Story by: Calli Forbes
Perseverance, team work, and supporting one another – a few of the life skills that participating in sports instills.
“All of those skills are transferable to everyday life – even overcoming adversity, which, in the case of Fort McMurray today, we need,” says Sarah Kambites with the United Nations Association of Canada. “Bad things happen to good people, but you pick up and move on the same way when you fall and you don’t finish the race, you work hard again for the next time.”
UNA-Canada’s Sport-in-a-Box program was developed in 2005 with the intention of using sport to combat discrimination and racism. Since then, the program has spread to communities across Canada, including Fort McMurray in February 2016.
However, plans to expand Sport-in-a-Box to other youth-serving organizations in Fort McMurray were put on hold after the program lost its materials, and resources on the ground, to the wildfires in May.
“Either we had to throw the towel in and say ‘it’s over’, or ask ‘how do we regroup’?” Sarah recalls.
UNA-Canada reached out to the Canadian Red Cross for support through Alberta Wildfires 2016 Community Organizations Partnership Program.
“Red Cross really supported us to reactivate the program in Fort McMurray where we left off and also to start to cultivate local capacity that will continue the program, giving that sense of ownership and long-term sustainability,” Sarah says.
To mark this reactivation, Sport-in-a-Box joined alongside the Scotiabank MI Summer Camps at MacDonald Island to simulate the Opening Ceremonies of the Summer Olympics for camp participants. Alongside camp games, 80 kids painted flags and learned about the countries they represented, received medals and then paraded these proudly in front of their parents before the end of the day.
“We now want them to create readiness and resilience,” Sarah says. “What you saw was celebrating that we survived it and we’re here to join the global community to celebrate the Olympics in Rio.”
Funding provided by the Red Cross supported the day’s events, along with an event to mark the UN International Day of Peace in September. It will also support the development of online materials for coaches, parents and athletes, training local volunteers to deliver the program, and establish bench markers and metrics to measure the program’s impact in the community.
Sarah hopes come this time next year she will see Sport-in-a-Box thriving throughout the Wood Buffalo region.
“Fort McMurray is on the map and they are marching forward.”