A decade ago, Lori Hewson, Suncor’s director of community investment and social innovation, noticed a worrying pattern. The Suncor Energy Foundation (SEF) was donating sizable amounts to social and environmental charities in Alberta’s booming Fort McMurray region, but the assistance wasn’t easing the community’s challenges. “Our presence as a company was drawing more people [to…
In March, CanadaHelps marked 20 years of service to Canadian charities. The country’s largest platform for donating and fundraising online has been used by more than 23,000 non-profits and millions of Canadians. While the sector it serves continues to struggle through the COVID-19 crisis, the platform has seen a record-breaking amount of activity as everything…
Publisher’s note: In November 2020, the Agora Foundation board of directors established an Editorial Advisory Committee whose members could provide input and insights into our evolving coverage of Canada’s philanthropic sector. We have drawn on their considerable experience in our reporting. This spring, we asked contributor Emily Mathieu to canvass some members of the EAC…
It’s official: the charitable and non-profit sector has a “home” in government in BC. The face of that home is Niki Sharma, elected in the province’s October election. The MLA for Vancouver-Hastings is now BC’s Parliamentary Secretary for Community Development and Non-Profits, joining a small handful of elected officials across Canada with the specific role…
The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed many truths: Canada relies heavily on fragile global supply chains; social and economic status affects health outcomes; many essential workers are poorly paid; and data matters. Never before has our collective attention been so focused on data. Case counts, hospitalization numbers, test positivity rates, and the predictions of the latest…
La pandémie de la COVID-19 a révélé de nombreuses vérités : le Canada dépend beaucoup de fragiles chaînes d’approvisionnement mondiales; le statut social et économique affecte les résultats en matière de santé; de nombreux travailleurs essentiels sont sous-payés; et les données sont importantes. Notre attention collective ne s’est jamais autant portée sur les données. Chaque jour,…
For Canada’s non-profit and charitable leaders, the 2021 federal budget was significant and historic for many reasons. It made the “most promises” to the sector that Peter Dinsdale, president and CEO of YMCA Canada, has ever seen. It was the first time that Anjum Sultana, national director of public policy at YWCA, encountered a budget…
When Kyle Russell, interim director of Alberta Theatre Projects (ATP), hears on the radio that the Alberta government is banning all gatherings of 250 people or more, he’s on his way to Walmart in search of hand sanitizer. The entire front-of-house staff is scouring Calgary for the elusive product – a quest shared by millions…
This is the first of an ongoing “Solutions Journalism” series. Its goal is to provide practical, informative, and expert resources and tools in concise, approachable articles, in response to feedback from readers and our editorial advisory committee about what they feel is relevant and timely. *** When the 162-year-old Yarmouth YMCA closed its doors for…
This is the third and final article in a series published as a collaboration between The Philanthropist and Century Initiative. *** The COVID-19 pandemic has affirmed an adage often attributed to management guru Peter Drucker: “What gets measured gets managed.” The latest COVID-19 case numbers and vaccination rates are not just frequent topics of discussion –…