On Purpose

Fran de la Luna came to Canada in 2001 from Singapore. And while they loved the city and decided to stay, they quickly became aware of the social isolation that is so often prevalent in Vancouver due to the weather and cultural attitudes. Instead of staying inside and moping like so many Vancouverites, Fran elected to do something about it by helping some of the people most vulnerable to exclusion from the community. Fran is now a community connector at Building Caring Communities, a group dedicated to helping people with disabilities to interact with and benefit from the community. We talked to Fran about experimentation, chance encounters, and pinball.

On the program: Building Caring Communities is an experimental group where we're doing a lot of social experiments to address social isolation and resiliency for folks with disabilities, particularly folks with developmental disabilities or cognitive disabilities.

On startup: The initiative came together as a result of collaboration of four disability agencies: posAbilities, the Burnaby Association for Community Inclusion, the Simon Fraser Society for Community Living, and Inclusion Powell River. The four agencies decided to tackle the question of what does it mean for folks with disabilities to live a meaningful life in the community?

On service: A lot of folks, after institutionalization ended, and they came out from the hospitals, they were spread out throughout Vancouver. There was a really big need to provide services for them. This could be anything from needing someone to come to your house and cook for you, or needing someone to take you to places. It's very service-based.

The four agencies realized that they were doing something that's not really great for folks with disabilities, because they are essentially providing them with good service but they're also isolating them from the community. There are people who have been living in their homes for 20 years and barely even know their neighbours. They don't have any interaction with the outside world. They don't have friends. Their life consists of schedules, contracts, agreements, reviews. A lot of staff are often time telling them what to do. But they don't really get the rich community experience.

On relationships: We're not trying to provide a service. We are trying to spend a lot of time with folks with disabilities to understand their lives. To understand what is it exactly that they're doing. What kind of lives they are living. And so where can we come in to address social isolation with them. We are actively taking a collaborative approach. We are always going to our folks and finding out what their interests are. What their passions are. What their gifts are. And that really started us out.

On clients: Everyone is different. For example, I'm working with five different individuals now and they each have different needs. It could be spending an hour or two with them a week. We’ll go for neighbourhood walks and do something called asset mapping, essentially asking questions like, “Where are places you have found to be welcoming and inclusive? What do you consider as asset in this neighbourhood that you live in?" We do a lot of creative stuff because all the connectors [BCC staff] come from different backgrounds. Some of us have creative backgrounds. And then we'll do a lot of research in terms of how they interact with people. We go right down into it, really getting to know the people. We call it the extended first date. It could take six months, it could take three months, it could take a year. But whatever it takes for us to know this person so that we can bring them out into the community and then include it into their lives.

On Kudoz: We interface with Kudoz all the time. We have participants who go to Kudoz and we will go with them. Kudoz is a really great platform for us to introduce our participants who have very limited experiences to open up so that they can try different things. And through that experience with Kudoz we can connect. Oftentimes we find that when a participant's experience opens up, it changes their life pretty drastically.

On success: There's a lady who is in her 60's. She's been deemed by people who support her to be stubborn. She never wants to leave the house and she will never wake up early in the morning. We started working with her and we started understanding her life a little bit better. We know that she's afraid to meet people, so trying to plan to meet people is tough. So we changed the environment and said okay, what if we accidentally bump into people, even though we're trying to plan it a little bit. And we found that she opened up to that. She had no problems meeting people when you bumped into them. So that was a really interesting discovery for us to find out. She showed us an entirely different part of herself because we changed the way we're approaching it. Some of the barriers are coming down. This is going against everything people who know her are saying; no, she's stubborn, won't wake up, won't come out of the house. But she's proving all of them wrong and showing us that actually there is capacity to do it all.

On the tools of the trade: We use our individual backgrounds as connectors. We look at what's currently happening in the disability sector. We also look at tons of research papers. So far we've done research on things like friendship, motivation, resilience, trust and courage. We've gone through all these research papers on what we call determinacy of human resilience or human interaction. And then we just pull these theories out. We'll go to our board and we'll use something called human-centred design thinking and we'll try to work on some ideas that we have. A lot of time the ideas will come from either our own personal experiences or simply by saying, okay this is what's been done, lets try something else.

I bring a lot of the queer stuff in as well. I'm currently working with someone who is queer. We're doing the angle of what does it mean to be a queer person with a disability trying to tap into Vancouver's gay community.

On inclusion: Inclusion is not simply just an attitude, it really is about work. Inclusion is about spending time with someone to understand how they connect, how they express themselves, what their beliefs are and where we can find bridges around that. And having the patience to do that.

On changing attitudes: I stopped looking at folks with disabilities as folks with disabilities. I started looking at them as people. Very often times I've been put into my place but virtue of how awesome folks with disabilities are. They can do things that I cannot do. They can think about things that I cannot think. I have someone who I'm working with who plays heavy metal on the piano no problem. You throw him any heavy metal song, he will play it on the piano like nobody's business. Another guy that I work with, he's the Canadian pinball champion. He has a fan club. I was like, this is blowing my mind. We don't really have a normal society. We just have people. Different types of people, awesome people doing amazing stuff. And why they are labeled with a disability is beyond me. Sooner or later we're all going to be disabled because we're going to grow old. I’m going to need someone to come clean my house. I'm going to maybe need help to pee. We're all going down that road eventually.

On what you can do: My simplest answer will always be to go find someone and spend time with them if you can. There are really great videos. There are really great books. You can volunteer. Kudoz is a good example, where you can be a host so you get at least a little bit of a glimpse of what interacting with someone with disabilities is.

After watching a locally-produced documentary film, David Schein woke up to the reality of day-to-day food waste: too much is going into the garbage. From supermarkets to local groceries to home kitchens, a huge quantity of the food we produce and buy is wasted. Stores don’t sell it fast enough, we buy too much, or we don’t eat it before it goes bad. David wanted to do something about it, so he started Food Stash Foundation, an organization that picks up food that would otherwise be wasted and finds homes for it at local charities that feed hungry people. He’s just starting out and learning the ups and downs of trying to do something good for the community. We talked to David about celery, the price of gas, and 900 pounds of tomatoes.

On the beginning: I watched the movie Just Eat It last year and it opened my eyes to the whole food system and how big a problem it is all along the chain. From farm to wholesale to supermarket to at home. I was shocked that 50% of the waste in Canada is happening in the home, buying too much or not finishing it.

On startup: I was a high school teacher so I had the summer off. Then in September I started Food Stash, instead of going back to work as a teacher. I'd just go on my bike and was biking around to lots of little produce stores, and supermarkets, and cafes, and bakeries, and asking if they wanted to donate any unsold food items. I was going to redistribute it to different charities. I went out and tried to find charities that were interested in receiving food and it has steadily grown from there. I never delivered food on my bike, in the beginning I was just getting out there scoping it out. Then once I got two or three stores within two weeks, I had a Toyota Camry so I was using the Camry. Which quickly became too small.

On funding: It's not making any money right now. I do have a donation button on the website and we've received $2,000 in donations since September, so it's pretty good. That's covered pretty much all of the gas, which is the biggest expense. Pretty much the only expense. But going forward, if it's going to be sustainable, then I do need to generate enough money to have a salary so I can continue. I mean obviously I can't volunteer forever. Also I would like to get a kitchen space and then a cold storage space, because right now I'm delivering everything same day. I pick it up and deliver it within a few hours.

On preventing food waste at home: You've just got to get in the habit of checking in, you know look at the back of your fridge. Also the less you buy, or the more frequently you shop probably will lead to less waste, just because when your fridge is jam packed, you can't see what's in there. You forget about something, something gets squished in the back, whereas if you have more space you'll see, "Oh yeah that celery is starting to go, let's make a stir-fry or make soup or whatever."

On putting yourself on the line: I've tried out some of the prepared foods, because the prepared foods have the most risk involved. With produce and dairy, you'll see it visually or you can smell it with dairy. But prepared foods could go off without having a change in taste or smell. Like the sandwiches or the wraps, or the ready-made entrees. So I have experimented with those to see, a day after, it's okay. Two days after, three days after, etc.

On barriers: Not all charities are equipped with big cold storage facilities with lots of kitchen staff who can prep all these things, so a lot of charities can't take 100 pounds of produce. And who knows what you're getting, it's a wide variety. It takes a skilled chef and team to be able to take a mix-match of produce and turn it into a great meal.

I thought it would be easier. Some charities have experiences in the past of food getting dumped on them and it not being good quality, and maybe they only save fifteen or twenty percent and it just creates extra work for them. They end up having to throw most of it out, so they can be wary. It takes a little bit to build that relationship and trust and the charities tell me they're using about 80% of the produce I give them, which I think is a high percentage.

On future plans: I'd like to start picking up from more farms, especially as we get into the summer. There's so much out there and the quantities they have are pretty overwhelming. Like, in a month I've picked up 900 pounds of tomatoes, and 700 pounds of cucumbers. Having that cold storage would give me three or four days to donate it or I can make tomato sauce and reduce the volume; just having the space would give me more options, it would be a bit less stressful. I'd also like to start processing the food a little bit, to extend shelf life through dehydrating or freezing or canning. Making yogurt. Different things like that.

I just want to stay in Vancouver. There's another group in New Westminster and Burnaby called ReFood, which is doing pretty much exactly the same thing. So I don't feel the need to try to go all over the Lower Mainland, I just want to do as well as I can here. There's so many supermarkets. I'm only picking up from three big supermarkets, and not every day either; imagine if you're picking up from five supermarkets every single day.

On social media: I had never done Instagram before I started this in September so it's all new to me. It's the best because what we're doing is visual so it's cool for people to see the quality. I think people might get it in their heads that the food is bad, it's not the best stuff. But when they see pictures of grass fed, organic milk, and grass fed organic yogurt, and Parmesan cheese, or even just the apples. You can see the quality of the apples, or the red peppers. This is good stuff.

Instagram has enabled me to connect with people who support what I'm doing and want to help out. I've asked for volunteers, once in the fall and then once a couple weeks ago, and I've gotten a lot of responses. Since January there's been five volunteers helping me on a weekly basis, doing a pickup and a delivery.

On what he needs now: I’m looking for more sources of food, so if any of the readers work at a store or know of a store that might be interested in donating. I’m always looking for more volunteers. So people can email me about volunteering or if they work for a charity or know of a charity that would like to start receiving donations, they can contact me as well. Any little donations, little donations help. Even a couple of dollars. Yeah, gas is expensive.

Elaine Leung is a marine biologist with a lengthy résumè featuring research positions in exotic locales like Alaska, Hawaii, and Antarctica. But after 15 years working with all kinds of marine life and relatively little conservation action from world governments, Dr. Leung is trying a different strategy - kids. She founded Sea Smart, an organization that provides a variety of programs to kids in Vancouver featuring marine conservation. From beach walks to classroom discovery, Elaine does an incredible job of showing the next generation how important our oceans are to the health of the planet. We talked to Elaine about ocean noise, fish, and teaching kids to care.

