Certificate in Deafblind and Intervenor Studies

at George Brown College - St. James Campus Canada

The Pre-Health Sciences Pathway to Advanced Diplomas and Degrees (A108) program prepares you to gain entry to health science programs at a college or university. You will develop your knowledge and skills in communication, mathematics, human anatomy, biology, physics, and organic/inorganic chemistry so that you are well-prepared for the rigours of a degree or advanced diploma program. This program contains advanced level English and elective courses that may be eligible for transfer credits in other programs where applicable.

As a graduate from this program, you are eligible to apply to the following advanced diploma programs at George Brown College:

• Dental Hygiene
• Denturism
• Dental Technology
• Hearing Instrument Specialist

Social Service Worker (Accelerated) is an innovative one-year program (three semesters) designed to guide you in developing the knowledge, values and skills to work directly with a wide range of people in need.

This program stream is available to college and university graduates with a diploma or degree related to the field of social or community work. In this program, you’ll learn to identify and act upon the systemic barriers that can impede access to social and economic justice in today’s society.

Students will examine the expanding professional roles and responsibilities of social service workers in large urban centres and within a rapidly changing society.

In addition to the theoretical models, methods and skills of social service work practice, you will learn about:

• Group facilitation
• Allyship and anti-oppressive practice
• Counselling skills
• Social change and proposal development
• Social innovation
• Mental health
• Substance use and addiction

Many of the Social Service Worker faculty have professional experience with:

• Marginalized communities
• Institutional health and social service organizations
• Federal, provincial and municipal governments
• Research and initiatives in social innovation
• A range of not-for-profit organizations and agencies
• Direct practice with individuals, families, groups and communities

The Business – Accounting two-year diploma provides you with a solid background in basic accounting concepts and practices, as well as broad-based business skills related to accounting application software, spreadsheets and databases, economics, communications, law and taxation. This rigorous learning experience will enable you to build and demonstrate the skills you need to work in the field of accounting.

These industry-ready skills include:-

• Processing common business transactions
• Preparing reports on an organization's financial performance
• Preparing financial budgets and plans to support management decisions
• Analyzing operating performance

PROGRAM STANDARDS AND LEARNING OUTCOMES
The graduate has reliably demonstrated the ability to:

• Record financial transactions in compliance with Canadian Generally Accepted Accounting Principles for sole proprietorships, partnerships, private enterprises, publicly accountable enterprises and non-profit organizations.
• Prepare and present financial statements, reports and other documents in compliance with Canadian Generally Accepted Accounting Principles for sole proprietorships, partnerships and private enterprises.
• Contribute to recurring decision-making by applying fundamental management accounting concepts.
• Prepare individuals’ income tax returns and basic tax planning in compliance with relevant legislation and regulations.
• Analyze organizational structures, the interdependence of functional areas, and the impact those relationships can have on financial performance.
• Analyze, within a Canadian context, the impact of economic variables, legislation, ethics, technological advances and the environment on an organization’s operations.
• Outline the elements of an organization’s internal control system and risk management.
• Contribute to recurring decision-making by applying fundamental financial management concepts.

The Concept Art for Entertainment program will train students to meet industry demand for concept artists and fine artists with a focus in entertainment fields. Strategically designed to provide specialized skills for graduates of Game - Art, Interaction Design and Graphic Design, the intensive curriculum emphasizes the development of artistic and direction techniques relevant to the industry, namely concept art production and visual conceptualization, in real-world scenarios.

Students will become proficient with production processes, defining art styles and drawing techniques by interpreting stories, character profiles and design documentation. Throughout their time in the program, students will assemble a personal portfolio, while designing and directing the art production for games and film. This experience will provide graduates with the necessary professional practices to enter the workforce or become entrepreneurs.

Program Learning Outcomes

• The graduate has reliably demonstrated the ability to:
  • Propose artistic solutions to abstract design challenges according to project requirements and constraints.
  • Produce conceptualized art in a format that meets the needs of identified audiences and clients.
  • Select appropriate tools and software for the creation of conceptualized artwork.
  • Produce a portfolio showcasing a combination of diverse artistic styles that reflect conceptualized art standards.
  • Plan and create conceptualized artwork for digital media.
  • Apply effective entrepreneurial and business practices and project management skills to the profession of independent and/or company conceptual artist.
  • Contribute to and lead multi-disciplinary project teams to complete complex projects.
  • Select appropriate marketable concept art for public release.

