Bringing hope to youth

Dinner raises funds for young people in need

 

Windsor’s low unemployment has been a hard hit to many in the area, especially youth living on their own.

An event was held by public relations students from St. Clair College Nov. 17 in partnership with the Windsor Youth Centre.

WYC is a non-profit group that takes in youth who are struggling and provides them with a place to stay, homing programs, meals and employment support. The group’s mission statement, according to their website, is to serve “the basic and immediate needs of homeless and at-risk youth in a safe and friendly atmosphere with the aim to foster positive change and growth.”

One of the founders of WYC and Windsor native George Bozanich said the centre is one-of-a-kind and there are not many other options for at-risk youth in the area.

“We offer parent programs, relapse prevention programs and hot meals six nights a week,” said Bozanich. “We’ve been open for four years now and we just recently moved into our new space which we are very excited about.”

The old centre was located on Wyandotte Street East and had many issues, including lack of space and constant plumbing problems. According to Bozanich, the new space, also on Wyandotte, has a main hangout floor, quiet spaces, offices upstairs and a workshop for their artwork programs, plenty of room for the 150 youth it currently serves.

“The young group today put on the event because it is an age group they represent,” said Bozanich. “Their focus is education and I’m very glad to have these youth support other youth in need in the area. It’s how change starts.”

Cierra Bray, the event coordinator and public relations second year student at St. Clair College, helped create and run the event. She said all the money raised would be going towards helping youth succeed and furthering their careers.

“We chose the Windsor Youth Centre because we wanted to put ourselves in the shoes of these young individuals without anything who also, in some cases, support a child,” said Bray. “We wanted to make things relevant and let people see the struggle a lot of people have with post-secondary education. A lot of us are fortunate enough to be where we are and I hope we can help a lot of young people be where they want to be too.”

Bray said it’s very important to support the community, whether someone is a student, a fulltime employee or even someone struggling.

“We’re all people at the end of the day and we should love each other and support each other,” said Bray. “Especially with all the devastation that has been happening the past couple of days, I think we need to start coming together as one and supporting everyone in life.”