Medicine Hat’s Be Youth group participating in Alberta-wide bottle drive
By Jeremy Appel on October 13, 2018.
jappel@medicinehatnews.com
The Hat’s Be Youth is participating in the province-wide Great Prairie Bottle Harvest today, where it will be collecting empty bottles to raise money for its programming.
“The funds will come back into our youth centre,” said Jill Forsythe, Be Youth’s co-ordinator.
Be Youth typically offers free programming six days a week, she said.
Some of the programming the centre offers for youth includes a supper program Tuesdays and Thursdays, brunch on Saturdays, pool lessons, skating and various field trips.
“We want to teach basic life skills, like cooking, cleaning and that type of thing, but (also) resiliency, creating a better sense of community with our youth, giving them a bigger voice in our community,” Forsythe said.
Be Youth will be collecting bottles from 1-5 p.m. in the Southridge and Saamis Heights neighbourhoods.
It’s their first year participating in the drive, so there’s no specific expectation of how many bottles they will collect.
“The sky’s the limit, really,” said Forsythe. “We’ll just be collecting whatever we can get.”
The Great Prairie Bottle Harvest reached out to Be Youth to have them participate in the drive, not the other way around, she added.
“They were just reaching out to different non-profit organizations and some youth-serving organizations to see who was available and able to participate,” Forsythe said.
Those who don’t live in Southridge or Saamis Heights and want to contribute can drop off their bottles at the centre at 102-1201 Kingsway Ave. in the afternoon.
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