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United Way's crafty fundraising

Laura Busch
Northern News Services
Published Friday, November 25, 2011

SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
This is not your typical day in the classroom on the second floor of Aurora College. Then again, this isn't your typical classroom.

NNSL photo/graphic

Literacy Outreach Centre students and staff show off the handmade crafts they plan to sell to raise money for the United Way of Yellowknife. Johnny Aitaok, left, Chris Strus, Lynn Malcolm, Julie White and Xiaoyi Yan made tote bags, scarves, necklaces and other crafts out of recycled materials for a craft sale at Aurora College, scheduled for 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday. - Laura Busch/NNSL photo

Fabric, scissors and hot glue are spread across the table where books and writing assignments would typically be found. Pinned to the walls is an array of bags, necklaces, scarves, bracelets and other crafts.

The students are part of the day class at the Literacy Outreach Centre, an organization that aims to help adults with low levels of literacy improve or maintain their reading and writing skills. The students in this inclusive program, in which some students have physical or mental disabilities that hinder their literacy, are hard at work making crafts to sell in Saturday's craft fair at Aurora College. They plan to donate their proceeds to the United Way of Yellowknife.

"The fact that United Way keeps all its money in the North is really, really important," said Lynn Malcolm, instructor at Literacy Outreach, which is under the umbrella of the Yellowknife Association for Community Living. "I told the students - we were talking about this yesterday - that we have so few people in the North that the money that we raise would (really

make a difference) here."

On the day Yellowknifer visited the classroom, there were three students in class. This is pretty typical, the instructors said, although there are a few other students registered and new students are always welcome to join throughout the school year.

Last year, the literacy program received funding from the United Way and even though they missed the July deadline to apply this year, they wanted to do something to raise money for the charity, said Xiaoyi Yan, literacy outreach co-ordinator for the Literacy Outreach Centre.

"We wanted to help not only because we got funding from them, but because we know United Way has been a really great support for the community," she said.

The local United Way chapter is honoured to be the beneficiary of this project.

"NWT Literacy has also been a recipient in the past of funds. So this in my mind is just a lovely turnaround where they were a recipient but now they're also raising funds for us," said Mona Durkee, campaign co-ordinator for the United Way of Yellowknife. "What better encouragement is there than that?"

The group funds many groups and charities in the city.

The United Way of Yellowknife is going through some major restructuring changes as it converts into United Way NWT. This process has been in the works for about a year, but the organization has just been given approval by the parent organization in Ottawa to make the change official.

The conversion to United Way NWT from United Way of Yellowknife is because it was clearly evident the organization could have a systemic impact in many of the small communities in the NWT, said David Connelly, board chair for the United Way of Yellowknife.

The approval came too late in the year for the United Way to launch a fundraising campaign in the rest of the territory. However, it did accept applications from organizations outside of Yellowknife to receive funding.

United Way is in the midst of fundraising season with the Christmas holidays around the corner and the year-end acting as the deadline for people to be able to claim their contributions on their income tax. United Way's current fundraising campaign is set to wrap up in mid-December, though final numbers on how generous supporters have been this year won't be tallied until January, Durkee said.

"Right now is a big fundraising time for so many charities," Durkee said. "The one thing we don't do is we don't try and take away from any charity, but we support all the charities that (are registered in the NWT)."

The bulk of United Way of Yellowknife's funding comes from salary contributions by government employees. The federal government runs a fundraising campaign for the United Way on its own. Employees are encourage to donate and the government will match donations to a certain point.

This year, United Way hopes to raise $130,000 in the NWT, up from $120,000 raised last year.

With a recognition that this is a building year, the charity plans to not only fund organizations right across the territory but campaign for donations

territory-wide as well.

"Hopefully next year there will be more of a plan and we'll have more of a cabinet in place in order to set up events and kick off some things like that," Durkee said.

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