Interaction Design is an interdisciplinary field merging design skills such as user experience, interface development and graphic design with programming to create meaningful experiences between the user, digital and physical platforms, such as websites, wearables and mobile devices.

Modified by the psychological, social, economic and cultural factors that shape our present and future world, this ever-evolving field envisions new ways of human-computer interaction within systems, services, products and spaces across multiple industries.

Throughout the Interaction Design program, students will be expected to address such topics as mixed realities, immersive environments, usability, spatial relations and human factors. An emphasis on usability testing, research, collaboration and real-world projects distinguish this program.

Program Learning Outcomes

• The graduate has reliably demonstrated the ability to:
  • Collaborate in a team environment with various stakeholders to design multi-disciplinary products and services.
  • Apply the appropriate tools that allow for designing, building, visualizing, and programming digital interactive experiences.
  • Assess the requirements of a complex interactive media project.
  • Plan the development and execution of an interaction design project in response to resource and budgetary requirements.
  • Design a complex media project (interface, navigation, graphics, text treatment) using best practice design and development principles, and applying conceptual and theoretical frameworks.
  • Make interactive products, environments, systems and services using appropriate technologies, materials, and manufacturing methods.
  • Perform all work in compliance with regulations, legislation, security policies, industry standards and codes of ethics.
  • Use research skills to assess and inform optimal digital user experience within interactive interfaces.
  • Apply creative and innovative thinking techniques to manage change and solve design problems.
  • Make recommendations based on human computer interaction design guidelines to improve user experiences with interaction design.
  • Design an interactive product or service that delivers a usable interactive experience.
  • Contribute to a variety of interactive platforms and environments, incorporating the principles and elements of design.
  • Create a design solution in accordance with strategies, recommendations and state of the art methodologies.

Under the guidance of top baking professionals, you will develop core skills and unleash your creativity in a wide range of specialized areas, including:

• Chocolate and confections
• Wedding cakes
• Modern bakery cafe
• Tarts and pastries
• Plated desserts
• Artisan breads and breakfast pastries
• Petits fours, laminated dough and viennoiseries
• Ice cream and sorbets
• Artisan sugar confections

These skills will make you a sought-after graduate in the world of high-end bakery and pastry arts. Your classroom work will include a series of case studies designed to develop and perfect your baking skills. You will also complete an industry externship, gaining practical experience that will give you a real career advantage.

On the business side, you will learn the key skills that are necessary to run a successful baking operation, including:

• Business planning
• Leadership and motivation
• Sales and marketing
• Product packaging, showcasing and distribution methods

Program Learning Outcomes
The graduate has reliably demonstrated the ability to:

• Research and design a variety of bakery, pastry and confectionary-related products that meet the needs of a range of food service environments.
• Produce and present a variety of bakery, pastry and confectionary-related products that meet the needs of a range of food service environments.
• Apply fundamental nutritional principles, including recipe modifications, to all aspects of baking production, with an awareness of potential allergens and dietary requirements.
• Apply effective kitchen management skills in order to responsibly use resources in a baking and pastry operation.
• Identify effective business practices, including marketing and cost control in the management of a pastry and baking operation.
• Identify human resource management practices as they relate to the hospitality industry.
• Develop ongoing personal strategies and plans to enhance hospitality leadership in a baking and pastry arts environment.

Community Worker (Fast-Track) is a dynamic social justice program grounded in the principles of and respect for human rights and anti-oppression practice. Students are prepared to work with largely urban-centred, diverse communities across a range of issues (i.e. poverty, housing, food-justice, immigration and settlement, etc.) in ways that are responsive to their multiple and changing needs.

If you are passionate about human rights and social justice, committed to working with diverse communities, bring a mature and professional approach to your education and field work, and are prepared to take on a course load of 20+ hours per week, this program is for you.

