Consumers150: Consumer Engagement and Outreach

Professors Mary Cavanagh and Marina Pavlovic (University of Ottawa) in collaboration with the Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC) invite you to a half-day workshop Consumers150: Consumer Engagement and Outreach to be held on Monday, 18 September 2017, noon to 5:00 p.m. as a satellite event in conjunction with the Consumers150 conference.

This workshop is part of an on-going research project “Mapping Consumer Information Seeking Practices,” funded by the Law Foundation of Ontario, in which PIAC has been a community partner.

Participating groups will each receive a stipend to cover some of their travel expenses. The value of the stipend will depend on the number of participating groups and is likely to be around $500. Lunch and networking time will be built into the workshop.

About the project: Mapping the Front End: Legal Information Seeking Practices is a two-year project funded by the Law Foundation of Ontario Responsive Grants Program led by Dr Mary Cavanagh (uOttawa School of Information Studies) and Professor Marina Pavlovic (uOttawa Faculty of Law). Using consumer rights in mobile telecommunications services as a case-study, the project studies consumers’ everyday information seeking practices with an aim of connecting information users with information sources by developing consumer information literacy, awareness, and empowerment. This project is the first comprehensive study in Canada of the rights of cell phone users and includes mystery shopper transactions, consumer focus groups, follow-up interviews, an organizational survey and a mapping of current community-based resources. The project findings are a first step towards developing an evidence-based information needs, access, and uses framework and an effective community-situated ‘first response’ infrastructure assisting in strengthening people’s capacity for self-guided information seeking, access, and evaluation of a complex array of information sources.

About the workshop: There is a demonstrated need for consumers to learn about their rights, diagnose problems, seek context-specific information, make decisions, problem-solve, and engage in self-advocacy. We need your participation and feedback! Consumers150: Consumer Engagement and Outreach workshop is designed as a catalyst for engaging consumer groups in this research project, with the practical goal of producing suggestions and information tools and resources for all relevant community agencies currently working directly in the areas of for consumer advocacy, education, and engagement. The workshop will be an opportunity for representative organizations to:

• learn about the research project and its findings;
• influence the next steps of the research program;
• participate in an early development of two consumer-oriented tools: a pre-purchase interactive checklist and an interactive tool to assist wireless consumers in understanding their rights and offer problem solving pathways;
• discuss strategy and outreach to engage consumers in their work;
• network and collaborate with other organizations.

Please confirm your attendance by 10 September 2017 to Marina Pavlovic at [email protected].