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September 6, 2017
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Empowering older women In 2012, Krista James first met with a group of two dozen elderly Chinese women from Richmond, most of them immigrants and grandmothers, to ask them what sort of change they wanted to see in their community and in their lives. James, who is the Vancouver-based national...
September 5, 2017
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Ava, a 22-year-old UBC law student, motors along Highway 16 just west of Prince George in the pouring rain. As the car head- lights illuminate the outline of an Aboriginal girl hitchhiking by the side of the road, Ava wavers. Should she stop and pick her up? But the moment is gone, and she...
March 31, 2017
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Every Monday , Michael Leland cycles to the Royal Vancouver Yacht Club, towing a bike trailer. The trailer sports his own modifications: its load capacity has been expanded thanks to a freezer rack. Sometimes accompanied by a fellow member of the Binners’ Project, he pulls bottles and cans from a...
January 3, 2017
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In January 2016, Kevin Wong was a 23-year-old criminology student who, inspired by cop movies, wanted to become a police officer. Ian Desrosier was a 41-year-old inmate at the Nanaimo Correctional Centre (NCC), nearing the end of his two-year sentence for breaking and entering. Both were nervous as...
December 19, 2016
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Victoria’s Red Barn Market, on the corner of Vanalman and Glanford Avenues, is a bustling place. Customers come and go, day in, day out, some grabbing a smoked-meat sandwich for lunch, others picking up a week’s worth of meat and fresh produce. Outside, where the fruit and veggies are neatly...
April 21, 2016
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When a research team from InWithForward moved into a social housing complex in Burnaby for three months last year, their research revealed that many people with cognitive disabilities were feeling bored, stuck and curious about what else is out there. “We think if Kudoz is going to scale, it can’t...
February 25, 2016
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As steam unspools from fresh cups of coffee on a polished wood countertop, dozens of young minds fumble in the background to find seats for both their ideas and their posteriors. The air is electric, and the warm glow of string lights reflecting off vintage brick walls is homey and inviting. “Every...
May 13, 2015
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A new café has popped up in downtown Vancouver, serving up hot entrees, sandwiches, soups and salads to a busy lunch crowd. While ordinarily this wouldn’t be news, Café 335 is different: the affordable social enterprise eatery is staffed by graduates of the Culinary Skills Training Program, a...
October 27, 2014
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Shane Koyczan is no stranger to deeply personal material. The poetry of this Vancouver-based spoken word artist is rich in social commentary, and often delves with an unflinching eye into intimate and sometimes disturbing subject matter. However, when Vancouver Opera came calling two years ago to...
October 29, 2013
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A new bike park for the Boothroyd Indian Band is teaching local kids to do much more than grinds and flips. It’s 8:30 on a Saturday morning in July, just a few kilometres north of Boston Bar. The day is clear and promises to be a scorcher. In a dirt pit just a stone’s throw from the Boothroyd...
August 30, 2013
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The Turtle Valley Donkey Refuge Society provides a safe home for rescued, abused and unwanted donkeys in British Columbia. Located near Salmon Arm in BC's interior, the facility is home to 24 donkeys. One of these donkeys is “Sassy” (both by name and temperament). A 12-year-old Mammoth Donkey,...
June 12, 2013
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David Lemon isn’t looking for a pat on the back. Through his work he has been providing elderly Canadians in care with meaningful moments of joy, but he is far from satisfied. What he desperately wants is to make a bigger difference – more often, and for more people. His charitable organization,...
June 17, 2012
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“I heard a bluebird singing one day.” An elfin, tousled-haired girl sings onstage at Burnaby’s Museum Village, sweeping a broom and blowing bubbles . . . “He seemed a messenger of happy news. But now my bluebird is singing the blues.” Thirteen-year-old Avy Crowchild belts out the lament about...
December 18, 2011
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“The instant I heard about the Thistle, I knew it was for me,” says the mischievous-looking woman with the dark curls. In fact, Leni Goggins wanted to be involved so badly that she moved from Vermont to Vancouver. “I tried out New York, but I thought, no, I really want to be part of the Thistle,”...
December 17, 2011
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Bernice Michaluk is on her way to the Surrey Food Bank. She has finished her courses for the day at Vancouver Career College where she is training to be a medical receptionist. She walks home to her tiny condo and checks on her kids (she has three boys: 19, 17 and 14 – “Never a dull moment”). Then...
June 14, 2011
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She was an easy target. Gentle and wide-eyed, Cheryl Bosola Olamijulo was the new girl in class—and the only black kid in her entire Surrey, BC high school. Her family had emigrated from Nigeria in 2009 looking for a better life, but it wasn’t working out better for Cheryl. “I was always very shy,...
December 18, 2010
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Her enthusiasm is still contagious. It radiates from her toddler photos. It’s there in her megawatt grin as she savours dim sum in Hong Kong, poses with Christmas reindeer and wise men in Bolivia and laps up ice cream on a sunny day outing with a pal. Emily Longworth lived with a rare gusto. She...
December 18, 2010
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It’s just a pair of socks. But Matthew Taylor knows those two bits of grey wool could make the difference between a good decision and a bad date tonight for a young man on the rain-slicked streets of downtown Vancouver. Taylor and another outreach worker are walking through downtown south and...
December 17, 2010
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University of British Columbia - Beaty What do the largest animal on earth, and one of the smallest (and oldest) have in common? Two things - they’re both blue, and they’re both at the new Beaty Biodiversity Museum at UBC. At more than 25m in length, the blue whale is the largest animal on earth...
December 14, 2010
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Alethea’s a lucky girl. The petite three-year-old clambers up the metal steps, then gleefully launches herself down the slide. That might seem ordinary enough. But Alethea is blind, and many kids like her don’t know the simple joy of movement. That’s because physical activity – even sliding down a...
December 14, 2010
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“She was emaciated and dirty. She had glaucoma in one eye. She was crippled. Her back end sagged. And her rib cage was kicked in: likely someone had been booting her,” says Carol Hine, describing the first time she set eyes on an aging Rottweiler cross named Rosebud. “If you touched her along her...
December 18, 2009
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Nanaimo’s south end is a neighbourhood in transition, caught between the high-density development of downtown, the glitz of a waterfront conference centre that looks to the future and low-slung industrial buildings that look back into the city’s resource-based past. The Princess Royal Family Centre...
December 18, 2009
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The atmosphere verges on tribal. A group of 30-something men walk in a small circle swinging their babies gently as they sing softly, “Zoom, zoom, zoom, we’re going to the moon.” Then there’s a countdown: “Five, four, three, two, one – blast off!” The men lift the babies to the ceiling and there...
December 14, 2009
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A 13-year-old cooks all the meals for her three siblings because her alcoholic parents are often incapable of caring for their children ... A 12-year-old does her best to take care of her mentally ill mother ... A 16-year-old feeds and bathes his ailing grandfather ... This is the secret world of...
June 17, 2009
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Shea Jim is standing on the pitcher’s mound at Nat Bailey Stadium. At nine years old, she’s almost lost in this huge field of green. The people in the stands, including her family, can barely pick her out. She’s calm, waiting. It’s July 31. The Vancouver Canadians are taking on the Salem- Keizer...