What can you expect from the Community Worker (Fast-Track) program?

• The three-semester Community Worker (Fast-Track) program combines classroom instruction with supervised field placements. Theory, analysis and practice are presented through a variety of innovative instructional tools developed from popular education and learner-centred approaches to teaching and learning.
• Highly participatory classes of dialogue, debate, activities, interactive lectures, guest speakers and panels, and group work provide students with a program of study that is current, exciting and critically engaging.

What key skills will you learn?
Throughout the program, students will have the opportunity to develop a variety of important and high-demand skills, including:

• Anti-oppressive and intercultural practice in working with diverse populations (including youth, immigrant communities, Indigenous populations)
• Critical analysis, research and writing
• Group facilitation and leadership
• Individual and group counselling
• Conflict mediation and restorative justice
• Community organizing, activism and advocacy
• Community development, project design and proposal writing
• Policy analysis and rights-based advocacy

Features of the Community Worker program include:

• Strong ties with over 350 agencies across the Greater Toronto Area (GTA).
• Founder and lead organizer of the annual Tommy Douglas Institute that brings communities, students, educators and activists together to explore higher education and social justice in the 21st century.
• The full-time Community Worker (C101) program has been graduating community workers for more than 40 years.

Program courses are organized into four core areas:

• Community work theory and practice
• Social and political analysis
• Group skills and counselling
• Field placement and seminar

Not only will you develop relationships with our community partners through field placements, you will also meet with sector professionals in your classrooms at networking events, guest panels and program electives taught by agencies and practitioners currently working in the field (i.e. Community Legal Issues, Urban Aboriginal Peoples’ Perspectives in Community Development, Housing and Homelessness).

Who are the Community Worker (Fast-Track) faculty?
The experienced educators that make up our faculty bring their passion for education and change to create a highly engaging and dynamic learning environment. Coming from backgrounds in local, national and global activism, they remain active on social issues and maintain close ties to communities, activists and organizations.

What kind of students enrol in the Community Worker (Fast-Track) program?
Graduates from other degrees and diploma programs interested in learning more about social justice and community development enrol in this program. Our students are a diverse group of students with broad social and community experiences.

Program Learning Outcomes

• The graduate has reliably demonstrated the ability to:
  • Establish constructive relationships with individuals concerned with community work.
  • Describe their personal values and motivation as a community worker.
  • Serve in a variety of grassroots community organizations especially in the areas of co-operatives, seniors and community legal services.
  • Be comfortable in community work roles ranging from direct service to classical advocacy and organizing.
  • Understand and articulate the special needs of multicultural groups.
  • Analyze social inequalities and demonstrate creativity in the organization of new services and institutions to meet community needs.
  • Work with groups to identify their own needs.
  • Access existing services and community resources.

The Business – Human Resources program at George Brown College in Toronto provides students with a practical approach to human resources management that prepares them for a variety of careers within this growing field. They will learn to:

• Design human resources policies and programs that adhere to employment legislation
• Attract, retain and develop a productive workforce
• Manage employee diversity
• Ensure health and safety at the workplace
• Advise on employee/labour relations

Our program enables you to work towards obtaining the professional designations offered through the Human Resources Professional Association of Ontario (HRPA). For information about obtaining professional designations in HR, please contact the Human Resources Professional Association of Ontario.

Program Learning Outcomes
The graduate has reliably demonstrated the ability to:

• Participate in the recruitment, selection, and retention of employees.
• Participate in performance management processes.
• Participate in the planning, delivery, and evaluation of employee orientation, training, and development programs.
• Contribute to an organization’s success through effective employee relations.
• Assist with the administration and communication of the organization’s total compensation plan.
• Participate in organizational health and safety policies and practices.
• Apply current and emerging information technologies to support the human resources function.
• Implement organizational development strategies aimed at promoting organizational effectiveness.
• Communicate human resources information accurately and credibly in oral, written, and graphic form.
• Plan and act on personal professional development plans to achieve ongoing competence in human resources professional practice.
• Identify the human resources component of a business plan.
• Assist in the collection and analysis of human resources data.

