by Karine

Last December, I wrote a little something about our upcoming Retreat Yourself weekend. The dates were locked, May 27-31 2010, the location as well, Edenvale Retreat Centre in Abbotsford just outside Vancouver, but we were going to officially open registrations in January. Well it’s January!

Since my last post on Retreat Yourself, I had many questions about the retreat that we usually hold in the summer east of Canada. Just know that we are not forgetting about a Retreat East, we are exploring other options and possibilities and will let everyone know where and when this event will take place.

In the mean time, we are really excited about the retreat in Vancouver. We are opening the registrations to any young adults in Canada who have never been to one of our Retreat Yourself weekends (so yes, this means people on the east coast, as well as the west!). The weekend is free (accommodations and meals) and we have travel assistance to help people who are struggling financially get to Vancouver. It is an unforgettable weekend and we can't wait to experience it with our amazing facilitators and retreaters!

The spaces are limited, so people should connect with us now!
For more details, you can connect with Karine at karine@youngadultcancer.ca.

Posted on Jan 25, 2010 - 12:03 PM

by Karine

A little more than a year ago, YACC made major changes to our website and updated everything. In the process, many improvements were made, many more are to come but there are also some things that were put on ice to find a better system to make them available to you.

One of those things was the information on local resources for young adults. Even though there are still not enough resources out there, there are some organizations doing an amazing job and we need to promote them more efficiently. You can find some of these organizations on the Links section of the Community, but we know not everything is there. We try and keep up with support groups across the country as best as possible. Finding the existing resources is a challenge. Some initiatives are cancer specific, have a time limit, are for young woman only, etc.

To keep an accurate and relevant list of resources we need reliable sources. YACC will celebrate its 10th year of existence this year and in those 10 years, we saw our network of professionals grow and get stronger. Until now, they have been our biggest source of information when it comes to services specifically for young adults or relevant to the population. They usually connect with us when a new service is available or when they want to create something for young adults.

Our survivor community also plays an important role in feeding us information about the local resources. They are an essential source of info for us because they not only know what is out there, but very often, they have experienced the resource and can tell us what it can do for the young adult population. The constructive feedback is then passed along to the local organizations asking for guidance and information while creating new resources for YA (full circle).

Until we have our new web tool to find resources in Canada (which is in development), we will try and list local as many support services in the country as possible. With the help of one of our SIA (Survivors In Action), we started to update the information and will put it up on the site in the next couple of weeks.
If you know about a good resource for young adults in your community, please connect with us.

Posted on Jan 19, 2010 - 06:00 AM

by Lesley

We are losing a member of our team on Friday. Emily Geary, who has been our Director of Fund Development since May, is leaving YACC for another opportunity. While we wish Emily all the luck and happiness in the world and we will miss her terribly. Her knowledge of the not-for-profit world was one thing, but her glowing personality (sarcasm and all) will be missed by all of us here at YACC.

But as Geoff so wisely puts it, Emily is just on loan. We will get her back some day!

Until that day, good luck Emily! You made a huge impact on us as individuals and on the organization as a whole in these past few months. We hope you are as happy in your new position as (we know) you were here!

From the YACC Team!

Posted on Jan 07, 2010 - 10:54 AM