On history: I've always been a very curious person, and even now, I'm going constantly, asking questions about everything. I guess what it came down to was I always loved the ocean when I was growing up. It never actually occurred to me to be a marine biologist, because it's one of those dream jobs that doesn't really exist, right? It's only something you see in movies, and people studying dolphins. Then, for my first real job out of high school, I was only 20, I got a job studying sea lions for UBC. I fell in love with marine biology and never looked back.

On changing course: As someone who's been working with endangered species for over 15 years now, over 30 of the species that I've worked with or interacted with will go extinct within my lifetime. The thing is, I can't quit. If we all quit, then who's going to be doing this? Who's going to fight for our environment? After all this work, trying to save all those species, and realizing it hasn’t amounted to any conservation actions, I needed to change course. I believe so strongly in the power of individual action to create positive change. That's the whole idea behind Sea Smart, is that every little action counts and together we can do so much more.

On Sea Smart: Our mission is to get kids excited about our oceans and empower them to be environmental champions. We all know that our youth are our hope for the future and planet, but they're getting increasingly disconnected from nature, and more and more attached to their screens, their tablets, their phones, their computers. It's a big problem, because when kids lose that connection with nature, they start caring less about it. They don't really care about taking action to protect it, so the whole idea behind Sea Smart is that we bring our oceans to you in the classroom, so that even if you don't live right by the ocean, you can learn about the ocean. You can learn about how amazing it is.

On strategies: We don't just teach kids about ocean problems. We get them to actively brainstorm solutions and to identify actions they can take to help. It doesn't matter if you're in kindergarten, grade 7, or grade 12, there's something that you can do to help, and hopefully they take this knowledge home and they share it with their parents.

On fun: We try to turn everything into a game or really fun activity. For instance, underwater noise, we're trying these really innovative teaching techniques to get the kids to experience firsthand what it's like to be a marine animal growing up, or living in the ocean that's surrounded by all these threats. We taught the kids about echolocation, how a lot of marine animals use sound and echoes to find their prey and each other. We blindfolded the kids and we had fish on the floor. We had other kids tell them where all the fish was, but then we had other kids who were boats, and making lots of boat noise. The kids could really experience that when you're relying on sound to find your prey, how difficult that is in an ocean of increasingly loud noises.

On kids: I've been working as a marine biologists for over 15 years now, all around the world, for different governments, universities, NGOs, and even the mining and gas industries. Mainly working with adults on conservation issues. Most of my research is focused on studying endangered species. What's causing decline, how to mitigate those factors. Inevitably, it's always related to some human economic activity, but you can't get governments to do anything to protect these animals, because they'd rather protect economic interests than environmental interests. Adults are stubborn, whereas kids are a lot more open, and when we get kids who realize, "Wow! There's all these different things that we can be doing differently, or all these things that we can change at home. Why don't we do that?" Then they can ask their parents to do things differently.

On feedback: I've had lots of parents of students saying how impressed they are by the amount of knowledge their kids are retaining and bringing home and teaching them about anything from sustainable seafood to ocean friendly cleaning products to plastic use.

On environmental politics: It's very, very scary times. I don't even know what to make of the situation. I don't know what can be done to change. Obama did so much for the environment, and now when Trump is threatening to take away all of that work that took so long to do. It breaks my heart and terrifies me. I've been trying to figure out what can we do, and I've talked to a lot of American friends who are closely tied into the political scene there. They're all saying to me, "There's nothing you can really do in the US, but focus on Canada. Make sure what happens in the US doesn't happen in Canada." That's where I'm mainly focusing my efforts.

On critical thinking: Whenever I teach kids in Sea Smart, I present unbiased, transparent information. That's very important to me. I never present anything from a political view, but I do share with them what's currently happening and let them decide what they want to do with that information.

On what to eat: I teach my kids about sustainable seafood too, and it's really hard to know whether or not something is sustainable, because there's so many different factors to consider. I think it's great to have organizations like Ocean Wise and Sea Choice, because they take the guess work out for you. That being said, it's difficult when you don't have proper labeling. I find restaurants really difficult. Especially if they aren't Ocean Wise restaurants. I always ask the servers, and the chefs, and the managers, where is the seafood from? They always say, "I don't know."

There have been a lot of detours and pitstops on Shea Emry’s journey from CFL linebacker to men’s mental health advocate. Depression, yoga, screaming in the woods, axe throwing, and plenty more. Each one has been a learning opportunity that helped Shea found Wellmen, an outdoor adventure club that gets men in touch with their true selves. Wellmen gets groups of men together to share the difficulties in their lives, learn from each other, and grow as a result of opening up, all while doing traditionally masculine things like mountain biking, hiking, and building camp fires. It’s a way for Shea to help break apart society’s construct of what it means to be a man, and rebuild it as something more positive. We talked to Shea about injury, legacy, and learning to be a better father.

On the beginning: To be a professional football player, what you do to get to that point is you put the blinders on and you go hard as hell and you try and figure out how you're going to make it to the top. I stopped going to my summer cabin. I stopped snowboarding. I stopped doing everything that I was passionate about, what I really enjoyed doing. When I got to that point where I was at the top of my game, I got a concussion and my passion, my purpose, what I loved to do in the world was taken away from me. It stripped me of my identity and stripped me of any motivation to get up in the morning. I had a very deep battle with depression, which I've battled with at a couple of points in my life before that and then since.

On goals: I needed to figure out who I was. I needed to figure out what I was passionate about. I didn't have the answers to those questions. I knew I was passionate about going outside and I wanted to help people. The only way I knew how to do that was by going out and being myself. I was advised to go be that. Go be yourself, tell your story, take risks.

On failure: I hosted a yoga event in Montreal for my team. I invited about 75 guys and five of them showed up. The other ones didn't show up, didn't respond. Some of them sent their girlfriends or their wives. Some of my business associates sent their girlfriends or their wives and I thought to myself, "How am I going to connect with these guys?" You've got to go to where they are, I've got to speak their language. It was not yoga.

On history: I wanted them to gain the perspective that I had gained from yoga. I went through this process of trying to figure out who I was and where I came from and that involved me talking to my grandmother about my great-grandparents and my grandfather who was a lumberjack. Talking to my uncles and my dad who all worked in the forestry industry in some way. My grandfather was a pulp and paper guy, my uncle was a lumberjack, my dad was in the forest fire fighting industry, my other uncle was in the timber broker business. Manly stuff, football coaches, hockey coaches, boxers, war vets. It’s just where I came from, and it wasn't at all repressive. It was who they were; it was what they did.

On breaking through: I learned all this about myself and really understood that I liked yoga and it didn't fit within that traditional construct of masculinity. If I wanted to connect these guys with this introspection, I had to connect yoga and actions. How can I do that? Well, axe throwing, and yoga, and adventure. So we put it all together, and reiterated it over and over and over again and always included some aspect of mindfulness introspection with some type of masculine activity. Whether it's just a hike in the woods, or axe throwing and yelling at the top of your lungs on top of a mountain. For us to speak to those men, we have to go to where they are. We have to speak their language. That's why the façade is hyper-masculine because you don't want to create more barriers if you're trying to break the barriers down.

On ventilating: I had this revelation where I was in West Vancouver at Cypress Falls and it was right at the beginning of spring and the falls were just roaring and it was deafening. I had this feeling to yell. I felt this little voice inside of me wanting to get out and I was in the process of taking these risks and telling people these stories and I just yelled at the top of my lungs. Now my wife and I whenever we go up to nature, we always practice that. Just screaming, get it off your chest.

On Wellmen: I put myself out there, I put my ideas out there. My idea was Wellmen, to connect these dudes with one another and themselves by taking them out into the woods and connecting them with who they are as men. You know, through my concussion, through gaining perspective and having that purpose and passion taken away, that trauma was a gift to then empower me to create and catalyze myself into putting Wellmen out into the world.

On success: For me, when I have conversations with someone two months after our adventure, and he comes up to me and says he just wants to help and wants to volunteer. Then we volunteer together and on our drive home he tells me all about his story and what he's gone through and how he's battled what he's battled. If that's what it takes for someone to get there, then that's why I'm doing it because it inspires me. That's where I get the empowerment to do more of this, to continue going on.

On politics: I think the state of masculinity was taking such strides in the right direction. Now we've taken fifty steps backwards with someone who's leading the world, which then enables people from everywhere to think that's it's okay to be that way, and that they'll get ahead in life and they'll be the most powerful person in the world, which is debatable, and still be that way. For me to be doing the work that I'm doing and for everyone else in this space who's trying to have these conversations and enable people to have more love in their lives, to bring in hate and repression and to do it with not even giving two craps about the repercussions, it's scary.

On work in progress: I have Wellmen going, I've got an axe throwing company, I’ve got a couple things going on but, I'm still battling this ingrained thought process. I need game day. I need to perform. I need to show up and execute. This is how I show up. How I show up as a middle linebacker who's been a leader of alpha males for the past 15 years; as a father, it's very different. Sometimes, more often than not probably, I show up as that linebacker. I'm having these conversations with men but I'm not trying to stand up and say that I'm perfect. That I don't go the opposite direction or I don't snap every once in awhile. I know that that's who I am and that's what I'm trying to fight against. I'm trying to really understand as much as I can about myself by doing this work, so that when those situations come up I can acknowledge the fact that because I raised my voice, my son now yells at me.

On healing wounds: I was abused as a child and I didn't at all feel like I could tell my parents about it or my family. Not because they were repressive, not because they were like, "Shea don't be a pussy, don't do this, don't do that." It was because the construct [of masculinity] didn't empower me to acknowledge that experience as masculine. For me to have that experience and to live in the world that we lived in and we still live in, I didn't feel like I could openly communicate that to my parents or to anyone without being seen as not manly. I literally had zipped up that and thrown away the key and thought about ways how I could ensure that no one would ever find out. Now I'm doing it at a TedX talk. It took me flexing that vulnerability muscle over and over and over and over again.

Tesicca Truong is cofounder of CityHive, a social enterprise that seeks to create opportunities for youth to influence the future of their city. It’s an important effort to create balance between the traditional rulemakers and those who will eventually be affected by the decisions made today. With a long résumé that extends back to her childhood including entrepreneurship and environmentalism, Tesicca is well-prepared to meet the challenges that future holds. We talked to Tesicca about the city, water, and road trips.

On CityHive: We're a millennial-driven nonprofit social enterprise, based in Vancouver, and we're on a mission to transform the way that young people are engaged in the shaping and co-creation of their city.

On mission: On the one hand, we have cities and big institutions that have these big, hairy goals. Vancouver, for example, wants to be the greenest city in the world, or the most renewable city, or 100% renewable by 2040, but they won't be able to do it without people being on board, without citizen engagement. On the flip side, we have young people who have a lot of passion and energy and time, and are highly educated, often, but don't necessarily have the connections or experience. So, we see ourselves as a bridge builder where we create opportunities for people, especially young people, to be able to help solve these big, hairy goals that cities and institutions have, while also gaining experience, making connections, and the piece that's really important for young people, is having an impact, really knowing that the work that they're doing is contributing to something that's needed in the city.

