Youth Club had great summer of fundraising

Justin Seward
Times Reporter

 

Numerous fundraising efforts not only contributed to a busy summer for the Strathmore Youth Club, but also helped raise over a thousand dollars for the Alberta Children’s Hospital.
The $1,247 raised from bake sales and car washes went into buying toys that were delivered on Aug. 21 to the Alberta Children’s Hospital.
“This summer we decided instead of doing a bunch of little fundraisers where the children donated to different organizations that we wanted to donate it all to the Children’s Hospital,” said Hannah Magee, Strathmore Youth Club’s Program and Outreach Coordinator. “And for that reason, we have a couple of frequent flyers that go there, some special kids for us. (On many) Fridays, we did things like car washes and bake sales.”
As a way to recognize the hard work, Magee felt that it was a great experience for all 32 youth club members to bring the toys to the kids.
“We took a trip into the Children’s Hospital and all the kids were able to donate that to them,” said Magee. “And then we got a wonderful tour of the place. It was just a great experience for the kids to be able to see their hard work all summer and how it paid off and see where it went to.”
She thought from what transpired from the summer camp will go all year round, not just with one group, but all of them.
“We want to keep the Friday community service days going and all of our groups,” said Magee. “So not just our after-school kids, (but) our leadership kids and the groups that I work with through the junior high and the high school is putting a fundraising, kind of volunteer aspect in those groups and putting that back into a Kids helping Kids fund.”
The biggest thing that the Youth Club staff wanted the kids to learn was teamwork and to meet new people they wouldn’t have normally met.
Now that September has arrived, the Youth Club is offering a number of programs during the school months, including the after-school program having started on the first day of school that runs Monday to Friday.
Other programs include Artistic Expressions, Excel (leadership), Extreme Kids, Fantaboulus Fridays, Fusion, Clubworks, Social Networking Safety, Hit the Road, Skills for Life (boys) and EYES (girls), safeTALK, Fishing, photography, Stage Right, Junior Chef, Mad Science and Cornerstone (leadership).
For more information on the programs, you can go to http://www.youthclubofstrathmore.ca/current-programming/newsletters/ or contact the Strathmore Youth Club at 403-934-4918.