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To highlight the work Creation Grantees are doing in their communities, the Creation Community Grants Team sends out Q&A forms so they can share their experiences creating and carrying out their projects. Today we are featuring responses from Shanna, Delany, and Taylor of Wikwemikong Wolverines Hockey.
Community: Wikwemikong Unceded Territory
Grant Type: Scaling Grants
Q: Tell us about your group and project!
A: Wikwemikong Wolverines are a youth-led hockey group that supports programming across different stages of hockey development in our community. We play in tournaments and host various free community events centring on physical wellbeing through mobility, agility, strength, and cardiovascular fitness. Alongside the physical domain, we aim to foster community and connect with youth by focusing on mental and emotional well-being. We build in moments of reflection, gratitude, and confidence-building into the programming so youth participants can feel good inside and out!
Q: As the youth running the project, what impact do you hope it will have?
A: We hope that our project will support the development of physical exercise with our young people and build connections and a sense of camaraderie through struggling, laughing, and persevering through challenging workouts together! We hope that young people leave our events feeling accomplished, stronger, and more adaptable to deal with the highs and lows of everyday life. We aim to instill self-confidence, mastery, and a proud Anishinaabe identity. Most of all, we hope a significant impact is that our hockey camps, tournament participation, and dryland events bring moments of joy for Anishinaabe youth as we all play and prepare for the game that we love – hockey!
Q: What is something you have learned?
A: We have learned that project management is a huge commitment, and that promoting our events to ensure that youth can see, with sufficient notice, what is being offered is a key part of running the projects! We have had some learning curves, but our social media presence has been growing, and we love sharing pictures of our participants following our events. It helps build our community and celebrate the young people coming out each week!
Q: What is your favourite moment from running your project
A: Recently, one of my favourite moments has been pulling into the dryland space to see youth waiting and ready to begin dryland! It can feel like such a gamble whether we will get participants, but each week we have been consistently getting young people, which is heartwarming. They show up ready to work, and we have such a blast earning our water breaks, getting a sweat on, and working hard throughout the session. Each other’s grit and energy often inspire us, and it helps us to work harder together!