On 30Network: Our first public program is called 30Network and it just launched recently. It's for thirty young people under thirty, looking at the issue of housing affordability. They’re not just people with an expert background in planning or housing or urban issues, we're looking to bring people from diverse areas of expertise, from design, from the arts, from sports, from travel, business, to look at the issues from different angles, and to come up with creative solutions, because we know that there are young people already that are facing these challenges of affordability in housing and are staying in the city. The goal is to go through a four step process and come out of it with solutions, projects, and ideas that they can really get off the ground and launched.

On the future of business: We do fee for service work for organizations that are looking to become more millennial-oriented, looking at how they can adapt their organizations for young people who are coming into the workforce, but also just to keep up with the times. Things are changing. It's not just young people who are changing; there are employees who are expecting different things out of employers as well, in terms of flexibility, in terms of the way that work is being done. We're really looking to help these organizations adapt and become leaders in their fields.

On the method: We do an internal review and an external review. On the internal side, we look at their organizational structure, for example, looking at whether their boards are representative and have young people as part of them. We also look at the organizational structure, the hiring practices, what benefits are involved and how that might be relevant or may no longer be relevant, and what might be needed to be added or modified in order to be more attractive and appealing. Then, on the external side, looking at the organization's branding, messaging, voicing, how they communicate, through what channels, and how to set up new ones. Also, what to continue doing, but also what to add to their existing portfolio of work.

On a history of activism: I guess it all started when I was in high school, actually, when I first ran a conference called Planet Earth. It was suppose to be in conjunction with the UN Habitat conference that was happening at UBC, and they were looking for a group to run the youth component of it, so we organized and planned it. At the very last minute, they underwent some restructuring at UBC, so it got cut, and we went ahead with our programming without funding, venues, sponsors, basically everything we were counting on, but we somehow made it happen. It eventually evolved to become the Vancouver School Board Sustainability Conference, which is now still going on.

On water: Later I started working on a project called "Youth for Tap," which was a pro tap water, anti-bottled water campaign, where we worked to install new water refill stations so young people had access to clean tap water in schools, but also looking at removing bottled water and providing a free alternative that people had an option to use. Water should be a right. Through that campaign it spread from my school, to my whole school district, to other cities as well. Within my school district, we were able to lobby the school board trustees to purchase one water refill station for every single school in the district. That was a big win for us.

On The Starfish Canada: I was nominated for the Top 25 Environmentalists Under 25 when I was quite young, which is really nice, but now I'm actually one of the judges for Starfish. I feel like I've really benefited from being part of the program and being nominated on a very prestigious list, but also, it's quite an honour now to be able to read about all these amazing, upcoming young people who are doing really, really great work in their communities.

On her parents: They're actually both immigrants to Canada. I think that did colour my view in many ways. Like, just feeling very grateful to be here, in Canada, first of all, for all the opportunities, like access to education. My dad always told me when he first arrived to Canada, he had to convince my grandmother that here in Canada, girls need to go to school. In Canada, you can't just expect a woman to get married and be taken care of, she needs to be educated.

On childhood: We just spent a lot of time traveling. When my parents got married, instead of going for a quick honeymoon, they saved up and then backpacked around the world for a year. When I was young we did a road trip for two months across Canada. We really fell in love with Canada and nature and the environment. I feel like that's where that connection started.

On learning: For me, a really pivotal moment, my formative years, was a program that I did called Trek. It was an outdoor education program. We spent half the year doing formal school stuff but then the rest of the year we went hiking, backpacking, kayaking. It was a rad program. That's also when they introduced the concept of sustainability. It was the first time that I started learning about things that were happening in the world through school. It really opened my eyes. I felt this urgency to do something.

On youth: I think we do a disservice to children and youth when we don't believe that they are competent and able people who are ready to contribute to our society until they turn nineteen. I think we're really, really underselling them and also depriving them of their ability to contribute, meaningfully, to the community.

Food can heal in more ways than you might think. Amber Anderson has been using food as way to help people in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside for years at H.A.V.E. Culinary Training Society. The full commercial kitchen, restaurant, coffee shop and catering company takes in people with barriers to employment, rebuilds their self-confidence, gives them in-demand cooking skills, and finds them jobs. It’s a selfless pursuit for Amber, who could easily be doing fine dining in an upscale neighbourhood. But helping people pull themselves out of poverty and addiction is more important to Amber than fois gras and duck confit. We talked to Amber about growing up cooking, relative success, and shoestring fries.

On H.A.V.E.: We train people with barriers, we give them skills and then help them find employment. A lot of them have fallen through the cracks, really feel like they have no opportunities. There really are a lot of opportunities out there but it's very hard to see where those are or how to even qualify for them. We help with everything. We don't just give them skills. We help them with life skills. We've got a counsellor here. If they have bad teeth, we get them to a dentist. If they're living on the street, we find them somewhere to live. We give them breakfast and lunch every day. You can't learn on an empty stomach.

On motivation: When we first started here, we noticed how many people there were to help do up their résumés. But if you don't have the skills to put on that résumé, what good is it? We were trying to sink some money into the Downtown Eastside, giving them training. We were really one of the very first to actually give them the skills to put on their résumé.

On history: As long as I can remember I've been cooking. I was kicked out of my house at 15 but worked evenings and then put myself through school. I got my Red Seal, and then I went in to get my Certified Chef de Cuisine. I've been doing it forever. It's my 56th birthday today, and I've been cooking since I was 15.

When I was going through school, I didn't do well. I'm dyslexic and they taught you the traditional way, and if you didn't learn the traditional way, you just got left behind and no one really understood what to do to help you comprehend what you're learning. I had to find different ways to get from A to B. Most people here do not go in a straight line either. It might take a little longer, you might do it a little differently, but you get to where you need to go. I think that's my biggest strength; I really understand that you shouldn't teach everyone one way. You should teach how they need to learn.

On beginning: A lot of them have never cooked before. A lot of them have and maybe fallen into addictions and stuff like that, and they're trying to get back. It doesn't matter if you've got lots of experience or if you've got none, we start from day one with knife skills. We get everyone in their uniforms, we sit down, we have breakfast and then we start our day.

On family: We do the breakfast and lunch where we all sit together for a couple of reasons. A lot of our clients have learning disabilities in different variations, along with mental health issues or addictions or lots of other barriers. Most people don't come in with just one. Poverty is always one of them. When we sit down and we have breakfast, it creates the family feel, so it makes them feel that they're safe here. Out there they don't really feel very safe, and there's not a lot of safe places for them.

On long-term success: Even after they graduate, they come back. They can have breakfast and lunch any time. They know when we eat. While we're talking and having breakfast and enjoying the morning, little red flags come up. It keeps you on top of issues that are just under the surface that we should be addressing so that they don't end up leaving or dropping out. We're sitting at about a 75% success rate, and down here that's huge.

On perseverance: We don't have that three strikes you're out mentality. A lot of people have been on drugs for quite a while. One or two times trying to get off of it is just not realistic. I've had a guy that's gone through the program six times. He just kept falling off and falling off. We would never give up on him, and now he's been clean and sober for three years, and he's worked his way up the ladder. He's got his own apartment. Every time he's in town, he comes in and buys a lunch to support us and tells us thank you, "I just want you to see how good I'm doing and that I'm giving back."

On self-esteem: When they first come through the door, they're broken. They don't have confidence in themselves, they don't trust anyone. Sometimes it takes a couple of weeks just to get them to have enough confidence in themselves so that they can learn or trust. The difference when they walk out with that certificate and their job, it's heads held high, and it's incredible. It's overwhelming to see.

On cooking tips: We get a whole bunch of root vegetables, and then we'll roast up the root vegetables, and we'll get them really, really nice so they got the sweetness coming out, and you cool them down, and that's your snacks at night. Pull them out of the fridge and it's like candy for crying out loud, and it's vegetables.

On fundamentals: They get the white coat on from day one, and they're learning from day one. We do these little shoestring french fries. They're just to die for. They're little and tiny. Well, that's their knife skills. That's the first day. We do everything by hand. By the time you're finished doing a 50-pound box of potatoes, you're really good with that knife.

On the business: We have a huge catering company, and then we have the line for the restaurant. Between 12:00 and 1:00, we've got lineups out the door. At noon, you know you're going to be slammed, and you're going to have twenty bills up, and that's when we really teach them about line cooking and organizing and cooking more things at once all at the same time.

On finding jobs: We've got eight weeks where we watch and see where their strengths are, and then we place them somewhere they can utilize those strengths. It was a learning curve for me because I wasn't thinking, "Well, that's a pub and this guy's got alcohol issues." Now I've smartened up. This is the person. This is what they're looking for, and unless your job fits this person, then I either have someone for you or I don't. We find jobs that they're going to be successful in and move up the ladder, and we want them to succeed. We're not going to just place them to get them working somewhere. That'll never work.

On the future: We're building up the catering business. We do get some government money sometimes. We do not rely on it. If we do get it, great. It's icing on the cake. It's more people that we can train.

For a lot of people on the West Coast, the winter of 2016/2017 has been pretty miserable. For people like Brett Trainor, the piles of snow have just been encouragement to get outside and go fast. Brett is the cofounder of Mountain Mentors, a backcountry sports mentorship program for women. We’ve featured plenty of people who use sports to give back, but this one is the first to feature some of the very unique, very extreme sports that we enjoy locally, as well as being just for women. Mountain Mentors is the the product of overwhelming demand and they provide a valuable service and vibrant community for women who are striving to excel in their sports. We talked to Brett about snowboarding, growing up in the mountains, and role models.

On Mountain Mentors: We're an all female alpine mentorship program. Alpine mentorship is the same as a career-based mentorship program or any other type of professional development where there's a set contract and goals and expectations but instead of having those goals in your career life or your personal life it's alpine-based goals, so it's sports like backcountry skiing, climbing, and mountain biking.

On goals: It's been proven that having a female role model is really beneficial in terms of keeping girls in sports and excelling. There are a lot of programs for women in sports; a lot is being done but we felt like a lot of them didn't resonate with us so we wanted to do something a bit different that was more about being an athlete and more about mentorship and maybe less about being female first.

On demand: We spent all last summer trying to solicit our friends and personal connections to just get 10 mentors. That was our goal. Then we launched and we had over 150 applications. It was amazing. We ended up closing applications for mentees early and only keeping mentor applications open for the final two months. It's my passion project but I'm really happy to keep it small. It's been a really awesome learning experience and I'm sure it will grow but we don't want to rush it. We want to do it right, so, small and purposeful.

On matchmaking: We pair people up and then we have two mingler events, one in Whistler, one in Vancouver, so mentors and mentees get to meet each other. Not only are they meeting their mentor or their mentee but they're meeting all the other women too, which reinforces building a community. At that session there's some formal goal planning and they also sign a mentorship agreement saying that they’re going to meet x number of times for a month or every week, whatever they've decided. They sign it and it's kind of like their contract, not only to each other but to the organization as well. Then they sign a waiver. After that it's really in their own hands to get what they want out of the season. We've already got so many amazing photos and updates from people who are going out and doing stuff.

