Creating Places. Engaging Minds.

​We are creating new ways for youth to participate in city building.

What We Do

​Strategy + Design

We are experts at engaging youth in the consultation and design phases of youth-facing projects and services for public and non-profit organizations.

Workshops

We deliver city-building workshops for schools and youth organizations that focus on empathy.
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1UP Program

We enable high school students to lead their own community design-build projects by providing inspiration, leadership training, and project mentorship.

News & Views

Our latest youth engagement events and stories.
Leaders Lab 2019- Day 1
From August 16–18, 2019 1UP Toronto and Urban Minds hosted the second annual 1UP Leaders Lab. 1UP Leaders Lab is a free three-day youth leadership training program for high school students with a focus on urban planning, city-building, and architecture. Our program trains these students to become fellows who lead their own school chapter to tackle a challenge in their own communities.​
Forget Age. Treat Youth As Equals When It Comes to City Building
​Youth are residents of cities today and stewards of our cities tomorrow. In the landscape of city-building discourse, youth voices are frequently lost to engagement processes that are intimidating, inaccessible, and unclear. In other cases, youth voices are simply not sought after based on assumptions that youth do not want to participate and that even if they did, their feedback is too unrealistic to ever be implemented.
Students transform school vestibule into green space
Project Plant is a community design-build project by 1UP Earl Haig chapter. Their goal was to transform their school's music wing vestibule into a meaningful space for students to enjoy and destress.
Is youth engagement just a PR stunt?
The short answer is yes, but we can change that.
#WouldYouRatherMC
A physical-digital interactive art experience ​that brings people together
​to discuss the future of Markham Centre.
The 8 Rules of Youth Engagement
1. Welcome youth as co-creators.
Acknowledge their capabilities as critical thinkers and doers. Engaging them once is not enough, but actively engaging them as problem solvers throughout the duration of your project will provide added value.

Interested in working with us? Let's chat.

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We're always looking for collaborators and partnerships.

If you're interested in city building and youth engagement,
​give us a shout at hello@urbanminds.co
© COPYRIGHT 2019. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.