All Stories

Vancouver Sun charity marks 10th year of helping schoolkids

Vancouver Sun charity marks 10th year of helping schoolkids

Before the pandemic of 2019, approximately one in five of this province’s children lived below the poverty line. Almost two years into this crisis there is every sign that poverty...

2021/2022

Shelley Fralic: An advocate for children in need

Shelley Fralic: An advocate for children in need

There are thousands of children in this province who have been fed, clothed and cherished because of the concern and compassion of Shelley Fralic, one of the instigators of the...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: $1.2 million in grants given out to schools and organizations

Adopt-A-School: $1.2 million in grants given out to schools and organizations

“We have never had so many requests for help before. It is a measure of our readers’ concern and generosity that we have been able to meet these requests.” —...

2020/2021

Adopt-a-School: A special thanks to Vancouver Sun readers

Adopt-a-School: A special thanks to Vancouver Sun readers

There was the 103-year-old woman who donated to the 2020 Adopt-a-School fundraising campaign not once, but twice. The reason? She knew the children needed help, and wanted to make sure...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: Resilience in children should never be confused with tragedy

Adopt-A-School: Resilience in children should never be confused with tragedy

By recognizing “resilience” as anything other than a tragedy in the life of an impoverished child — and to speak of it as something vaguely admirable — is to ignore...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: Hunger, poverty not limited to just inner-city schools

Adopt-A-School: Hunger, poverty not limited to just inner-city schools

Although the school boundary stretches all the way north to within 40 kilometres of Egmont and south down the bucolic highway to Sechelt, Pender Harbour Elementary-Secondary school has just 75...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: 16-year-old homeless girl survives with the help of Safe Schools team

Adopt-A-School: 16-year-old homeless girl survives with the help of Safe Schools team

“I became homeless in the summer of 2019. But in my heart I knew I’d never had a home, I never had stability.” — 16-year-old homeless girl The Christmas Eve...

2020/2021

Adopt-a-School: Last push before Christmas

Adopt-a-School: Last push before Christmas

We are pleased — and very grateful — to report that we have raised $902,246 as of 5pm, Wednesday, December 23, 2020. When we kicked off our 10th annual Adopt-a-School...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: Britannia Secondary wants to dismantle barriers

Adopt-A-School: Britannia Secondary wants to dismantle barriers

“If food is not a factor, and (adequate) clothing is not a problem, students can focus on what matters most which is their education and development.” — Britannia Secondary School...

2020/2021

Donations Reach $750,000 for Adopt-a-School’s 2020 campaign

Donations Reach $750,000 for Adopt-a-School’s 2020 campaign

When we kicked off our 10th annual Adopt-a-School fundraising campaign in November, we were hopeful that Vancouver Sun readers would once again open their hearts — and their wallets —...

2020/2021

Coquitlam’s Encompass Alternative program staff have been giving until it hurts

Coquitlam’s Encompass Alternative program staff have been giving until it hurts

Principal Lisa Dubé, youth worker Karin Leathwood and others at Coquitlam’s Encompass Alternative program — with their families, friends and acquaintances — know how it feels to give till it...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: COVID-19 has made things tough at Nakusp Secondary School

Adopt-A-School: COVID-19 has made things tough at Nakusp Secondary School

Nakusp Secondary School principal Peter Gajda is asking The Vancouver Sun’s Adopt A School campaign for $5,000 to provide more food and hot meals each week. NAKUSP — It sounds...