On learning: If your only goal is just to become a better snowboarder you probably wouldn't be the best fit for the organization. The idea is that you already have an AST-1 course. You already have your backcountry gear and you're looking to get to a higher level. You would likely be paired with someone who's been snowboarding their whole lives. We have professionals and snowboard instructors as mentors so these ladies are super skilled. It’s likely that you would meet up once a month and you might go spend a day just skiing terrain together while focusing on some technique or you might go and do some avalanche awareness and practice digging a pit and making some decisions based on that. Or you might just go because you wanted to have a friend to go with who also does the same sport as you, which is still shockingly hard to find.

On women in sports: There is a disparity between the number of women participating in these sports compared to men. I don't think that women like to ski any differently than men like to ski. It's really fun. That's why we do these things. It makes us feel good. We like to be outside. But I think that women learn differently or have different barriers and to see a woman in a position of power excelling in backcountry skiing or snowboarding or mountain biking is super inspiring and to be able to have that one-on-one relationship is really meaningful. I think it's about building community and I think that the emotional connections to people who do the same things as you are often more important for women.

On finances: Right now we're funded out of our pockets. We didn't think that our overhead would be that much. I mean it's really not. We offered the program free of charge this year. A lot of these amazing female programs are quite expensive. Like an all-female guided weekend is not really affordable to anyone. We felt like there are those, which are great, and then there are entry level programs which are also great but what about the middle? That's what we're trying to do. Be affordable and have a broad scope to a lot of people.

On growing up: My parents met downhill skiing and then when they had me they were like, "Shit. What do we do with this little tyke?" So they towed me around behind them and they just learned to cross-country ski and then I started doing cross-country ski lessons and downhill lessons when I was young. Then I got involved with the race team and it just kind of happened that I started racing. I don't really cross-country ski anymore. I ski tour and I've mountain biked my whole life too. My boyfriend's from Whistler so since we've been together I bike a lot more now too. I love it.

On motivation: I've always been pretty philanthropically minded. The first fundraising I did, oh my God I actually remember this so vividly, was a raffle ticket draw in elementary school and you got the pre-sold raffle tickets for this fundraiser. The prize was a giant monkey stuffy and I was like, "Holy shit, I need that monkey stuffy." I could stand in it and wrap it around me. It was that or money and I was like, "I want the monkey." So I sold so many tickets, blew everyone else out of the water. I've always done a lot of volunteering. My undergrad is in sustainable development so I did a lot of work in East Africa working for nonprofits and volunteering over there.

On the future: Sure it would be nice to get funding or more participants but I think that I'd be more interested in talking with people who have experiences starting something similar and have ideas for scaling up or are interested in maybe joining our board and helping us grow our program. I think that right now I'd rather connect with and onboard people who are stoked on our mission and want to get involved.

Traditionally, the stereotypical environmentalist falls into one of two archetypes: the scientist collecting samples on the side of a mountain, and the hippie protester chained to a tree. Kyle Empringham knows that young environmentalists in the 21st century are a lot harder to categorize. Seven years ago he cofounded The Starfish Canada, a nationwide effort to recognize, connect, and unite young environmentalists of all kinds across the country. Since then, the organization has worked with people in a broad range of disciplines and interests, from sustainability fundraisers to solar technology designers. In an era of political change and significant challenges to environmental health, it’s important that young people have a voice and Kyle is doing his best to give them a megaphone. We talked to Kyle about activism, growing up, and the environmental conversation.

On foundation: The Starfish Canada was founded in 2010 as a university class project. A friend and I were working on biodiversity and conservation and environmental things. We knew we wanted a way to explain some of our concepts across different disciplines and different fields. We decided to create a website and see how we could bring different university disciplines together. Now it's seven years later and we're doing a lot more than that.

On communication: We've expanded to really focus on how we can help youth who are doing really great environmental work talk to other people about that work. We put the focus on youth who have great ideas and sometimes just need a little assistance in order to find the best path forward to communicate it or to get people on board.

For example, fossil fuel divestment is one of the biggest topics and people are really trying to advocate and push for their universities to divest in from fossil fuels. A lot of them get good traction but have a hard time trying to figure out how to communicate to their peers. So a lot of our work has been about trying to help them mobilize the people around them. Fossil fuel divestment may make sense to an environmentalist but it's not going to make sense to maybe an economist. So how do we bring everyone into the conversation and have good conversations about what you're trying to get to?

On the Top 25: Our biggest flagship program is Top 25 Environmentalists Under 25. Every year we celebrate 25 people really making positive change across the country who are doing great environmental work in whatever capacity that might be. Sometimes it’s a climate change activist,  sometimes it's people doing conservation work in their local communities, sometimes it's people even asking for larger political change across the federal or provincial system. It's really fun and interesting to bring all these people together. It's allowed us to figure out who some of the top environmentalists in Canada really are. And who really has momentum and traction behind them. And then through that to be able to connect them and other people together so that it's not just local communities doing little pockets of work here and there but these great youth who are doing great work are able to connect with each other and hear from each other and learn from each other, so that they can take that lesson and apply it to their own community.

On activism: We're registered as a federal non-profit. But we haven't registered as a charity for the reason that we want to be able to support these youth who are doing things that are a little more partisan.

On funding: Our funding is mostly grass roots. And we try to be really intentional about the way we get our funding. It's always a difficult balance between the philosophy of where you get your money from and simply needing money to get work done. I think it's easy to fall into the trap of a big funder that can give hundreds of thousands of dollars to do something that doesn't necessarily meet up with the community values of the project.

On success: Environmentalism is often a doom and gloom situation that we face and a lot of people are feeling inspired to do something but also feeling the weight of the world on their shoulders. Being able to say “you're doing a really good job, keep it up,” I think it kind of lifts the work that these young environmentalists are doing to a whole different place and let's them know that there's people behind them wanting them to succeed.

On politics: What I’ve seen from the environmental movement and especially young folks it's certainly a sense of being disenfranchised because it's one man, sitting at a desk, wiping away a lot of the work that's been done over the past eight years. Canada's response to that has been certainly a lot of optimism. Trudeau thanking Trump for the work that he's been doing and welcoming him with open arms. I understand the political nature of Trudeau doing that and thanking Trump and saying we have common values but I think that if you listen to young folks especially, they'll tell you that we don't have common values with the Americans in the same way that I think Trudeau is trying to convey. The environmentalists who I know aren't folks who are going to sit idly by and let Trudeau get away with some of the things he's been saying or potentially acting upon. Especially with how it's looking down south.

On working nationally: A lot of our projects span from coast to coast to coast and because of that sometimes it's hard to understand the expansiveness of the whole project. We have people in Vancouver and Halifax working together in a way they hadn't imagined before. That part has been really interesting to see and we know that we are doing work that not a lot of other groups are doing and we're doing it in a really intentional way so I think that provides certain opportunities for different kinds of conversations to be happening and we're excited about that.

On growing up: I was a very suburban kid. I was outside on the street playing street hockey but yeah not very environmental growing up. When I look back there were certainly things that my mom did but they weren't for environmental reasons. The concept of reducing, reusing, recycling was something embedded within my family. It was definitely something that as I grew up I understood that it was actually an environmental ethic that was almost unintentional that was instilled in me. Both my mom and my dad had four other brothers and sisters. My dad grew up on a farm as well. There's a bit of ethic there that gets instilled without calling it environmentalism. Even when I talk to my parents about this sort of stuff, you can see the wheels are turning in their heads like "I didn't really look at it that way but this is kind of what I've been thinking my whole life".

On conversation: My parents have voted conservative for a long period of time. In the 2015 election there were moments when we would talk about it. I grew up in a family that said you don't talk about who you vote for. But I got more politically involved so I forced the conversation. We were talking about what I'm valuing in my vote and who I wanted to see leading this country. I ended up saying that their vote is really about me. I didn't mean it in a selfish way, but if I'm your kid, don't you want to see someone who is going to help me throughout my life as well? And that was something that resonated with them. Deeper discussions and meeting people where they're at and talking to them on a values level is really the part that drives people to understand where those cognitive dissonances are and how they can maybe work to do something a little bit different.

A few days ago we came across a post from Taylor Roades in a Facebook group. It’s a compelling look at the fear, anxiety, and hope felt by people around the world in a new era of political uncertainty. As a wedding photographer, Taylor is an observer with a special perspective on love, diversity, and what it means for cultures to connect. As a small business owner, she’s a sterling example of someone who stands up for her convictions, even in the face of potential backlash. We talked to Taylor about showcasing love, feeling helpless, and taking action in a country that embraces diversity.

On education: I didn't go to school for photography. I went to school for business and that really wasn't for me. I was getting into photography at the time and I thought, "I'm just going to take a year off and see", and I went traveling. I spent 6 months in Southeast Asia on that trip. I got more into photography, and when I got back from that trip, I was just going to try and see if I could make the photography thing work. If not, I was going to go back to school. I just never went back to school.

On helping hands: I caught a few different breaks. When I was still in school, I got a small grant from the Ontario Small Business Association. That gave me enough, with my own savings, to buy a decent camera, which I never would have been able to afford as a student otherwise. Then they also paired me with a mentor, someone who had been running a business in the area for years, so I got paired with a real estate agent. She was just so awesome and had such good advice and is still a resource that I go back to if I ever have questions.

On subject matter: I shot weddings in the Toronto area for three years, and I still shoot a few every year back there. Then I moved to Victoria and then Vancouver. I just wanted to shoot landscapes and scenery, and be in the mountains every weekend and be outdoors.

On diversity: Living in Toronto is so multicultural. I grew up where, as a white person, I was a minority in my public school, and we had anti-racism talks as children. My best friend lived down the street in the same sort of suburban, cookie-cutter house as I did, but there were 15 people from Pakistan in the same house that my nuclear family of five lived in. Being exposed to that at a really young age and having friends from all over the world in Toronto, you go out for Vietnamese on one night, and then you go to your friend's house and they serve you Indian, even though they were born in the Congo. They immigrated to South Africa, and then were refugees to Canada. To go and have dinner at their house, you're talking about politics but also anything else that you would talk about as a Canadian. It just goes to show that you can be friends with anyone.

On experience: Because of my travel background and part of my travel portfolio was people from all over, I feel that's why I get so many multicultural weddings and a lot of mixed weddings. I've shot a Jewish-Thai wedding. It had these Thai dancers dressed in formal dress doing the Hora. But it's celebrated. This year I did a Korean-Canadian wedding and the mother of the groom, who was Canadian, was wearing a hanbok. That mix happens all the time, it’s so cool. I get to see a part of where you're from, and it's such a good thing.

On wedding photos: I know all those people personally. I was there on a big day for them, which is sort of anthropological in that you see all their family and all their friends, and all the people that make up who they are. Then I have a personal connection with them, so it was hard for me to pull those photos out of context and talk about diversity as a whole. I didn't shoot those trying to shoot diversity. I shot those to save memories for people to show their kids one day what they looked like when they were 28. I think that in showing weddings, even if you don't agree with me, I’m showing people this is actually what it is like. This is contemporary, this is now.

