanding how policy that attempts to address child poverty is inadequate on multiple levels. She has worked in both community front-line work and research, combining lived experience and practical/theoretical knowledge. Sydney’s presentation will address how the Ontario Government’s COVID-19 back to school plan reinforces dominant constructions of childhood. She argues that the neoliberal economic crisis resulting from COVID-19 shutdowns influenced the decision to return to school at a detrimental cost for public health and for children. The presentation concludes by drawing on a post-child ethical framework that recognizes how children can learn from various experiences in various places and with various beings.
