I Need a Hero: December 19, 2008

Well hello there all, did you miss me? I have been a little busy, saving the world. But seriously I have been enjoying some down time, working on me. Over the years I have been very busy sitting on committees, going to meetings and working hard to try and make this place a little better and from where I sit I got to say not much has changed. What I continuously find is that it’s a thankless job, no matter how hard you work to try and do some good there is always someone out there thinking you have an ulterior motive. I guess that’s just human nature isn’t it. So anyway I’m back!
I am looking forward to the Christmas break and spending some time with my girls and doing some fun stuff with them. I will get a chance to take a breath and just be me, how does the song go? “I’ve got to be me”  anyway enough about me. Grace and Hannah are quite active in figure skating, it is very nice to see them out there socializing, learning and doing something they enjoy.
Friendship House has been very busy over the past few weeks as you know we had an open house last week and it went very well. Plenty of people showed up and paid their respects and had a tour of the place. It was very successful as our staff shared information about the programs offered and freely gave of their time to show people around. Thank you for everyone who dropped by “Da House” and thanks to the staff and board members who helped out.
As this is the season of giving may I suggest a few places that often get over looked when it comes receiving donations. You all know about the usual suspects and they do good work but if I were to donate somewhere I would bring it to the good ladies at the Mission of the Good Shepherd. They run a soup kitchen among other things out of there hall, down on third avenue just across from General Paint. The other group is the Kaien Island Poverty Society otherwise known as K.A.P.S. they work with children and families who live in McKay Street neighbourhood. They are both very good groups and very solid. As you know I like to compare things to the NHL, so if they were NHL teams they would be like the Calgary Flames and Nashville Predators both gritty teams who show up with the lunch box ready to work. Check them out and make a donation go ahead I dare you to think outside the box.
And speaking about thinking outside the box, I think this is more into left field, the good ole boys from School District 52 just can’t seem to get it right. They were in the news again not getting much support about setting up their Alternate School in Cowbay.
Just to remind you Friendship House was in partnership for over ten years with the School District 52 offering the Kaien Island Alternate School out of our building which is located “downtown” then they cut us. We weren’t perfect in delivering the program but we always had graduates and we always had people coming back to school because it was in our “downtown” location.
With their new initiative they have a $100,000.00 to play with, I wish they would have consulted with us first we could have done so much more and reached so many more youth with that influx of funds. What also is getting lost in all this is that we contributed roughly $100,000.00 annually to this partnership, no one seems bothered by that or seems to care. But I do miss seeing all those smiling faces of the students walking thru our halls and taking ownership of the program feeling like they belonged. Yeah it’s too bad that the Old Boys Club at School District decided to end our relationship without really having a plan in place and being okay with that, while our most disadvantaged youth fell thru the cracks. More surprisingly was the fact that the School Board approved ending this relationship without a plan in place.
So this new Alternate School will be delayed again and one has to wonder how much this is all costing. We appreciated the letter from Brenda L. Leighton in the Daily News letter to the Editor on December 11, 2008 asking for answers. It’s too bad they did not do any consultation beforehand not after the fact unfortunately this administrative move hurts the kids and how can you measure the loss of another youth.
But in the meantime we at “Da House” have been working in partnership with the NWCC in offering an Adult Grad Program in our “downtown” location we are just finishing up our first term together and looking forward to the January 5, 2009 when the next term starts up. So if you know anyone who wants to get their grade twelve, they can do it with us and NWCC. And as my new hero Obama would say, “Can we do it…Yes we can”. Registration forms are available at the NWCC or “downtown” @ the Friendship House come and check us out we’re the best “Alternative” 
Hey if you have any comments about this article you can email me at ineedahero.pr@gmail.com or phone me you know where I am. Have a safe Christmas, pay it forward, keep it real and watch out for karma. Merry Christmas!
“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.” Gandhi