On understanding: Within my weddings, I am participating pretty actively with other cultures. I've seen so many other traditions and especially when it's a new tradition, I definitely ask questions. I feel very comfortable, and people hire me for the way I see moments, so the more open they are, the more I can see them.

On differing opinions: My family is kind of conservative, and I get so angry when they're like, "Oh but you can't have Christmas trees in school any more.” They're not taking away your Christmas trees, they're giving you the opportunity to learn more.

On politics: I'm in this state of dread, I'm scared about what might possibly happen in Canada. What trickles over the border. I surround myself here, in Vancouver, with other like-minded people. Then I quickly go back to Toronto to visit my family, and I'm smacked in the face with people who don't actually think like me. I come from them, I still love them, but you kind of forget.

On taking action: I've been calling my MP's, I've been trying to be as active as I ever have been. It kind of feels like screaming into an empty room. When Trudeau said we were going to take in 25,000 refugees last year, my roommate and I had a small space in Mount Pleasant, but we talked about if we could have someone come live with us for up to six months. We went to the meetings in Vancouver, which was super heartening. They were turning people away at the door; there were 5,000 people that came out who had accommodation that they wanted to give, or volunteer their time in some way. We called them to follow up a bunch of times, and I'm sure they were overloaded with people, but we pretty much never heard back. That's hard. We want to do something, we're here, we're standing ready to help and then just...you're still useless.

On her Facebook post: Do I feel better or worse after writing it? I don't know. I feel better, I guess. Because at least my views are known. And where I stand. I put it publicly on my wedding website as well, for my business. Anyone who potentially wants to hire me will see that. For me there's right and wrong. I think businesses in our capitalist society actually have a lot of power.

On Donald Trump: I just don't understand how he can know nothing about world politics. I don't think I'm that special. My family is normal, I grew up in the suburbs and I know so much more about world politics. He's the President of the United States. He should know more than I do about world politics.

On goals: I think within my work, my business, [the goal is] to continue to showcase diversity in a positive light. That's something that I can do, and to personally be as politically active as possible. To continue to talk to my friends from all different places with a lot of different perspectives.

Denise Brennan is doing her best to shape the future of going to work in Canada. Creative Coworkers, her successful coworking space is an experiment in new ways to work. Operating as both a for-profit and not-for-profit, Denise welcomes all types of businesses, social enterprises, charity events and community projects into her space, providing sponsorship where she can and offering unusual features like 24 hour access, hammocks, coffee roasted down the street, and a location in one of Vancouver’s most interesting and complicated neighbourhoods, Railtown. She’s building a community that defies traditional 9-to-5 thinking and it’s catching on.

We talked to Denise about values, sharing, and breaking down traditions.

On the business model: We're a coworking space, primarily for creative production. The business is structured as a for-profit and a not-for-profit. They work in conjunction with each other.

On the nonprofit side: The nonprofit side has a super-affordable annual membership. It's $30 a year. It gives people two hours free in the boardroom every month. A free beer/coffee on any visit. Reduced rate for workshops and invitations to events. It would have been my preference to have the whole thing be a nonprofit. But you need to spend a year becoming a nonprofit before you can apply for grant funding. I spend far more time on the nonprofit part. We sponsor things like volunteer parties for environmental or cycling organizations. We did an event for Team Helping, which fundraises for children with Type 1 diabetes. We did Say Hi to a Stranger, which works against social alienation. I do a lot of either free or substantially reduced-rates bookings for values-aligned organizations.

On the for-profit side: We have higher rates for the engineers who just come in for a meeting in the boardroom. They can pay full price. I pass that on to sponsor other events.

On values: I come from an alternative politics background. I'm very interested in civic engagement. I'm very big on community-oriented stuff. This space is in a very tricky, challenging, wonderful, diverse, odd-ball neighbourhood that requires a lot of cultural and social sensitivity. That's the kind of thing I'm interested in. Being aware of an environment and helping the people in it. Like Bicycle Valet, for example. They have a volunteer appreciation party every six months. Loving your volunteers is very values-aligned. I also did a bunch of stuff with various environmental organizations, so anything that's anti-pipeline, pro-greening, solar energy, all of that kind of stuff. Alternative energy and environmentalism. I have a lot of respect for nonprofits and how challenging it is in many ways and how tiny the margins are and how you really have to have a vision.

On division of labour: I have a business partner. He is money. I am work. It's a very good division because I have no money and he has no interest in working here. I'm the sweat.

On destiny: For some strange reason, my parents tell me, since I was a toddler, I was obsessed with sharing - equitable sharing. Everybody had to have the same amount of pie. I would take the slightly smaller piece and everybody had to have a piece of pie.

On the housing market: It took me nine months to find this space. In the interim, I became somewhat of a...not quite expert, but I became very knowledgeable about Vancouver real estate. It’s very complicated. There's a lot of politics. Certain real estate companies control certain patches of real estate. It was a very eye-opening experience. You have to be a particular kind of weirdo to get excited about negotiating a commercial lease.

On buying local: I only spent two weeks building this space out. I'm very cash-conscious. We did the build for this place for less than $25,000, which was kind of unbelievable. I had all of the furniture made in the Lower Mainland. I co-designed all these desks from North Vancouver. The ones in the kitchen are from New Westminster. I really focus on local. Our coffee is roasted a couple blocks away at Goliath at MakerLabs. Our beer is from Postmark around the corner and Hoyne from Victoria.

On the future of work: I'm part of a BC coworking collective that is slowly formalizing right now. It's a really intriguing industry to be in. The trend in work is helping us out. I think more and more people are becoming aware that you don't have to have a 9-to-5 job, and maybe there isn't even one of those for you. There's still people who work traditional hours here. They're more of the oddballs. I actually have more people who come in at 7:00 because they work on an adjusted schedule for Asian time, or they just like being early birds. Our modern understanding of what work has to be is actually a pretty brief history. But paradigms change pretty quickly and I definitely think that the 9-to-5 is going the way of the dodo.

On workspace: Your co-working space kind of looks like you, like people's dogs resemble them. There's a flavour for every personality. It is definitely a manifestation of my own weird personality out there. I also very much encourage people to make it their own.

If you are a nonprofit or business in need of office space, get in touch with Denise at Creative Coworkers. Here’s a partial list of organizations supported by Creative Coworkers:

Women in Production

Vancouver Futurists

Federal Politics Chat Nights

Ideas Vancouver

Wordpress.com in a weekend

Meditation & Chocolate for Creatives

Say Hi to a Stranger

Randi Winter‘s Team Helping

The Art Party

LAB ART SHOW

The Bicycle Valet Better Environmentally Sound Transportation (BEST)

British Columbia Cycling Coalition (BCCC)

TEDxEastVan

Cineworks Annex

Chapel Sound Festival 2016

Would you believe that a fifth of the human population has a disability? It’s true. Chances are someone you know is affected by some kind of disability, whether visible or invisible.

Naitik Mehta doesn’t have a disability but he’s working on a system to unite those who do with technology leaders who can help to overcome disability through mentorship. Naitik and his cofounders started NextBillion.org in 2016 with the goal of creating a large-scale mentorship network. They started by putting out a request for applications and were overwhelmed by responses from around the world. Mentors and mentees were paired up and NextBillion.org are working to ensure those partnerships are successfully maintained and mutually beneficial. We talked to Naitik about mentorship, startups, and helping people reach their highest potential.

On disability: One in five people in the world have a disability. At 1.27 billion people, that makes it the world's largest minority. That's where the name “NextBillion” comes from. We are building a community to help people with visible and invisible disabilities, to destigmatize the notion of disability, and also help businesses diversify. Visible disabilities include physical impairments, mobility impairments, especially ones that are visible like when you meet someone and you know they're wearing either a hearing aid or they have an assistive device with them. That's a physical disability, a visible disability. Invisible disability is one such bipolar disorder or anxiety, depression, a lot of the mental illnesses fall under that category. Dyslexia, autism spectrum, all of those disabilities are invisible disabilities.

On mentorship: We wanted to test if personal mentorship was helpful for someone with a disability if they're paired with an industrial leader. We launched online and we have 30 mentorships going on, all over the world. We got mentors and mentee applications from 30 countries, but since it was the first program for us, we picked only 30 mentorship pairs to test the idea of a mentorship program.

On mentors: Mentors are anyone who has valuable, professional experience in an industry. The first cohort is focused on technology. The mentors are anyone in any field related to technology, want to give back to the community and they may or may not have a disability; it could be that someone has second hand experience with a disability, or know someone in their friend circle, family or  professional circle who has a disability. We also ask mentors if they have specific preferences on who they would like to mentor or if there are specific topics they want to mentor around and that's how we match them to a mentee.

Our mentors include people who have worked at organizations such as United Nations, Google, Facebook, Apple, Stanford, Microsoft, Uber, Paypal, Nascar, Visa, and many others. That's one of the factors that we use to vet or select mentors, to make sure they have an array of experiences and knowledge that they can give back.

On maintenance: One of the main things we learned in our early research, was that most mentorships fall off after the first two weeks because there's either not enough commitment from both sides or there's difficulty in keeping track of what's happening and how to lead the mentorship. Ours is kind of a three-way mentorship where we have the mentor and mentee and we have someone from a team who is in charge of facilitating their mentorship. Every week we provide resources, like goal setting, for example, or topics you could talk about, guiding them from week to week. That's how the mentorship is structured.

On matching: A good example of one of the mentorship pairs is a mentee who is interested in building a technology-based language translation toolkit based on their previous experiences, and we matched them with a mentor who is working with machine learning technology at Microsoft.  That's kind of where the magic starts, when you match two people who have similar stories or experiences.

On overhead: We haven't spent a dollar since we launched. It's all been through word of mouth. We got a lot of applications from Africa, for example. We had 80 or 90 people within the African continent share it with each other, so that kind of drove some traffic and that's how we started. One in two people either has a disability or knows someone with a disability, so that helps. All of this is bootstrapped. We have a team of seven people and all of us are doing it out of our own time but we're registered as a social enterprise. Our aim is to figure out a way for us to have a sustainable business model but also continue to impact people.

On working with businesses: One of the problems we are tackling is helping businesses connect to the community of people with disabilities and since this is just the start, we just have 30 mentorships, it's not too strong of a connection yet, but our vision is to better provide opportunities to people with disabilities. People with disabilities have a 50% higher chance of unemployment. The business aspect is kind of a moving piece that we are trying to find the best avenue to incorporate within our model.

On motivation: I personally don't have a disability. Two of my co-founders have a disability. One of them is visually impaired and the other co-founder has a disability called avascular necrosis. My co-founder Kartik is from India. He told me his story as someone with visual impairment: after college he applied to the top technology university in India and they rejected him, they wouldn't let him give an entrance exam just because he is blind. His mentors encouraged him to apply abroad and he's finishing up his computer science degree at Stanford right now.

