Tanya Shute

BIOGRAPHY

Tanya Shute worked as a front-line social worker and community developer for two decades in York Region, working primarily in women’s shelters and community mental health and addictions centres.  Tanya worked in the psychiatric survivor movement for many years. She was the Executive Director of the Krasman Centre for Community Mental Health (Central LHIN) for many years before leaving the field for a teaching career. Tanya was a faculty and program coordinator for Seneca College’s Social Services Worker program, and was the lead curriculum author, program coordinator, and faculty member in Seneca College’s Honours Bachelor degree in Community Mental Health and Addictions and post-graduate Mental Health Intervention certificate program. Her research program centres primarily on addressing community organizations' and community movements' needs for research, including: 2SLGBTQ+ health and wellbeing, homelessness and poverty, consumer/survivor organizations, and lived experience peer support. She also does research about social work education and pedagogy.

Tanya did her MSW with Laurentian University, and taught as a sessional instructor for seven years at the Barrie campus and online before her appointment as Lecturer with the School of Social Work in 2017. She is now an Assistant Professor. Her PhD in Education focused on academic failure and professional education (York University).

RSW, MSW, PhD (Education)

Tanya has a broad and eclectic community-based research program. Many research projects are participatory action research with community organizations and community members on projects that are community-led and initiated. Tanya’s approach to research orients the research process as only one step in the process of community development and transformation, and usually focuses on research projects that have a significant community change or social action result as the objective. Tanya is currently engaged in community-based research in several areas, including suburban/rural homelessness, health and wellbeing of trans people living in rural/suburban/small towns, the psychiatric survivor movement and its organizations, and lay health education/lay sexual health education for youth. Tanya  is also interested in social work education research. She is currently doing research on vocational education and adults who fail out of school, and a project looking into hostility and aggression in social work classrooms.  

2014 Laurentian University Teaching Excellence Award (part-time faculty)

Book Chapters:

Yorke, Byrch, Ham, Craggs, & Shute. (2016). Queering space in social work: How Simcoe County has moved from queerful to queerious. In S. Hillock & Mulé (Eds.), Queering Social Work Education (pp.227-246). Vancouver, BC: UBC Press.

Articles in Peer-Reviewed Journals

Story, K., Shute, T., & Thomson, A. (2009). Building a culture of recovery: A comprehensive recovery education strategy. Journal of Ethics in Mental Health, 3(1), 10-15.

Book Reviews:

Shute, T. (2013). [Review of the book Integrating Social Work Theory and Practice: A practical skills guide], in Journal of Social Work 2013, no. 13, v.5, pp. 553-554.

Shute, T. (2014). [Review of the book Confronting oppression, restoring justice: From policy analysis to social justice], in Journal of Social Work 2014, no.14, v.2, pp.220-221.

Shute, T. (2014). [Review of the book Social determinants and mental health], in Journal of Social Work 2014, no. 14, v.6, pp.661-662.

Shute, T. (2015). [Review of the book Human rights and social equality: Challenges for social work], in Journal of Social Work 2015, no.15, v.5, pp.558-559.

Shute, T. (2016). [Review of the book Working with homeless and vulnerable people], in Journal of Social Work 2016, no.16, v.4, pp.515-517.  

Shute, T. (2017). [Review of the book Why do they hate us? Essays on race], in Journal of Social Work 2017, no.17, v.4, pp. 505-506.

Shute, T. (2017). [Review of the book Advocacy practice for social justice], in Journal of Social Work 2017, no.17, v.5, pp.524-525.

Shute, T. (2017). [Review of the book The practice of social work in North America: Culture, context and competency development] in Journal of Social Work 2017, no.18, v.1, pp. 107-108.

Shute, T. (2018). [Review of the book Social policy and planning for the 21st century: In search of the next great transformation] in Journal of Social Work 2018, no. 18, v.3, pp. 364-365.