Growing Together

To Our Kinark Community

This past year has been one of meaningful progress, bold thinking, and continued dedication to quality in all aspects of our work. In 2024–25, Kinark deepened its impact across Ontario’s child and youth mental health and autism systems. Through innovation, collaboration, and a clear focus on quality, we have advanced important work that not only strengthens our services but also contributes to lasting change across the broader sectors we serve. 

We are proud to share that we made significant strides in delivering high-quality, timely services for children, youth, and families. Our Time-Limited Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT) model helped more young people access the right support at the right time, while our continued involvement in the provincial work to establish a new approach to intensive services is helping to ensure children and youth with significant needs can access effective treatment in a timely manner. As Lead Agency in three regions, Kinark remained deeply engaged in collaborative local planning to improve service navigation and system responsiveness. 

Also in our Child and Youth Mental Health program, we launched a new partnership with Hong Fook Mental Health Association to co-design culturally responsive programming. Funded through a grant from the Knowledge Institute, this collaboration will include a CBT summer camp launching in 2025; an exciting step forward in making mental health care more inclusive, accessible, and reflective of the communities we serve. 

Our Autism Services team also continued to evolve to meet the needs of families navigating the Ontario Autism Program. We expanded our fee-for-service offerings and remain focused on providing outcome-driven care that is responsive to family goals and service gaps. This past year, we supported 339 more clients than the year prior, reflecting growing demand for our services. Client experience data also remained strong, with positive results across key indicators of satisfaction, engagement, and perceived impact. 

We made significant progress in our Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) efforts as well. This year marked an important milestone in our journey as we launched the next phase of our DEI Learning Strategy. These efforts are contributing to our shared goals of providing welcoming, responsive and culturally appropriate programs and services and fostering an inclusive culture across our organization – seeking to embed equity is embedded in all aspects of who we are.  

As we continue to support some of the province’s most complex and high-needs youth, included in the 10,730 clients and families we supported this year, quality and accountability remain our most important achievements. Through investment in system improvements, staff learning, and continuous monitoring, we are building the infrastructure that enables Kinark to provide consistently excellent and safe treatment and care. 

As we look ahead, we are energized by the progress we’ve made, and by the opportunities still to come. Thank you for standing with us as we continue our mission to help children and youth with complex needs achieve better life outcomes.