Also, one of the things that I think motivates me to do stuff that helps people is my contrasting experience, having lived in Pune, India and then having come to Vancouver. There's so many things that Vancouver does really well. Like the education system, for example, in India is pretty rigid, it's kind of like a cookie cutter model, but for me to take design and come here and study is super off-the-path and I want to be able to help others, since this is something that I'm passionate about and I've had the chance to follow it as formal education. I'm really passionate about giving the same opportunity that I've had to other people around me.

On interests: As a design student I feel like it's all about problem solving from a user's perspective and empathizing with what barriers people face and how we can solve that through technology. I'm really passionate about combining technology with social impact.

On his desire to give back: I think it comes from family because my grandma has a really big heart. Every year we would clean out clothes from the closet and take out ones that I really didn't need. They could be my favorite clothes but my grandma was like, "You're not really wearing that anymore, maybe we should give it away to someone who needs it." I'd be like, "But, but, but," but then we would go and donate these clothes, especially in India, right outside our home there's homeless people on the street and we would go and give it to them directly and that was something that really touched me.

If you live in Vancouver, especially in the Mount Pleasant neighbourhood, you probably noticed an incredible change last summer. What once were blank walls on buildings throughout the area suddenly became canvases for giant-scale artworks. Bombastic colour, bold shapes and diverse subject matter became part of the cultural and physical landscape, free for everyone to enjoy. It was the result of the Vancouver Mural Festival, a multi-day arts and culture event that showcased the work of over fifty street artists from Vancouver and around the world. Thanks to Cofounder and Marketing Director Gabriel Hall, it’s going to be an annual event that literally leaves a mark on the city. We talked to Gabe about the idea, what success looks like, and the challenge of making something cool.

On genesis: The root of everything was this conversation that Dave and I were having on my deck one day. He was looking for something to do after SingItfwd. He was trying to figure out what his next project was going to be and we were talking about what we wanted to see in the city. We're two guys who grew up in Vancouver and want to affect it in a positive way and do something cool. What do we want to change? What do we want to try and make better? What do we want to try and help grow? We wanted to get rid of that whole weird attitude in Vancouver that you can't do really awesome cool things. I hate saying “No Fun City”.

On the city: Vancouver doesn't have any credibility on an international scale as far as arts and culture go. We've got some bands that come from here. We do a lot of film production here but people who grow up in a small town who really want to be an artist would never think, "I'm going to move to Vancouver." We were thinking, how can we empower the people who live in this city to take charge of the culture and to feel like we can do totally awesome rad stuff here? We don't have to move to Berlin. We don't have to go to New York or Montreal or wherever.

On street art: We’ve traveled a lot, and one of the lynch pins of most creative cities is there's almost always a crazy street art scene. How come we don't have a crazy street art scene in Vancouver? Well you're not allowed. The city won't let you. You can't just do art there. Then we started digging into that idea? How do we foster a street art scene in a city that doesn't have one and has what we thought at the time were a lot of rules that said you couldn't do that.

On change: It's about trying to empower arts and culture in this city as a whole. It's a great big party. It's a lot of public art on the walls that everybody can see and have access to but in a deeper sense, hopefully, it's a growth, a cultural change in Vancouver.

On the City of Vancouver: The City was actually one of our biggest pleasant surprises. We went in there thinking, "Oh man. This is going to be the biggest fight we're going to have to fight the whole time. We're for sure going to have to fight them tooth and nail on everything and we're not going to get to do what we want to do." That was the preconceived notion that we had. But when we got in there and we started talking to people, we realized that everybody thought that somebody else wasn't going to let us do it but nobody had a reason why we couldn't do it. Everybody thought it was an awesome idea. Everybody at the City was super on board. It wasn't about a big fight, it was about opening the door and wading through some bureaucracy and asking a lot of questions about why and how. How do we figure out why everybody thinks we can't do it when everybody thinks we should do it? It was the biggest surprise I think of the entire fest. They were our major funder.

On experiencing the festival: I had about a 20 minute gap where there was nothing coming in. My phone wasn't ringing. My walkie talkie wasn't blowing up and I got to just go for a walk down the street and had a moment where I got misty-eyed. I just started crying walking down the street. Partially it was exhaustion and panic I think but it was also amazing to be walking down Main Street and see all these people here for this thing that we all worked so hard on for a couple of years to put together and make it happen. It's insane man. It was a beautiful day.

On goals: We really intentionally tried to not be just another festival because we're aware of that as a thing. We've lived here. We've been to all those festivals. I don't want to knock anybody down but we had this sense of really wanting to stand head and shoulders above everything else that's going on.

On success: I think there were a number of factors. I think the fact that we brought a bunch of really big international artists into town was important. The fact that we were audacious in our goal setting and the size of our projects and the size of the walls that we wanted to do. One of the key things that our team at Transformation Projects did was create a lot of diversity and interesting little pockets in the festival. I think that was the main thing people felt was that everywhere they went there was something unique and interesting happening.

On community: We just said to everybody who wanted to get involved, "What do you want to do? Give us your idea. Tell us what you think is a cool thing that you can do." Then we just let them execute it. It wasn't Dave's brain or my brain or anybody's two or three brains coming up with everything that was going to happen. This festival is about everyone who pitched in because everyone who we touched and everyone we came across along the way was so stoked about it and wanted to help out in whatever way they could. We had tons of volunteers. We had tons of businesses. We had tons of people going out of their way and bending over backwards to make it happen.

On the murals: Everybody just assumed they would be up for a couple of months and then we'd have to paint them over and go back to boring walls again. They're permanent. That's the point of it.

On representation: One of our mantras that we came up with early in the process was “changing the way art is seen in Vancouver.” We wanted to change the way art is perceived in Vancouver but we also wanted to physically change the way that it's seen - we wanted to bring it into public space and make it accessible to everyone and make it a part of the fabric of the living and breathing city. This is our part that we can do but the whole point of us doing this is to empower other people to do other awesome stuff.

On support: Low Tide Properties, they're not huge developers, they really give a shit about improving the neighbourhoods that they own properties in and doing cool stuff. They really gave us a ton of support. The Mount Pleasant BIA also. They had a festival that they were doing called the Autumn Shift. It was going to be on that same weekend so when we approached them to talk about doing the mural festival after a little bit of back and forth they said, "Hey, why don't we just do them together?” Burrard Arts Foundation helped us out big time as well. They organized a really cool gallery show for us in the month leading up to the fest where they actually had a hung gallery of artwork by all the artists that were in the festival.

On the future: We're planning to do at least 10 years. Our focus is on Mount Pleasant and the neighbourhoods that we already started in, expanding and pushing boundaries. We're still pretty new at this and so we're just opening every door to see what's inside.

Elaine Cheng has a degree in Food and Nutrition. She also has a Master’s Degree in Food Culture & Communications. She also has a successful food consulting business. The common thread should be obvious. Elaine’s love of food has led her through all kinds of experiences, which she has collectively leveraged to give back to her community. Whether it’s through feeding those in need, telling stories, or helping people get their ideas off the ground, Elaine uses food as the means to make positive change in the lives of those around her. Speaking with Elaine will inspire you to take action to support something you care about, and also eat a big sandwich or a bowl of noodles. We talked to Elaine about learning, eating, and community.

On education: I’m more of a practical, hands-on person than a book person. I didn't want to go the clinical dietitian route and work in hospitals. So I decided to do my culinary training at the Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts. Then, I worked as a Nutrition Consultant for restaurants for about six years on behalf of the Government Health Check Program and the Informed Dining Program. Then I thought maybe I could pursue further studies in these two avenues, nutrition and cooking. I looked into a couple Masters and there's one in Italy that’s so out of the box. They don't believe in just regurgitating information and memorizing textbooks and regurgitating it and then forgetting it. They believe in experiential learning. We went on trips every month to a different part of Europe and lived there for a week and learn about the food culture. We dined in vineyards. We made relationships with farmers and really heard their stories about how they started and got to know their families. We also visited breweries, distilleries, cheese makers, fishmongers, and the whole spectrum of the food culture in that city.

On experience: Our reports were not written. They use the five senses. For example, our class was broken up into three groups. One went to Amsterdam, one went to Switzerland, and one went to France. Each of us had to present our findings. The Switzerland group staggered us around the classroom and blindfolded us. Then, they would pour wine in our glasses and ask, "What kind of memories does this evoke? What kind of stories come across your mind when you drink this wine? Do you think it's a red or a white wine?" Then, they would play music. They would play sounds of wood crackling noises and they tell us, "This is what we heard when we walked into the home of the farmer at the top of his mountainside." Then, they would walk around with trays of truffle-infused fennel and waft it in our noses. "This is what we smelled when we walked in the fields of this place." It's a lot of using your other senses. We had to drink a lot of wine, then chart our emotions, twenty different emotions in order of what we feel, anger, aggression, excitement, happiness, a whole bunch of them. It was funny to see that our classmates had similar graphs of those emotions. We do the same for chocolate, cheese, honey, prosciutto, olive oil. We learned to train our palette to be critics and learn to distinguish quality in food.

On food and community: My classmates were Austrian, Australian, Norwegian, Japanese, German, so we would have cultural nights in each of our homes. I became really inspired by the community that I experienced there. I wanted to bring that to a lonely city like Vancouver. I started thinking about ways to incorporate food and communicate it in a way that bridges community. Then, I moved to the UK for a couple months to do my internship. I worked with the former Jamie Oliver Ministry of Food. I saw the poverty gap and I wrote my thesis on how food can bridge that. I also worked with co-workers who were all from the streets. They were given a chance by the Prince’s Trust Foundation to really empower them with skills and training and apprenticeship in kitchens. They decided to move back into their communities and teach kids and adults how to cook.

On food waste: There's a lot happening around food waste and food redistribution and really cool, creative movements highlighting food waste. I wanted to focus on one aspect of food sustainability and that was the one. Like imperfect produce. They would sell it in different grocery stores and market it as a brand and really draw attention to that. Then, I approached the founder of this worldwide movement called Feeding the 5000. Feedback Global is his organization, and they have movements all over 52 countries around the world except North America. I asked if we could bring the movement to Canada. It’s is basically an event to raise awareness for food waste in the city. We fed a couple thousand people all on food that would have gone to waste, imperfect produce from the farms that they can't sell in stores, overstocked freezers from suppliers, overstocked items, near expired items.

On events: To tap into the creative food communication bridging community, I launch events that highlight a social cause that's really dear to my heart. For example, I partnered with Dinner Party YVR. I did an event to highlight bringing clean water to Africa. We used food and art and storytelling through a four course menu to illustrate the story of Africa. Then, at the fundraiser, each element on the plate tells a story about the people. It was a progression. It was a journey of what it's like to bring water there. I know there's a lot of foodies and people loving food in the city and events. I wanted to do an event story to highlight something they would not think about if they're just going along in their day to day routine. I like to bring in social causes that just really impact the world into action. Food is my vehicle to bring that up.

On presentation: One event was even more gourmet, beautifully plated items, but they were all imperfect produce. We would slice fennel really thin and we would deep fry things. We plated used oyster shells that were from a restaurant and we sanitized them and we did a faux fried rice out of roasted cauliflower. We plated it like art, like a high-end restaurant using garbage. That's where the connection comes in.