The Assaulted Women's and Children's Counsellor/Advocate program provides students with a feminist analysis of the political and counselling issues related to gender-based violence experienced primarily by self-identified women, children, trans and non-binary survivors. It trains students to be agents for change in their work of community education, political action and law reform. It prepares students to provide anti-oppressive counselling for survivors who have experienced or are experiencing gender-based violence.

Note: Some of our student placement partners require students in this program to have a police reference check completed before their field placement. These reference checks, which can take up to four months, are done to protect the clientele of these agencies, who are considered “vulnerable persons” under the law. The fees for the reference checks vary and must be paid by the student. Students are responsible for ensuring that the check covers appropriateness for “individuals being employed and/or volunteering who will be working with vulnerable person(s).” Students who are unable to provide a clear police reference check may find that their choice of placements is limited.

Field education plays an important role in this program by preparing students to work with those affected by gender-based violence including not only those directly impacted, but the communities within which they live and work. This often includes those who identify as trans and non-binary, and other disenfranchised populations.

In year one, students will spend 250 hours with a non-profit community partner (Mondays and Tuesdays, January – April) and will typically engage in introductory activities, such as shadowing staff, conducting outreach, fundraising and special events, and learning about how programs and services are developed. First-year placements vary and can include sites that focus on public education, food banks, drop-ins and political action work, but are generally not frontline positions.

In second year, students will build on that experience by engaging in more direct 1-to-1 survivor counselling, group facilitation, case management, and advocacy. Placements begin in September and continue through to the end of April for a minimum of 500 hours. Students will often do this placement at emergency shelters, rape crisis centres, youth services, health providers and other agencies who provide frontline support.

The agencies used by the program for field placements are very similar to those employing our graduates. In many instances, employers hire graduates because of contact and experience with them through the fieldwork placement. Most agencies are within Toronto, while some agencies, located in other communities such as Brampton, St. Catherines, London, Hamilton, Barrie, Pickering and Oshawa, provide students who live in those communities with placement opportunities.

Program Learning Outcomes

• The graduate has reliably demonstrated the ability to:
  • Apply a feminist analysis in all areas of their work in the field of violence against women and children.
  • Provide ongoing supportive counselling.
  • Provide individual advocacy and political advocacy services
  • Facilitate groups for women and children.
  • Demonstrate knowledge of existing services for women.
  • Cope with high stress work demands and develop strategies for personal survival on the job.
  • Develop and deliver prevention programs.
  • Organize fundraising and write applications and proposals for grants.
  • Utilize the media and organize community response to violence against women and children.
  • Become familiar with pertinent legislation and understand the process of formulating social policy.

The Digital Design – Game Design program develops the production and design abilities of students in management scenarios through courses in design documentation, milestone and pipeline scheduling, game design theory and psychology. Taught by faculty with industry experience and mentored by local game industry leaders, students will learn how to design and develop games, not only for the entertainment market but also for serious gaming applications in health, education, construction, marketing and other sectors.

Students will have the unique opportunity to develop commercial quality games in a simulated video game studio environment, at times working with industry partners, game artists and programmers.

It is anticipated that graduates of this program will find employment in the game industry. Prior to graduation, each student will have assembled a portfolio/demo of their creative work demonstrating their ability in game design and highlighting their chosen area of specialization.

Program Learning Outcomes

• The graduate has reliably demonstrated the ability to:
  • Design environment and characters using the principles of game design.
  • Read, analyze and create game design documents for effective game creation and management.
  • Create environments, objects and characters for integration within a video game.
  • Import game assets and levels into game engines to create appropriate high-end 3D game applications or engines.
  • Produce a 3D game using appropriate tools and game management techniques.
  • Create and produce digital components, games and documentation using a variety of computer platforms.
  • Prepare a variety of industry standard documents and prototypes in a skilled manner and demonstrate professional presentation and organizational skills.
  • Develop and present a working game design document for a marketable game.
  • Use an existing game engine to create a prototype game.
  • Evaluate different types of games and platforms and select the appropriate ones for a particular game strategy.
  • Present the game design prototype and document using innovative techniques as well as digital, verbal and written skills.
  • Manage the design and production process of a game prototype.