Telus, Hyatt join forces to help school: Family day at Beaconsfield part of ongoing contribution to community
Earlier this year, Lord Beaconsfield Elementary’s classroom computer system that was on the verge of collapsewas rescued by a $25,000 Telus donation to The Vancouver Sun’s Adopt-A-School campaign. The school had asked AAS for money to buy computers to replace ones that had stopped working. This was limiting students’ ability to learn a technology-based curriculum. […]
Community comes to rescue of hungry families in Surrey
Such is the state of poverty in some North Surrey homes that a family recently had only a single onion to eat between them all weekend. “That’s all they had,” said Liane Ricou, an official with the Surrey School Board. “We know of families that don’t even have that. They’ll go all weekend without eating […]
Homeless teens often stay hidden
Homelessness among teenagers is an invisible epidemic, says Dawne Tomlinson, principal of Langley Secondary. “You will see homeless adults in Langley but you won’t see homeless teenagers because they are invisible. They wear all the right things and stuff because they are so much more vulnerable if they look homeless: vulnerable in school, vulnerable on […]
Beedie Group helps children in need, stepping forward to ‘adopt’ neighborhood school
It’s Friday and lunch day at Burnaby’s Douglas Road Elementary and there’s nothing but joy on the face of principal Mary-Ann Brown as she dishes out the macaroni and cheese to the line of waiting children each holding a plastic container and spoon. “We do this once a week and the kids just love it,” […]
Donors help Charlie’s Closet keep Tupper secondary students well dressed
A year ago Charlie’s Closet was almost bare – just two used T-shirts on a rickety clothes rack in a small storage room at Tupper secondary school in east Vancouver. Hardly an inventory to be of much help for impoverished students needing socks, underwear, coats, pants, jackets, shirts or shoes. “We didn’t have much. I […]
Canucks coach Willie Desjardins returns to class to talk to kids about teamwork
A qualified social worker and holder of two teaching degrees, Willie Desjardins has a curious background for a National Hockey League coach. But it showed to good effect Friday in the lunch room of Grandview Elementary School, where in the midst of 160 children, the coach of the Vancouver Canucks looked as comfortable as he […]
A closet for students who don’t have one at home
There are some students attending Vancouver’s Sir Charles Tupper Secondary who own their own cars. And there are some who own only the clothes on their backs. The gulf that exists between those two groups needs no exploring. “Kids with cars? Yes. I remember seeing one kid broken down who didn’t know how to use […]
CABE looks after teen mothers and their children
For many Grade 12 students, graduation year is a hectic but fabled time of anticipation and excitement as the world beyond the classroom waits. But for Vanessa Ellingson — the head and breadwinner of a family of three — the thought of leaving the security of Coquitlam’s smallest secondary school fills her with dread. “I’m […]
Providing for young moms — and babies
Kayci is 16 weeks old and her mother Shakayla Bowe is 16 years old — a symmetry of weeks and years that will never come again. And if those numbers suggest this is a child looking after a baby, the ready smile on the baby’s face shows that this is a child as tender in […]
Canucks icon Trevor Linden scores with inner-city school
The largest collection of Canucks jerseys seen so far this fall were one the backs of kids and teachers stuffed in the gym of Surrey’s Mary Jane Shannon elementary in honour of Trevor Linden, who came to the school Thursday to support The Vancouver Sun’s Adopt-a-School campaign. Most of the shirts sported the iconic number […]