2020/2021

Technology opens the school door — both real and virtual — for vulnerable students

Technology opens the school door — both real and virtual — for vulnerable students

The shy young man doesn’t speak or show his face. All I see during a video call is a hand holding up sophisticated sketches that might some day be turned...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: London Drugs steps up to assist kids at inner city schools

Adopt-A-School: London Drugs steps up to assist kids at inner city schools

“Being able to give back to those in need in the communities we serve is paramount to London Drugs. Especially this year, we want to do as much as we...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: Improving the life chances for students

Adopt-A-School: Improving the life chances for students

NANAIMO — Brett Hancock, principal of the alternative school system in Nanaimo, has learned that for a number of his students facing financial hardships, academic success can be explained by...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: A little help with necessities keeps a family going

Adopt-A-School: A little help with necessities keeps a family going

Surrey school district’s Welcome Centre and the Safe Schools Wraparound program tap Adopt-A-School in effort to keep kids at risk on a healthy path The lot of the Soleil family,...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: School uses funds to feed family jobless because of COVID

Adopt-A-School: School uses funds to feed family jobless because of COVID

About a quarter of the kids at Matheson Secondary come from low-income families After all the travails caused by the pandemic — unemployment, hunger and the stresses that come with...

2020/2021

Donors’ amazing generosity hits $500,000 milestone

Donors’ amazing generosity hits $500,000 milestone

When we kicked off our 10th annual Adopt-a-School fundraising campaign in November, we were hopeful that Vancouver Sun readers would once again open their hearts — and their wallets —...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: Helping kids who may not have food outside of school

Adopt-A-School: Helping kids who may not have food outside of school

Grants target student hunger in Surrey schools For Manjot Badesha, it was only a matter of time before the emotional toll of it all kicked in. The family outreach worker...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: A little effort goes a long way at Pacific Custom Brokers

Adopt-A-School: A little effort goes a long way at Pacific Custom Brokers

Pacific Custom Brokers has adopted Royal Heights Elementary School in North Surrey, a small school that has many families struggling Three years ago the owner of Pacific Custom Brokers, Glen...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: Wellington Elementary is struggling to feed its impoverished students

Adopt-A-School: Wellington Elementary is struggling to feed its impoverished students

“Because of COVID we can’t bring volunteers into the building for the food program so we are trying to reinvent it. We are going to have to get prepared food...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: Families in need aren’t rare at Prince Charles Elementary

Adopt-A-School: Families in need aren’t rare at Prince Charles Elementary

Adopt-A-School: COVID adding to pressures of impoverished For almost 20 years Amy Lauwers, the child care worker at Surrey’s Prince Charles Elementary school, has been helping families trapped by poverty...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: Vancouver executive tees off on childhood hunger

Adopt-A-School: Vancouver executive tees off on childhood hunger

‘I want to issue a challenge to (golfers) to put the money they would have spent on golfing holidays to help these children,’ says Renate Mueller This past summer, Renate...

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: School tries to help families through problem after problem

Adopt-A-School: School tries to help families through problem after problem

The usual range of stresses on low-income families with children at Royal Heights elementary has been exacerbated by the pandemic Royal Heights Elementary is one of the smallest schools in...

2020/2021

Shelley Fralic: Ten years of feeding hungry children, thanks to Vancouver Sun readers

Shelley Fralic: Ten years of feeding hungry children, thanks to Vancouver Sun readers

Opinion: Adopt-a-School is now the No. 1 provider of food to public schoolchildren in B.C. You know the child poverty statistics, because we write about them frequently in this newspaper....

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: COVID adding to pressures of impoverished children and families

Adopt-A-School: COVID adding to pressures of impoverished children and families

For many middle-class professionals, it is fair to say that poverty — as a condition of life — is something they can only imagine. Not having enough money to feed...

2020/2021

Adopt-a-School: Pandemic created a need for a breakfast and lunch program at Park Avenue Elementary

Adopt-a-School: Pandemic created a need for a breakfast and lunch program at Park Avenue Elementary

Staff at Park Avenue Elementary have been providing breakfast and a bagged lunch for children using food hampers being sent to the school and funds from the school district’s foundation....

2020/2021

Adopt-a-School: 2020 Campaign Launch

Adopt-a-School: 2020 Campaign Launch

Adopt-A-School: B.C.’s children need us more than ever as almost $1 million has been requested by 102 schools We need you again. We face the coming months with some trepidation....

