By Owen Charters, President & CEO, BGC Canada

June 25, 2024

We face a future where BGC’s work is needed more than ever. We have spent the last six years building resiliency and strength—now we must put that strength to work.

We owe it to the children and youth of Canada to do better

BGC Clubs are the answer to many of these problems. We have been the solution for 125 years, and we will be for many more. As a collective, we are committed to advocating a broad agenda for children and youth in this country, building on calls for a national child and youth strategy (championed by Senator Moodie).

Last month, we hosted our biannual National Conference: Making Waves. These conferences are a chance for senior leaders and staff at BGC Clubs to come together to learn and network with others from across the country. It’s also a chance for everyone to be reminded of the greater impact of the BGC movement and discuss how we can further improve.

A new chapter for BGC Clubs

This conference year was big—it was the kick-off to a new chapter for BGC Clubs. We closed the books on the strategic plan that has guided us so well, including through a pandemic, saying farewell to Stronger Together and launching our national strategic plan: Growing Together, Creating Opportunities.

We face a future where what we do is needed more than ever. We have spent the last six years building resiliency and strength – even testing our capacity during a pandemic. Now we must put that strength to work, delivering for more kids and families across Canada.

As of April—less than a year after reaching the 40 million milestone—Canada’s population surpassed 41 million. Last year, we served more than 150,000 young people—but Clubs can’t keep up with the growth in needs. Canada’s population is growing. It is time to be ambitious and to grow.

Children and youth are moving – from large urban areas to smaller cities and towns, and Clubs must be ready to accommodate the influx. We need to be in communities we’re not already serving. But even within our existing communities, we must have ambitions to grow.

We are lobbying governments for funds that can support growth, like the $100 million sport and recreation capital fund in Ontario. Or the federal program for daycare expansion.

We are looking at programs that will helps us innovate and create new ways to build capital, like accessing the $900 million social finance fund.

We are asking the BGC Canada Foundation to launch an ambitious campaign. We are asking corporate partners to help us grow.

BGC Clubs matter to kids. They change the lives of every youth that comes through the door.

Read more:

• Because of a Club 
• The Youth Mental Health Crisis 
• BGC Clubs provide kids with basic needs so they can have brighter futures 

The latest message from Owen Charters, President & CEO, BGC Canada (May 22). Full transcript below.

This weekend, many of you would have been packing suitcases and preparing to travel to Kingston, Ontario for our 2020 National Conference: Making Waves.

Instead, we’re now preparing to meet you all on Zoom for our Annual General Meeting next Friday. It definitely won’t be the same as meeting in person, and it won’t reflect the camaraderie, the learning, and the networking that our national conference provides.

But we have been meeting. In fact, it feels like our movement is closer than ever to each other. We are seeing each other more frequently now over video conference. I have personally seen more faces more often than ever before.

It is true that video conference remains a poor substitute for in-person meetings. There really is Zoom-fatigue that comes from our brains trying to scan and process the many faces on screen and try to interpret emotion and meanings from each small Brady-bunch square that fills the pixels in front of us.

Personally, I’ve changed to a mix of video conferences and phone meetings, just so that I can rest my eyes (and brain) and provide some variety in meeting formats.

But what is important is connecting. We are connecting to each other. We are using what we have available to reduce the distance to each other. We are reaching out more frequently to more people—I’m hearing from former colleagues, connections, friends—many that I usually hear from infrequently in normal times.

Don’t stop connecting. Don’t stop reaching out. Our role now is to reach the children, youth, and families we serve in virtual or distanced ways. And Clubs are doing just that. We know that the human connection to others is important—it’s important for our health, it’s important for our social well-being.

And we need to connect with each other. As we have been doing, and as we will continue to do.

With or without a conference in beautiful Kingston next week, we are strong together. We are a great team of Club staff and volunteers nationwide working for every community. Working for every child, every teen, every family that needs our support now.

We may not be able to meet in person, but I feel the connection to each of you stronger than ever.

Stay strong.  Stay safe.