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Help support our Children First Fund

Meeting Needs, Creating Opportunities, and Transforming Lives … Thanks to You

What is the Children First Fund?

The children, youth and families that we work with are some of the strongest, and most resilient people we know, and we want to give them the best opportunities we can to succeed.

When our children, youth and families experience challenges that can’t be addressed with existing supports, our Children First Fund steps in to fill these critical funding gaps.

Your gifts to our Children First Fund enable us to provide our children, youth and families with the resources and opportunities they need to overcome major barriers in their lives when they have nowhere else to turn, so they can be empowered to find their best outcomes.

Our work is governed by two fundamental beliefs:

  1. We recognize the value of providing early help to isolated and struggling families before intrusive intervention is required.
  2. We know from experience that by providing the children and youth in our care with opportunities for growth, they can achieve a better future for themselves.

Who does the Children First Fund Support?

Our Children First Fund helps to empower the children, youth and families that we serve, including families that are receiving services from us, and youth who have aged out of care.

What Supports Does our Children First Fund Provide?

The Children First Fund supports our children, youth and families by:

  1. Filling local gaps in support by helping them to meet their basic needs when they are struggling to do so.
  2. Supporting them in overcoming big problems that are impacting their well-being.
  3. Providing them with resources and opportunities that empower them to succeed

We provide support to our children, youth and families through four main pillars:

To learn more about our pillars, and our impact, please click here.

Here are our four pillars: Building Opportunities for Youth Success (which empowers youth leaving care with the resources and opportunities they need to succeed); Supporting Strong & Resilient Families (which Empowers families with the resources and opportunities they need to be strong and resilient); Meeting Urgent Needs (which ensures that children, youth and families recieving services from us can meet their basic needs when they can't find or access support elsewhere); and enriching lives (which provides enrichment opportunities that improve the health and well-being of our children, youth and families)

Why is the Children First Fund Important?

It fills local gaps in support that exist for the children, youth and families we serve

We want to provide the children, youth and families that we serve with everything they need to succeed. Sometimes, the resources that we need to do this work fall outside of the government funding that we receive.

The Children First Fund ensures that our children, youth and families have somewhere to turn when they can’t find the help they need elsewhere.

It provides the unique support that our children, youth and families need

The children, youth and families that we work with often struggle with a variety of complex barriers and challenges. Utilizing an extremely individualized approach, our Children First Fund allows us to go beyond our mandate to provide unique supports, resources and opportunities that our children, youth and families need to achieve their best outcomes.

The Children First Fund would not exist without you!

Our Children First Fund is available to the children, youth and families we serve because of you, our incredible supporters! In fact, the work of our Children First Fund is entirely dependent on the generosity of our supporters – if it weren’t for you, our Children First Fund wouldn’t exist!

Thanks to your incredible gifts, we can continue to meet needs, create opportunities and transform the lives of the children, youth and families that we serve.

We know that our Children First Fund makes an incredible difference, because we’ve seen it first-hand – and it’s all possible through your support.

Thank you for all that your incredible support makes possible. We couldn’t do it without you!

If you have questions about our Children First Fund, or want to know how you can support our work, please contact Patricia Brady, Fund Development & Communications Manager, via 519-824-2410 x3299 or email patricia.brady@fcsgw.org.