On the future: I don't like to preach to the converted. I like to preach to the person who's never thought about it in a relevant way. I would love to start a social enterprise. Own a commissary kitchen, have a co-working space outside that would help entrepreneurs, a good working community space. Then, the kitchen would be for any food entrepreneurs who need the space to make something for social good and give back, zero waste products or whatever. I also have a model where we employ people who are marginalized to work in the kitchen and have a coffee shop there as well.

Ashleigh Turner is a volunteer with NetSquared Vancouver, a group whose mission is to help nonprofit organizations harness the power of technology for social good. She’s also the Communications Manager at Options for Sexual Health, a registered charity that provides sexual health services to British Columbians. The two roles complement each other perfectly: working in charity helps Ashleigh understand the technological needs of nonprofits, while volunteering with NetSquared helps her to reach and benefit charities and clients outside the usual Options demographic. As a result, she’s a very busy person, but all of it channels into one thing - improving the communities and lives around her. We talked to Ashleigh about sexual health, technology, and the internet.

On NetSquared Vancouver: I was blown away with the amazing amount of knowledge that I could get from a free meetup. About a year and a bit ago, I signed up, because Eli put a call out, and decided that I was going to start volunteering with his awesome organization that provides free workshops, free education for the nonprofit world, and a variety of folks who need support around technology, and how they use it in their nonprofit jobs.

On NetSquared events: Most of the events that I've seen until recently have been lectures. However, lately what has been happening, which is really awesome, is they've been doing these hands-on learning sessions. Folks can go in with their problems that they're having on a specific issue, and they can work on it and actually come out of those sessions with a product that's working for them. For the Google AdWords grant, there was a two-part series. The first part was how to get your Google AdWords Grant. The presenter actually walked us through, step-by-step, how to get the grants in and how to get the money out. Then the second step was, once you've got that in hand, what do you do to make it work? People were able to learn how to actually put into action the Google Ad Grant.

On clients: There's a really wide range of nonprofits that are helped out by the services provided by NetSquared Vancouver, and I'm always blown away by the number of causes that are being supported by the work that NetSquared Vancouver does. Technology is such an important part of what everybody's doing now, looking at different ways to diversify funding and marketing can be answered by tech options.

On Options for Sexual Health: Our mission is to champion and celebrate sexual health, which looks like a bunch of different things. We have three core programs. We have 58 clinics throughout the province of BC. We have an education program that does education from K to 12, courses for adults, courses for parents and caregivers, and courses for professionals. Then we have 1-800-Sex-Sense. They are able to answer any questions about sexual health, sexuality, basically anything that falls under the sexual umbrella. They are nonjudgmental, they are experts, and they will be able to answer those questions.

On history: As a youth, I was always the go-to person for my friends to ask sexual health questions or sexuality questions. I just found different ways to find the resources and find the answers for them. This was pre-Internet, so I'd have to find other ways to find the answers. As I went through school, I always had that in the back of my mind as something that's interesting, but not necessarily something I was going to do.

Going through psychology and English, I realized that I wanted to work in any helping profession. Psychology was something that really interested me. I did some counselling courses after I finished my university degree, and decided I wanted to go into counselling, but wanted to have a little bit more of a specialization, so I did a doctorate in human sexuality.

I started as a volunteer with OPT, and that was really to find out if I could talk about sex all day every day, and be comfortable with it. It turns out, I'm still here, so obviously I can. That turned into working at the clinic, which then turned into working at the provincial office, which then turned into, well, I guess this is what I'll do while I go to school, which then turned into a volunteer coordinator position, which then turned into the communications manager position.

On purpose: For me, one of the reasons why I have stayed committed to Options, and to the nonprofit world, is that I see the impact that we're making in the world, I see the change that we're able to provide to our clients, and those who use our services, and I see that this is something that is so necessary, and so needed. The cool thing is, when I started looking at the rest of the nonprofit world, I see those people doing the same thing in their organizations. I see that there are people who are making the changes in the world that I want to see made. That's really what drives me forward.

On social media: As an organization, it is one way that we can connect with folks over really large geographical distance. Having the ability to use technology to communicate allows us to provide information, education, and support over great distances. It's a quick and immediate way to connect with our clients. So, if the clinic is closed due to snowy weather, it can be quickly and easily communicated through social media channels, through our website, etc. The flip side of it is, because we have clinics in communities that are more rural, they don't walk around with their smartphones all the time, they are not checking Facebook and social media all the time, so it can be almost like a vacuum that we live in. We are so used to it that we forget about the other, more traditional ways of reaching folks. It's been a little bit of a balancing act of, how to use the social media channels, how do we use our communication tools to be inclusive and make sure we reach as many folks as possible, including those in rural communities.

On funding: We don't have the fluffy kitties and puppies like the SPCA. The SPCA's awesome. STIs aren’t cute and fluffy. It's quite the opposite. The challenge is always to find those individuals who have a values alignment with Options for Sexual Health, who understand that this is a service that is available to all British Columbians, and that every person will have some aspect of sexual health or sexuality touch their lives at some point. Whether they need our services today, tomorrow, the next day, not for 10 years, not for 20 years, or maybe they don't want to use our services, or need to use our services anymore, our services are still important, they're still relevant, and so the struggle for us is to find that values alignment to show folks that the service is important.

We get core funding from the Ministry of health, as well as through the Provincial Health Services Authority. We received grants through the Community Gaming Grant. We get supported by United Way. Then, throughout the province, we have other grants with support at the community level, like the Columbia Basin Trust. Then, we do have sponsors, we have a breakfast event that we do as a fundraiser, and we have individual donors as well.

Music Heals is one of the fastest growing, most agile charities in Vancouver. The team has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars in only a few years of operation and increased access to music therapy in hospitals and clinics, for cancer patients, seniors and so many more. For founder David Barnett, the reason for their popularity is obvious: music touches everyone, both donors and patients. David, Executive Director Chris Brandt and their team have turned this universal love of music into a vibrant community of musicians, therapists, fundraisers, fans, and of course, donors. We talked to David about the charity, the therapy, and good vibes.

On Music Heals: It’s a charity driven by fans of music and business community people who are passionate music lovers who see and feel the power of music in their daily lives and how it makes them feel. When you start researching the therapeutic benefits of music the stories are endless. Originally when I started this charity I was in a fortunate position to be able to go out and create something and really wanted to find something that we were passionate about and music is something that, as a fan, I forever know the effects of it, just how it makes you feel when you listen to it or you go see concerts. As we researched more into therapeutic settings, the benefits are just unbelievable. How do you put the two together and go out and really see where the needs are in the community? Therapy just seems to be underappreciated and underfunded.

On community: I grew up in and around charities. My father was very involved with Variety Club. I always recognized that there were opportunities to bring people together in a charitable environment, whether it's dinners or events or just gatherings where you end up becoming friends, working with and really building this larger community. The goal was never really to start a charity but to start something that brought people together. It created this larger circle of friendships in the group where you can work with people and spend time with people who have this common goal and a common passion of music. Being a music-based charity it's very difficult to find people who don't love what you're doing. Anybody who likes music on any level sees the benefits.

On change: A lot of the charities that I've dabbled in over the last 10, 15 years were all related to music industry labels. You're depending on your labels, depending on your bands, depending on your managers. They were music-related charities so you really relied on the music industry to support them. But as the music industry has changed in the last 10 years, that industry’s not really an industry anymore.

On reaching people: How do I get to the lawyer who's a closet musician and the doctor who's a musician and a fan of music? The lawyer who hops in his car at night who's driving home and puts on his favourite music because it makes him feel? How do you translate that? How do you get that person to understand a little bit of the other power of it. If it's making you feel a certain way as you're driving home, what does it feel like to that kid in hospital? It's just so powerful. We really strategized about having some type of engagement with our potential donors on how music makes them feel.

On music therapy: Most people don't know all the effects. Even when I started and got involved in researching about music therapy, originally I envisioned it with senior's homes. The guy playing piano at lunch hour or with kids in developmental stuff. As you get more involved and you see it with cancer patients or burn units and mental health and hospices and palliative care, it's just overwhelming how it's being used on so many different levels as a therapy. It's mind blowing to just watch some of the results coming out of some of these facilities and some of the stories we hear about parents and their kids and dealing with cancer and death. There's a lot of people out there trying to spread the love and all we're trying to do is help fund it.

On fundraising: It's difficult to just go and ask corporations for a cheque. It's a lot easier to sell them a table to a larger event. The gala is really leaning on a lot of personal friends and businesses who we know are passionate about music. We want to spend time with artists who are going out and trying to give back. If it's the band adding a dollar to the cover charge on their tour across Canada, that's going to go to music therapy. There was a band a few years ago, The Matinee, who were doing covers online, so anytime there was a hundred dollar donation they would do a fun cover. We've also gone away from the [traditional] round table concept and we're moving into a little bit more of a rock and roll, Persian rug, couches vibe where you feel like you're part of something different. I think that's really what we're trying to go after, that type of non-gala gala.

On social media: We don't just tell music therapy stories, we keep people posted and updated on music industry notes and what's happening and cool trends because the conversation is about music. We're really trying to run the charity as a business with a business mindset and a fun, almost startup type of business mindset where the end result is to give away a lot of money.

On feedback: My fulfillment comes from hearing the stories and being able to give the money away. One of the things that we started a couple years ago was this video of how we spend your money and I think it was really important for us and for me to be able to share that with the community and how we're spending your money. At the end of the day people don't really know specifically where their money's going. So to have the recipients of the money tell their stories is important. The more stories we can get from the therapeutic community out to the general public, the more support we're going to get long-term. Knowing that children's hospital has a couple of part-time people for all the kids at the hospital is disheartening, so being able to help fund it so those therapists are working full-time or more, it makes us feel good when you get the feedback and it's all very positive.

At On Purpose, we regularly speak to changemakers with established organizations that are fully set up and operating. They provide a good example of how people are achieving the successes that we celebrate. Today, we’ve gotten a unique look at a new organization just before it gets off the ground.

Street Feet Society is being founded by Nina Sheere and her partner in an effort to combat foot-related health issues, commonly known as street feet, suffered by homeless Canadians on the Downtown Eastside. It’s not something that many of us might think about on a regular basis, but it’s an affliction that is both painful and a drain on the medical system. Nina’s goal is to provide clean socks to people who need them, as well as to educate Vancouver’s youth on the problem and motivate them to help collect socks and raise money.

We talked to Nina about street feet, starting up, and the importance of building a community around a cause.

On street feet: In Vancouver it's super common. It's raining all the time, it's really gross in the winters and you're exposed to horrible elements when you're living on the street so people don't have the ability to change their socks and shoes. They'll have their socks and shoes on for weeks, months at a time and be outside. Sometimes by the time they get into a hospital their feet have become so infected that when you remove their socks it literally is peeling off layers of flesh. It's super painful. It really easily causes infections and for people who are already so marginalized and have so many medical issues a lot of the time it's really risky when it's such an avoidable thing. It's super unknown to the general public.

