Surrey: Refugee families receive food and vital assistance
For refugee families it’s often the local school that holds them together until they find their balance. And for Obeid Abouzeid, his wife Nazadar and their five children – all boys – their place of refuge is Lena Shaw Elementary on 100A Avenue in Whalley. This Surrey school is home to 42 Arabic-speaking children, including […]
Tutors keep it real, pay it forward at QE in Whalley
The world outside can be harsh and dangerous for teenagers in Whalley but it’s countered wonderfully by the warmth and caring found in the library of Queen Elizabeth Secondary on peer-to-peer tutoring nights. Twice a week after school as many as 16 tutors set up shop in the library like vendors in a market, each with a card on […]
Tupper Alternative Program
There’s nothing extravagant about what the alternative school program at Vancouver’s Sir Charles Tupper Secondary needs from the community. Food, clothing and bus tickets. Some students don’t have enough to eat at home, some don’t have coats just hoodies for all weathers, and some skip school because it’s too far to walk or skateboard in […]
Sidoo family steps up for Maple Ridge Secondary
When Jordan Sidoo was 14 years old he would sell pen and pencil sets to his friends to raise money for The Vancouver Sun’s Adopt-A-School campaign. Seven years later he’s a director of the Sidoo family’s charitable foundation with his brother Dylan, 24. And on Wednesday the brothers wrote a $15,000 cheque to AAS to be used to […]
Donations have dried up at Maple Ridge Secondary
Canada is proud of being a classless society, we give out a few honours — Order of Canada, Order of British Columbia — but we don’t do bowing and scraping or raising people above others with titles: sir this, lord that, lady so-and-so. However, if you look at how we treat our poor — and […]
Blundell Seafoods helping teens in need with jobs, scholarships
Last December, Jeremy Law, the general manager of Blundell Seafoods in Richmond, not only sent cases of canned tuna to schools where hunger was prevalent, but followed up with an offer to employ older students struggling with poverty. “It was a brilliant offer,” said Sarah McKay, a member of Surrey’s Safe Schools Team, who gladly accepted it. The team […]
London Drugs brightens students’ Christmas with gifts and toys
Principal Lisa Jamieson didn’t hide her delight when the London Drugs truck pulled up outside Old Yale Road Elementary delivering bags of toys and gifts. “We are such a needy school,” said Jamieson, whose school on 132nd St. in Whalley is high on the list of Surrey’s inner city schools that needs all the help […]
Pre-kindergarten classes help kids get school-ready; StrongStart will also expose some parents to social, health programs
When Henry Peters arrived this year as principal of South Vancouver’s John Henderson Elementary, one thing he noticed was that some children entering kindergarten weren’t as prepared for school life as they should have been. “I see the kindergarteners every week and I could just tell at the beginning of the year that there was something missing […]
Helping Children Overcome Trauma Through Art
“We’ve all been broken before, but we heal. We do have the darkness still, but we have to learn to live without the darkness.“ A HANDWRITTEN SIGN PINNED TO THE WALL IN GUILDFORD PARK SECONDARY For many refugee students attending Surrey schools, their bodies may be safely in a classroom, but their minds are still inhabiting the dangerous places they fled. Surrey likely […]
Breakfast food for students a growing need
Robin Pilchak knows what it’s like being a single mother with young children and how hard it is to feed them when money is tight. “I’m a single mom with three kids, and I struggled for quite a while. It’s not easy to get good, healthy food for kids because it costs so much,” said Pilchak. […]