All in for Kids: Helping kids and youth achieve the brightest future possible.

Every child and youth in our community deserves the chance to grow up great.

When kids develop critical skills at a young age, they build a path to a successful life – and kids that grow up to be great make our communities great too. We believe that every child across the Lower Mainland deserves an equal opportunity to be all that they can be.

Thanks to United Way donors like you, more than 43,500 local kids participated in healthy, safe, educational activities through after-school programs last year. These programs help improve kids’ academic success and increase their self-confidence and self-esteem.

The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, months of school closures and the cancellation of many extracurricular programs has been challenging for many kids and youth. However, it’s become very clear that the crisis has served to intensify the inequity that disadvantaged kids already face.

In Greater Vancouver alone, over 81,000 kids live in poverty. That’s one in five children in our region. And for kids living in single-parent households in Greater Vancouver the child poverty rate is 50%. Kids living in these circumstances are less likely to have access to technology, more likely to fall behind in the curriculum and are at greater risk of developing troubling behavioural issues as a result of increased stress and anxiety.

Thanks to ongoing support, United Way has been able to adapt our United Way School’s Out programs to keep school-aged kids safe, connected and engaged during this difficult time. We’ve also been able to launch youth mental health programs that allow young people to connect with the support they need right in their very own community.

That support is more vital now than ever before. According to Statistics Canada, almost two-thirds of 15 to 24 year-olds reported COVID-19 has had a negative impact on their mental health, and 41% were likely to report symptoms consistent with moderate or severe anxiety.

Our Youth Mental Health programs provide supports including: online and safe, in-person short term individual clinical counselling sessions; group sessions facilitated by youth workers to help provide coping strategies (to deal with depression, anxiety, and/or stress); guidance and mentoring with respect to physical health and mental wellness (mindfulness, relationships); as well as peer-to-peer support and learning circles.

Your local love ensures that no child or youth is left behind.

Please give generously today.