Is the current generation of school-age kids the first that will have a chance to truly solve global problems such as poverty?
If the March 2 rally of 15,000 Saskatchewan students at the Sasktel Centre in Saskatoon is any indication, at least they certainly think so.
We Day, an offshoot of Craig Kielberger’s Free the Children organization, has become a very big deal in the province and locally. This year, nearly 400 students—120-plus from the Catholic division and 250-plus from the public division—made the trek to get pumped up for the next year of making a difference in the local and global communities. Tickets for We Day events are not available for sale, the kids have to earn their way in by engaging in charitable projects.
Kielberger started the not-for-profit international development organization when he was just 12 years old. In 2008, he and brother Marc founded Me to We, a for-profit company they call a “social enterprise” that pays women in Africa to make fashion accessories for the North American market and workers in Canada to produce environmentally friendly clothing. Half the profits are donated to Free the Children and the other half are reinvested in the company, their website states.
In addition to the We Day events, Me to We runs leadership camps and sponsors volunteer travel to Africa, South America and Asia.
Amber Hershmiller, one of the teachers from Sacred High School who accompanied the kids to Saskatoon said We Day 2016 was inspiring.
“It was really great,” she said. “It gave me hope for the future because there’s a lot of crazy things going on in the world right now so if Saskatchewan has 15,000 kids who earned their way to go there, that’s pretty powerful.”
We Day events take on a frenetic pace with a wide variety of celebrities taking the stage amidst energetic music and, lights and visual media. This year, Henry Winkler, Chris Hadfield, Dr. Joyce Banda (president of the African nation of Malawi), Tyler Shaw, Rick Hansen, Jessi Cruickshank and others brought messages of service and hope to the gathering.
Perhaps most inspiring to the kids, though, were Craig and Marc Kielberger.
“I think seeing the Kielbergers, who started this organization so young, gives them a belief that kids can make a difference and the stuff that they’re doing is change and that they are powerful.”
Every school in the Good Spirit and Christ the Teacher divisions has various projects they undertake to contribute to the We movement.
For example, last year Sacred Heart students run an annual magazine campaign to sponsor a child through World Vision. Also, last year, they organized a food drive to support Farm Credit Canada’s Drive Away Hunger campaign, ran a toy drive for the Salvation Army’s Christmas efforts and held an auction that raised $1,100 they contributed to the $50,000 Yorkton Kinsmen and Kinettes donated to the provincial Telemiracle event last weekend.
