The Human Challenge Podcast Por Vanessa Ferlaino arte de portada

The Human Challenge

The Human Challenge

De: Vanessa Ferlaino
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The Human Challenge is an award-winning podcast that shares gripping, untold stories of underrepresented voices in society overcoming and even escaping systemic barriers. Each episode showcases a new deeply intimate story, using documentary-like storytelling. Stories touch on incarcerated people, refugees, immigration, Indigenous voices, women’s issues, climate justice, gender diversity, and more. With an aim to increase media representation, The Human Challenge is hosted and produced by award-winning artist, Vanessa Ferlaino, who has Hispanic and Italian-immigrant roots. Over 70% of our guests are diverse. Past guests have included returning citizens, displaced people, astronauts, GRAMMY and JUNO nominees, and more. This is a space for underrepresented stories. This is a space for the stories that are not always told. This is a space to remember our common humanity. This is The Human Challenge, challenging what it means to be human, one story at a time.


** Now Airing on Rogers TV **


** Subscribe to Vanessa's newsletter at vanessaferlaino.com/subscribe **


Tune In: Youtube Amazon Music Spotify Apple Podcasts iHeart Radio

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

2023
Biografías y Memorias Ciencias Sociales
Episodios
  • Shirley: A Residential School Story
    Mar 31 2026

    As we mark National Indigenous Languages Day on Turtle Island, Shirley Horn shares her residential school story, growing up in not one, but two residential schools. She would return years later to Shingwauk Hall after it became a university to pursue her education, become first chancellor, and then Chief of The Missanabie to help return land back to her community. In this touching episode, Shirley talks about her life healing the trauma that came with the residential school system, reconnecting with Indigenous culture, and her longing for Indigenous language. Learn more about her life in a new children’s book, “Shirley: An Indian Residential School Story,” written by Joanne Robertson. Available now!


    Special thank you to Children Of Shingwauk Alumni Association and Algoma University. This episode was recorded in The Elder Room at Shingwauk Anishinaabe Students Lounge at Algoma University.


    Cinematography by Shae Mclurg.

    The Human Challenge is hosted and produced by Vanessa Ferlaino. Watch the full episode on her Youtube channel here. Don't forget to subscribe!

    The Human Challenge is an award-winning podcast, recognized by Amazon Music and ACAST as an Indie Podcast Amplifier.

    Guess what? We're on Rogers TV! Check us out there!

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    Más Menos
    40 m
  • Eleven Years In The Making
    Mar 12 2026

    “I just never felt safe,” says Jessica Compton, after running away from a young life of kidnapping, abuse, and sexual assault. Deciding it was best she take care of herself, she lived on her own at the age of 16, working and paying her bills. During this time, drugs and alcohol numbed the pain, but lead to arson, assaults, and eventually, incarceration.


    “The cell saved me,” she says. “I saved myself.”


    After prison, she graduated college to be a correctional officer, and spent almost fourteen years as a youth worker, supporting aggressive youth, before founding Trees Of Stars, an arts and culture non-profit. But because of her criminal record, she worked in construction for almost eleven years before being able to work in her profession, as waited for her pardon. Her new book, Bits And Pieces, is a peer-support memoir, and available now.


    It took Jessica eleven years to be pardoned.


    Eleven years of putting the Bits And Pieces together again.


    Eleven years to find freedom.

    The Human Challenge is hosted and produced by Vanessa Ferlaino. Watch the full episode on her Youtube channel here. Don't forget to subscribe!

    The Human Challenge is an award-winning podcast, recognized by Amazon Music and ACAST as an Indie Podcast Amplifier.

    Guess what? We're on Rogers TV! Check us out there!

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    Más Menos
    21 m
  • Rebulding The House: Canada's Justice System
    Feb 19 2026

    Since childhood, Sara developed maladaptive behaviours growing up in a tiny shack with no electricity and an abusive father who sold her to the sex trade at the age of three. In and out of foster care for much of her life, it was finding herself in prison where Sara finally decided it was time to seek support and services for her mental health. Initially denied, she fought for access to services, and for what she couldn’t receive, she taught herself. Since her release, nothing has stopped her from fighting for justice. In her role at Northpine Foundation, Sara has served over 7500 formerly incarcerated people, reduced homelessness by 86%, lowered recidivism to 4.7%, and saved taxpayers over $1.13 billion of incarceration fees per year, over $68 million per year in hospital stays, and over $43 million in emergency visits. She also raised median income for formerly incarcerated people from $14,000 to $58,000. But her biggest impact has been looking into the eyes of the prison guard who sexually assaulted her and countless women in prison, and saying that she believed in him and forgave him. In this episode, Sara tells her story from the greater thread of social justice — from the effects of colonization on the prison system, the programming of society, and the political system. For Sara, social justice looks like changing the system; specifically, it’s rebuilding the house from the very foundations.

    The Human Challenge is hosted and produced by Vanessa Ferlaino. Watch the full episode on her Youtube channel here. Don't forget to subscribe!

    The Human Challenge is an award-winning podcast, recognized by Amazon Music and ACAST as an Indie Podcast Amplifier.

    Guess what? We're on Rogers TV! Check us out there!

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    Más Menos
    47 m
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