Youth Without Shelter "Home for the Holiday's" Matching Campaign

Toronto is one of the wealthiest cities in the world, yet has one of the largest homeless populations in all of Canada, with young people being the fastest growing percentage. At KPM Power, we believe that everyone should have access to food, education, and shelter and as such, we were so excited to have learned about Youth Without Shelter (YWS), located in North Etobicoke. A non-profit organization that works to provide emergency housing, and support programs for youth ages 16-24 years old with the goal to help build confidence, life-skills and to find long-term stable housing and jobs.

One of the most important programs that YWS offers is their Emergency Residential Program which offers emergency accommodations for up to 33 youth each night. In this program, youth are provided with counselling, food, clothing, and hygiene products. When we were visiting YWS’ facilities we were especially blown away by all the essential items that YWS keeps stocked including new clothing, footwear, toiletries, and perishable food items that the youth have access to.

Another important program that YWS offers is their Stay-In-School initiative that offers 20 youth a safe and stable environment while they focus on completing their education. While in this program, youth have access to guidance from a professional team, case management, one-on-one tutoring on specific subjects, a mentorship program, transit fares and textbooks, referral to scholarships and bursaries to cover educational costs, school supplies including laptops, and their own study space.

That is just the beginning of the incredible programs that YWS offers. They also provide everything in between such as the Life Skills, Mental Health, Employment and Housing and After-Care Program. We are confident that youth who enter YWS is getting the individual care that they need. We especially enjoyed hearing about their Iron Chef inspired competition where youth residents got to participate in a friendly competition and were judged by chefs around the community. Furthermore, one of their youths who participated in this program ended up going to Humber for post-secondary in culinary this past summer!

We were happy to see the newly renovated space where youth can work out and have a place to unwind. The space is welcoming, it really feels warm and homey, which we know are important factors for youth who are looking for a safe place to stay.

Additionally, it is always inspiring to see all the work done by the amazing employees and how much love they put into ensuring the programming that they are delivering at YWS is meaningful and impactful. While we were there, we saw just how passionate the staff were about helping to end the stigma around homelessness and supporting all youth who come through their doors in whatever way possible. We were particularly impressed by their dedicated chefs who wake up as early as 2:00AM to commute to the facility just to be able to prepare a hot breakfast by 6:00AM.

We are thrilled to have contributed to Youth Without Shelter during their “Home for the Holiday’s” Matching Gift campaign. We donated $10,000 which was matched by their benefactors and ultimately, doubling our efforts to help support YWS’ mission of “Ending homelessness, one youth at a time, one step at a time”. We are excited to see all the amazing things that Youth Without Shelter will continue to do and we are happy to be supporting a great organization that is dedicated to looking out for our youth.

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