2020/2021

Adopt-A-School: Desperate families in Cariboo-Chilcotin receiving food from Children’s Fund

Adopt-A-School: Desperate families in Cariboo-Chilcotin receiving food from Children’s Fund

WILLIAMS LAKE — The COVID-19 pandemic has left many teachers across the province scrambling to feed impoverished children going hungry now that school meals aren’t available, but the challenges facing...

2019/2020

Adopt-A-School: Emergency fund helping families through COVID-19 crisis

Adopt-A-School: Emergency fund helping families through COVID-19 crisis

The Trial Lawyers Association of B.C. has thrown its support behind the Vancouver Sun Children’s Fund campaign to feed impoverished children and families during the COVID-19 pandemic. “We know the...

2019/2020

Adopt-a-School: Rocky Mountain Chocolate

Adopt-a-School: Rocky Mountain Chocolate

Rocky Mountain Chocolate steps up at a crucial time Surrey families receiving food aid from the school district received an unexpected treat when $30,000 worth of chocolates — courtesy of...

2019/2020

Adopt-A-School: KidSafe needs $180,000 to care for at-risk kids during COVID19 crisis

Adopt-A-School: KidSafe needs $180,000 to care for at-risk kids during COVID19 crisis

If normal time now seems like a dream, pandemic time is a living nightmare for Quincey Kirscher. As the executive director of KidSafe Project Society she has the fate of...

2019/2020

Adopt-A-School: Emergency food hubs feed hungry children

Adopt-A-School: Emergency food hubs feed hungry children

Emergency food hubs provide needy children with sustenance Emergency food hubs set up by the Vancouver school board have distributed thousands of meals this week to impoverished children and families...

2019/2020

Adopt-A-School: Jacqui Cohen’s Foundation steps up to help C0VID-19 campaign

Adopt-A-School: Jacqui Cohen’s Foundation steps up to help C0VID-19 campaign

Jacqui Cohen’s voice faltered as she spoke of the need to help impoverished children and families in danger of going hungry now that the coronavirus has shut down schools. “I...

2019/2020

Adopt-a-School: Help is on the way for impoverished families

Adopt-a-School: Help is on the way for impoverished families

Relief is on the way from The Vancouver Sun’s Adopt-A-School Covid-19 fund to teachers and administrators scrambling to provide food and help to impoverished families. On Thursday, $129,000 was sent...

2019/2020

Adopt-a-School: Sedin families to help hungry children in COVID-19 crisis

Adopt-a-School: Sedin families to help hungry children in COVID-19 crisis

Among the first responders to The Vancouver Sun’s plea for money for impoverished children facing hunger now school meals are no longer available, were Henrik and Daniel Sedin and their...

2019/2020

Adopt-a-School and COVID-19

Adopt-a-School and COVID-19

With schools closed needy children are missing out on breakfast and lunch There isn’t an institution in the world — from the largest and most powerful to the smallest —...

2019/2020

Adopt-a-School: There is a dire need for people to be helped

Adopt-a-School: There is a dire need for people to be helped

Raymond Louie may have risen from the mailroom to the boardroom in the last 30 years — dumping his overalls for a suit and tie — but he has kept...

2019/2020

Adopt-A-School: Nanaimo-Ladysmith alternative education program gets a helping hand

Adopt-A-School: Nanaimo-Ladysmith alternative education program gets a helping hand

Entrepreneur Barj Dhahan has a long history of helping students Vancouver businessman Barj Dhahan was moved when he recently read a Nanaimo principal’s comment that he regarded every child in...

2019/2020

Adopt-A-School: Donations support Indigenous learning at Vancouver school

Adopt-A-School: Donations support Indigenous learning at Vancouver school

To be a non-Aboriginal principal of Vancouver’s only Indigenous-focus school — χpey̓ Elementary on Hastings Street near Victoria — Rose McKenzie is having to delve deep into her almost four...

2019/2020

Make a difference. Help children in your community!

Donate Now