The Door is now a bright, colourful place, full of the shouts of teenagers as they play pool or play video games.
The Door, located in the Dalhousie Community Centre, is a place where teenagers come to hang out after school – to meet friends, play games, have dinner and get help with homework.
Gangs of teenagers can be seen at the Playstation or on the computers, or just hanging out on the picnic tables.
But The Door wasn’t always so loud.
The youth centre is just finishing renovations to open up more rooms, enabling computers and the television to be incorporated into the main recreation room.
“I wanted the computers integrated with the program,” says Malik Ayass, the executive director of The Door. He says the computers have become increasingly popular, especially with many of newcomers to Canada.
Four computers have been moved to the main recreation room and they are almost always occupied by youth surfing the Internet.
Many of these youth are Karen, an ethnic group from Burma and Thailand.
“We have to do our part as a centre [to integrate all the youth], that’s why we opened up the room,” Ayass says. “We would like to help [develop] their life skills.”
The Door incorporates a mandate of recreation, socialization, and education into its programming, which is why it is trying to integrate popular activities with the main room.
“We’re not a school, we’re not a prison, we’re not a church. We’re a drop-in centre,” Ayass says, which is why they must appeal to youth’s interests.
“Through recreation we can build in education and socialization,” Ayass says.
The youth have welcomed the renovations, which began in the summer of 2007 and will soon be completed. They participated in decorating the place by painting the walls and creating artwork.
The Door attracts an average of 27 youth each night it is open, which means the place is buzzing from after school Monday to Thursday.
“It’s a good place to hang out,” says Wilson Huynh. He is a Carleton University information technology student who occasionally returns to this hang out spot where he spent most of his time as a teenager.
“It’s good for kids around here. There’s a lot of bad kids on the street and this is a kind of safe zone,” Huynh says.
The Door is also a place of learning for recent immigrants.
The program is free and organized for youth aged 12-18 years. It attracts a diverse crowd, although most are from low-income families and are high-risk, Ayass says.
The new Canadians are mostly interested in the computers, Ayass says. They are homesick and often look up news, videos and music from home.
“I tell them, ‘remember your culture, respect it, but you have a new culture now.’ And we want to learn about their culture,” Ayass says.
The Door has also integrated a bit of the Karen culture by incorporating their cuisine into the nightly dinners and by offering Karen dance lessons once a week.
The Karen youth seem to enjoy the sense of welcoming at The Door.
“What I like most is that we can all get together,” says Paw Kay, 17, a Karen immigrant who came to Canada two years ago.
Now a Karen youth outreach worker, Kay is encouraging other Karen youth to come to The Door to improve their English.
“And I get to practice my English,” Kay says. “For the Karen [youth], they can get help here.”
The Door offers ESL and homework help every night, organized by the education co-ordinator, Danielle Dolgoy.
Although The Door’s staff and budget is small, the place is lively thanks to the energy of the youth.
That is what The Door is looking for: positive youth for a positive atmosphere and positive integration.
“Any youth is a youth at risk,” Ayass says. “We’re talking about youth and I want them to integrate here.”