Skipping Stone is a safe space for all trans and gender-diverse individuals. (Brennan Lowes, CMRU.ca)
Transgender Calgarians need a safe place to seek support. Skipping Stone Calgary is that place. It offers resources to trans and gender-diverse individuals and their families/caregivers.
According to the most recent Canadian census in 2021, 59,460 Canadians identified themselves as transgender, and 41,355 identified as non-binary.
Their vision and what they’re working towards is “a province where trans and gender diverse individuals are surrounded by positivity, affirmation, and support free from barriers, stigma, and discrimination”.
Kameron Heughan, a social work student at Mount Royal University, has been working at Skipping Stone for two years working as a peer mentorship coordinator and as a community care coordinator.
Supporting youth through community connection
Heughan started at Skipping Stone during a practicum program and later began working on the peer mentorship program. His primary role is running a six-month program where “youth and families, predominantly parents and caregivers […] are connected with another member of the community, usually it’s somebody a little bit further along in their transition and or another parent or caregiver who has kind of been in the business of supporting a youth for a little bit longer.” Heughan explains is “for trans masc or nonbinary folks that are leaning more to a masculine identity just to share space and kind of build that community.”
Some of the group programs offered at Skipping Stone are:
- Strong hearts: for trans feminine folks.
- Flowing hearts: for folks beyond the binary.
- Young hearts: for trans feminine folks over 40.
- Open hearts: for all trans folks.
- Caring Hearts: for parents & caregivers.
Breaking down barriers to access
Accessing gender-affirming care in Alberta comes with many barriers; surgery wait times, financial costs, and finding supportive physicians, to name a few. Heughan explained that his biggest win while working with Skipping Stone is “helping people access gender-affirming health care. We’ve had so many people where it’s like barrier after barrier and they come to us and we try and make it as barrier-free as possible. So opening those doors for people and actually seeing them like six months from now […] and like them accessing the things that make them feel good and really like allow them to come into themselves”.
Because of organizations like Skipping Stone, transgender and gender-diverse people in Alberta have access to community connections, valuable resources, and the support they deserve.
Personal reflection
Through this project, I gained invaluable knowledge and insight into working with clients to create a final product that brings their vision to life. At first, I thought it would be difficult to find a community partner and overcome my initial shyness about reaching out and meeting with them. However, you cannot become better at any skill without actually practicing it, so this assignment allowed me to overcome the anxiety that comes with reaching out to prospective clients.
I also have not created many text-based promotional videos, so this project allowed me to explore how to make simple text over video interesting and easy to understand–without overwhelming the viewer. I hope that my community partner felt our partnership in this project was positive and mutually beneficial.
I created the promotional video to be a possible anchor video on their website, and social media sites–providing prospective clients with a quick reference to some of the programs offered by Skipping Stone. As a result, my aspiration for the final product of this project was to highlight the amazing work Skipping Stone is doing in Calgary to support transgender and gender-diverse individuals in Alberta, while helping those who need support find it in their services.
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