Our Impact

Facts: Helping Children 6 to 12

United Way of the Lower Mainland invests in research to identify what children need for their healthy development during middle childhood. We’re helping kids by funding out-of-school programs and educational programs for parents.

Helping Children 6 to 12: Our Impact

In 2008, United Way funded 53 organizations that used the funds to deliver 115 programs benefiting 42,000 school-age children, nearly 3,500 caregivers, and over 3,000 families. United Way also funded 62 programs and initiatives at 43 agencies across the region that target a broader population, of which children age 6 to 12 are a part.

In 2008/2009, we continued to build on the extensive expertise and relationships that have been cultivated over the last three years, while at the same time expanding into new areas of investment. Overall, we invested $4.5 million in children age 6 to 12 and their families. Throughout the year, we worked with many others to address issues, take action, and ensure positive results.

In 2009, thanks to the funds raised in the 2008 campaign, United Way will invest approximately $5 million helping kids age 6 to 12 to be healthy, happy and resilient.

Our children 6 to 12 face challenges

Did you know?

  • Children in middle childhood, age 6-12, spend about 67 hours a week in unstructured activities – that’s more time than they spend in school.
  • Many kids come home after school to empty houses, with little or no adult supervision and spare time to fill. As a result, United Way-funded research indicates that children are experiencing a rising sense of social isolation. 
  • Children in middle childhood want to be more engaged in activities that build their competence, physical health, and connectedness.
  • More children are experiencing mental health problems that emerge during the middle childhood years.
  • Many problems that appear in middle childhood (e.g. social isolation and declining self-esteem), if left unchecked, become more challenging as at risk children move into adolescence.
  • As many as forty one per cent of kids in grades 4 to 7 say they’ve been bullied and/or bullied others monthly.
  • BC has the highest child poverty rate in Canada. It’s the only province where child poverty rates were actually higher in 2006 than in 1997.
  • More than half of BC’s poor children live in families where at least one person has a full-time job.
  • Children from low-income families are less likely to do well at school, have lower literacy levels and are more likely as adults to suffer from job insecurity, underemployment, and poor health.

Impact Highlights

Since 2006, United Way has facilitated partnerships between agencies, school boards and community leaders and has invested nearly $1 million to make the Community Schools’ Partnership possible. Community schools: partnering with school districts and municipalities, United Way has increased the number of community schools in Surrey from one to 17 in 2009 and strengthened the coordination and programming in more than 50 existing community schools, through a neighbourhood ‘visioning’ process, in Vancouver – the result, maximizing neighbourhood access to public facilities during the after-school hours in both these communities.

Investments for our children during out-of-school time

In 2009, United Way supported a record 20 after-school grant projects throughout Burnaby, Surrey, and the TriCities area for a total of approximately $1 million. For the second year in a row we are targeting out-of-school programming in communities in the region. The result?  Programs are serving more than 1,300 children and 800 families, operating out of 45 sites. Six hundred kids every week are involved in after-school programs that provide a safe and fun alternative to being home alone.

United Way of the Lower Mainland helped to create a program that increases the success of at-risk, elementary school children. Friends of Simon (FOS), a program offered in partnership with Simon Fraser University, recruits university students as literacy tutors, particularly for immigrant and First Nations children. Working with community agencies and schools, FOS offers tutoring support during after-school, Saturday, and summer programs. Children increase their literacy skills through a range of activities. The result in 2009: 230 children are tutored each week during each school term; 57 active SFU tutors; 55 tutoring hours provided per week; 14 community sites throughout Surrey, Burnaby, and Coquitlam. The goal is to employ up to 100 tutors by the end of 2009, working in twice as many sites, which should allow the program to reach about 400 children each week.

Our investments for children 6 to 12 are guided by research and community engagement.  For example, through research with UBC, we learned what children are doing after school, what they want to be doing, how they feel about themselves, and what can be done to help them reach their fullest potential. United Way of the Lower Mainland is also working with UBC, HELP and the Vancouver School Board to implement a Middle Childhood Development Index (MDI) to measure success in achieving our commitment to kids 6-12.