On socks: There's a lot of great programs and tons of people in Vancouver who donate clothes all the time, especially in the winter. We love people that donate coats and things like that but nobody thinks to donate socks because you don't have them. You wear socks until you get holes in them and you don't have used socks to give. Nobody thinks to go out and buy packages of socks and donate them. Shelters, everywhere I've worked in social services, the number one thing we're always short on across the board is socks. We never have enough. Most people actually have access to shoes and if they could change their socks regularly and just keep their feet clean and dry they'd be fine. How often do we change our socks? Now imagine that you're living outside year round and you're someone who's literally facing all weather. The more people who have access to socks, the more it would eradicate street feet being an issue, which even financially would reduce a huge load on hospitals. It would reduce the load so much of people going in with any foot related health issues. Just clean socks. That's it!

On mobility: If you don't have healthy feet, it is really, really scary to be living on the street and you can't be mobile to access different services that you need to survive.

On outreach: I want to make this sustainable. Starting in the new year I'm going to be going into schools to give presentations and talk about what's happening in the Downtown Eastside and raise awareness for youth. It's going to be aimed towards middle school and high school aged youth and in these presentations we pitch the idea of them becoming their own organization within the school. They create a board, they run sock drives and programs, whatever they want it to look like. Then we're going to be the middleman to connect them to different organizations in the Downtown Eastside like outreach services, street nurses, things like that.

On partnerships: I'm partnering with Coast Mental Health a lot and they do street outreach. They have a huge amount of programs and SRO's. They have a resource centre. That was a really natural place for me to start because I'm so connected to them and I know that they need the socks. I'm also reaching out to Carnegie Outreach, the street nurses program, anywhere where they're quite mobile and in the community is going to be a starting point.

On the startup process: It's way more work than I thought it was going to be. Like so much more work. It's my partner and I who are doing this. We both have a history of working in shelters. We worked for the Cool Aid Society. That was how we got introduced to this whole concept. I remember it vividly. Coming back from a shift one night, we'd been working together and he said, "If I won the lottery the first thing I'd do was donate a ton of socks because this is ridiculous." From that we thought, why don't we do something about this now? We don't need to win the lottery. We could very easily create something to get people socks. This has been an idea for about two years but I was doing my masters and had not a lot of extra time. Now we're just starting to put it together. We thought it was going to be so easy and so great and we'll just go into schools and funnel socks. No problem, right?

On community: We have luckily gotten a lawyer on board who's going to do all the pro bono work, who's amazing and is setting us up as a legal society. We've registered our name. We are doing all of the legislative steps to make sure our butts are covered, which is so out of my element. We've gotten some of our friends on board and are literally pulling from our internal resources. My partner and I are really only well-versed in the social services aspect. We can bring that to the table but all the startup business stuff is so much more complex than I had initially imagined. It's definitely made me recognize that this is not really something we can do alone. That we really need to recognize who has certain strengths and pull them in and use them. We've started to create a board and now have a group of people that I really trust who are going to be involved in all these different aspects. The biggest thing is recognizing how we can tailor this to best meet the needs of the kids and best meet the needs of the people who are going to be receiving socks. So what is the most efficient and what's the best way we can be doing this? What exactly does that look like? That's really been where a lot of the fine tuning is coming in.

On history: I have been volunteering since I was 14 or 15. The school that I went to out in Port Moody was a really phenomenal high school and we had a teacher there who was amazing and under her, when I was in grade 10, a group of students and I started a not-for-profit organization in the school called Kodiaks with a Purpose. The main initiative was going to the Downtown Eastside, taking socks, taking clothes, bringing food and we did that about once a month. That was my first foray into any kind of social service work. From there I've been all over the map. I've done ton of different organizations in Victoria. I was in the sexual assault response team for three years in Victoria. Same with my partner. He was at food banks, then he was at the Cool Aid Society. It's definitely something we're both really passionate about.

On staying positive: My partner is in law enforcement now and I recently completed my internship working in prenatal addiction, women who are pregnant and using substances at the same time, as well as suffering from intimate partner violence. We have definitely dealt with some very dark populations between the two of us and it makes for some really hard days. We know we're going to have a lot of shitty days. We know that is part of our careers and we choose that and we love doing that work but on the flip side of it we need something that is going to be our passion project that makes us feel like there is still goodness in the world because that's honestly what I need to take hold of sometimes. Where is the goodness in the community? In the schools, with the youth, with people who actually still care and want to see positive change happening because sometimes it gets pretty dark.

On harm reduction: I think harm reduction to the layperson has now become quite narrowly attributed to giving out harm reduction supplies and I think that's become a really common misconception, that we're giving out specifically supplies for substance use and that's all that looks like. I think harm reduction is much more of a philosophy and it's a way that you approach people and a way that you work with people. It's about meeting people where they're at, which is exactly those organizations that we want to partner with. They meet people where they're at on the street.

On incremental improvement: To say that giving people a clean pair of socks isn't going to solve homelessness, I'm 100% aware of that. However, to say that I think is a really huge disservice to the number of homeless people that we do have currently and previously and will continue to have living in Vancouver. It is our reality and there's lots of things I would love to do to change that and hopefully I will continue to do some of those things later in my career but in this moment, why don't we make this situation a little bit better if we can.

On getting started: It's a lot of socks. Right now we're going to start off with friends and family members. Everyone gearing up, moving socks. Eventually down the line we're definitely going to look at transport and more storage as we get moving. It's going to be super grassroots. My living room and the spare bedroom are going to be sock storage.

If you’ve ever drained a three pointer on a public basketball hoop with no net, you know what it feels like to chase after your ball across the court. It takes you out of your rhythm, disrupts your flow, and just isn’t very fun. But a hoop with no net is also a symbol of the divide between affluent communities where kids have the opportunity to excel at sports and working class neighbourhoods where they often don’t. Brodan Thiel is doing his best to bridge that divide and make sure all young players have access to high level basketball skills training. He started with the Swishin’ Mission, a program to put nets on community hoops, and has expanded his ambitions to include free summer skills sessions and a low-cost academy called Dynamite Basketball. We talked to Brodan about accessibility, Instagram, and changing lives.

On the Swishin' Mission: I started putting up a net, then taking a picture and putting it on our Instagram, then we got a huge population of people coming to our Instagram account, being like, whoa, you're putting up nets in our community? Then we said, if you hashtag #swishinmission, I'll go to your court and I'll put up a net. Every time I put up a net, we post pics on Instagram and someone else reaches out [to fund another net]. We are living in the world at a time when instant gratification is the key thing. If you put up on Instagram that this person donated it, so this is their court, they are going to feel good about themselves.

On the importance of good facilities: Nobody wants to shoot on a hoop with no net. There's no feedback. Your ball starts rolling elsewhere, you don't hear that swish sound. Everyone wants to hear that swish sound. We put up around 150 last year. It was cool for me to do, and then we were donated a court in East Vancouver at the Italian Cultural Centre. We put up a lot of benches, we repainted the court, we painted the backboards, made it all nice. Then we did free sessions all summer for everyone in East Van who wanted to show up.

On opportunity: There's a lot of people out there trying to make money off basketball right now, because parents are willing to pay for all this stuff. I'm not going to lie to you, I'm trying to make a living doing this, but our services are much cheaper than a lot of the other ones, and we are trying to get it so everyone can get involved. We are chasing sponsorships not only for the Swishin' Mission, but for our academy as well. Giving kids the opportunity to play high level basketball, go to America, get the exposure that they couldn't if they didn't have money. This year, Big Brothers Vancouver has come on board donating a hundred nets to us, which is a great start, but that's just a start.

On commitment: It's going to keep growing. There is no way this is going to stop. Anytime there's a community endeavour like this, and people are getting behind it, it just keeps growing. If someone is passionate about it like I am, then that's the power in it. If someone is just doing it half-hearted, it's not going to work out. I've made a lot of financial sacrifices. I don't want to talk about the numbers or anything, but I was on full-time teaching salary, full-time coaching salary as well, and I basically wiped that all out just to pursue this, because I see this as the biggest thing in my life, and it's bringing me a lot of passion. I feel good about it.

On accessibility: We run skill sessions all year round for our kids. We train them on at different schools in different places. For a skill session for us it's $15 for these kids, which is next to nothing. Other academies are charging upwards of $50. We have a full gym, and that's what I would prefer, a place where lots of kids are coming, as opposed to having five kids who are paying a lot of money.

The way sports are going, not only in Vancouver, but everywhere in the world, is toward specification. We used to play sports year-round: you play volleyball, you play basketball, and then you play rugby. Now, kids are starting at six years old only playing basketball and they don't play anything else, and parents are putting time and money into this. Upwards of $10,000 a year is not unheard of. How do we get to a point where kids who are from families that can’t afford $10,000 can receive training like that, and still progress at the same rate. It's very difficult.

East Vancouver is traditionally a working-class area. There has only been one provincial championship from East Vancouver in history, and that was Britannia, one of my college teammates won it back in the day. There's a correlation between money and success in basketball, and so how do we get to a point where these kids are getting the same opportunities, the same training, even if they don't have the money? So, the long term vision of the program is to have a year-round sustainable product that is high-level for everybody.

On learning: Quest University is an unbelievable place that changed my life. I was a high school dropout. Basketball was not my number one thing growing up. I was into the party scene. Then I grew to be six foot five and very athletic, and I thought, okay, let's try this basketball thing out. I started taking it seriously, but I got cut from my grade 11 team, and that was a big cross in the road. Either you can work hard and try to get where you want to go, or else you can just quit altogether. I dropped out of school at that time; when I came back, I was more focused on my education. Then I went to Quest, and I was learning to write emails, I was learning all the stuff that I never learned in school. I was a very low-level learner. But at Quest you are allowed to focus solely on one thing for three and half weeks at a time, and that worked for me. I went on to teach high school for three years, now I have my masters in positive coaching from the University of Missouri. As soon as I started seeing success in my life, and got the blueprint of what it takes to be successful, everything sort of became easy, because if you work like a dog, you are going to get what you put in at the end of the day.

On success: We get emails from parents who are saying, “you're changing my kids life.” Of all the kids who came out last summer, the ones who came out consistently went from their B team to their A team at their schools, or they went from bench player to starter. This one kid we had got cut from the provincial team, and he said, I'm going to join you guys, I'm going to work my butt off all summer. He went to a national showcase camp and he made the top 10. For me, that's saying not only is this working, but it's giving these kids opportunities that they wouldn't have had elsewhere. That's the huge thing for me, it's changing these kids lives. We've seen a lot of success. We went from eight kids to 200 in our program in six months.

On history: I grew up in a very tough situation. My father was an alcoholic my whole life. Not to say that nobody else has that, a lot of people do. My mom was a strong force in my life. We lived in co-op housing from the time I was 12 until I graduated high school. We went to school with all these rich kids from North Vancouver, and we were getting made fun of. Then me and my brother started lifting weights, we were not getting pushed around anymore. Sports was our outlet. I just hope kids don't have to go through that, and I hope that basketball can maybe be the outlet. Hopefully, changing the community one kid at a time.