“Free from exploitation and disease.
Free from poverty and thirst.”

FREE THE CHILDREN: Free The Children is an organization founded in 1995 by a twelve year old Canadian boy by the name of Craig Keilbuger. It is one of the better known charities in Canada specializing in helping children in underdeveloped countries through education, sanitation, cleaning water, eliminating exploitation, and reducing poverty. Craig Kielburger created this organization after he saw a news article about a child labourer who was killed in Pakistan after he spoke up against child labour.

“It’s not charity. It’s sustainability. And no one is too young to help.”

In its charitable efforts the Free The Children Organization is being supported by several prestigious Canadian corporate sponsors such as Air Canada, National Bank, Investors Group, Me to WE, and Oprah’s Angel Network and many others. 

One partner that stood out to me was CTV. CTV is one of Free the Children’s major corporate partners. They are the main stream broadcasters of Free the Children’s most important and well known events, We Day.

WE DAY IS WATCHED BY MILLIONS ON CTV 

We Day was created by the Free the Children Organization, started in 2007 for students and youth, to influence them to make a positive change in society. It is a one day event that is hosted in large stadiums in selected cities across Canada for example Vancouver, Waterloo, Toronto and Winnipeg.  This is a day of celebration where many popular singers/dancers and speakers as well as many influential people perform inspirational speeches, songs and presentations that inspire youth to make a positive change in the world. This event is supported by corporate partners such as CTV for a worthy social cause. There is no admission fee but each group attending We Day must perform one domestic and one out of the country service during the next year.

An image from We Day

Some of the artists and influencial people that have performed or spoken at We Day are: Dr. Jane Goodall (founder of Jane Goodall Institute, UN Messenger of Peace), Al Gore (known for his film “The inconvenient truth”, former Vice President of the United States and Nobel Prize winner.), Elie Wiesel (Nobel Laureate), The cast of Degrassi: The Next Genereation, Jessi Cruickshank, host of MTV’s The After Show, Lieutenant General Roméo Dallaire (retired), Craig and Marc Kielburger, founders of Free The Children, Sarah McLachlan, The Jonas Brothers, Hedley, Jason Mraz, Justin Bieber and K’NAAN.

WE DAY!

 CTV is working presently together with Art Bound and Free The Children Organization to make a documentary movie about a trip undertaken by Craig Keilburger and representatives of Art Bound to Kenya to build an arts school. The intention is to inspire youth and to change their perception through contact with the arts.

One of the many ways I fundraised for Free The Children was hosting a boot camp! My amazing trainer Shanna (from FitnessFirst Personal Training) organized the boot camp for an hour and half work out that consisted of running stairs, taking laps around a park, tons of crunches and push-ups, running with sand bags and ball weights all in hot sunny weather! It was quite the work out.

The reason I chose to do a boot camp was because I am extremely passionate about fitness, health and wellness!

Shanna and I started to do these boot camps on a regular basis to fundraise for Free The Children! We created something called “Get Fit-Help A Kid” which is now the motto for all the boot camps we host!

I hope this educates you a little more on the partnership between CTV and Free The Children as well as what I have been doing to fundraise for Free The Children!

Have a good day!

Love,

Alexandra

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