Parents attest to KidSport’s impact as charity looks to grow

By Sean Rooney on July 6, 2018.

Note: Stephen Oldford’s last name was misspelled in the original version of this story.

srooney@medicinehatnews.com @MHNRooney

Police knew the sight of her teenaged son as well as she did.

Her daughter was disengaged.

Her youngest? It wasn’t just autism to blame for the way he acted out.

But a year after getting them connected to karate and football, Cathy Lea’s family is turning the corner.

“We are now a family,” said Lea, not her real last name. “We weren’t a family. I would never have been able to pay for my children to go to all these extra-curricular activities if KidSport didn’t jump in and say ‘OK, we’re going to give them this much, which will help you.'”

Lea fled Edmonton two years ago due to domestic abuse, which is why the News is withholding her name for safety reasons. She came to Medicine Hat in search of a fresh start, but any single parent will tell you it’s never easy to make ends meet even if you’ve only got one extra mouth to feed.

Like many parents facing tough financial times, programs such as KidSport and JumpStart often aren’t on the radar until someone tells you about them.

“My daughter wanted to learn dance,” said Stephen Oldford, who’s got four kids aged six months to 10 years. “It was really costly so the studio said I could try KidSport for funding. I faxed them off an application, was excited they got back to me and we were approved.”

Lea and Oldford are but two examples of what the local KidSport branch looks to help out with. Times have been tough for them, too, in the past few years, but an influx of donations in 2017 means they’ve re-upped their funding limits.

“We got creamed in the energy downturn in 2014,” said KidSport spokesman Connelly Sherwick. “We had enough funds for 2015 and into 2016, but we ended up having to reduce our funding from $300 per child to $200 for the majority of 2017 and half of 2016.

“Now, we did two things. We adjusted the funding back to $300 per child (per calendar year) after a huge 2017 for donations. The community really came to bat.”

That’s great news for parents like Oldford and Lea, who are well aware of the benefits of having kids in sports.

Lea was determined to get her kids to be more active, and karate seemed like a good fit. After all, as she notes, the abuse she’s endured was bound to affect them, too.

“With the background I have, I grew up in abuse, I left and went into the system and everything. When you grow up in stuff like that you tend to re-live the cycle, and that’s what I did with my children.

“We did soccer, we’ve done football, and now they really enjoy the self-defence and everything.”

Sports isn’t the only reason her family is doing so much better, of course. She’s told her story through Big Brothers and Big Sisters and at the local women’s shelter, and hopes that in telling it she can raise some awareness for the work various groups do in the community.

Lea had to make it happen for herself, as well.

“Oh, absolutely,” she said. “I have a bunch of friends that have come from the women’s shelter. Us women, we try to stick together sometimes.”

Last year her 15-year-old “was being brought home by the police on a regular basis.”

“We had situations where he was jumping off the hospital roof in the middle of winter. That was a 30-foot drop,” she said. “He had witnessed a lot of the abuse that went on, so he didn’t have any positives in his life. We were in the women’s shelter, moved out on our own and I didn’t know what to do with his time.”

Solution? Fill it up. But football, while a great outlet for all her son’s anger, wasn’t cheap.

KidSport has made it manageable.

“I had to say we’re going to have to pick and choose what we’re going to do,” said Lea. “Now with football and karate I don’t have to worry about where my son’s at. By the end of the day he’s too tired to get himself into trouble.”

Oldford played hockey, volleyball, baseball and tennis growing up, and wants his kids to have the same range of opportunities. But he knew that wouldn’t be easy, not as a single dad with four kids.

“I didn’t know about it until I took my daughter down to dance,” he said. “It’s amazing, it’s great for the kids, to have the opportunity to use sports when their parents can’t afford it.”

Oldford never actually sees any of the $300. KidSport sends it straight to the dance studio, which keeps anyone in the system from taking advantage.

“We look at your data, your income — it’s pretty much black and white,” said Sherwick. “You’re approved or you’re not. Then we send the cheque out.

“There will be the odd situation where a terrible event has happened in the family so last year’s income is not applicable to the current situation. In that case we use our discretion and on we go.”

After helping an area record 314 children in 2015, KidSport was short on cash. The volunteer-run group helped 301 in 2016 but only 245 last year. With the limit re-upped to $300 and family income limits updated to reflect the current economy, the hope is to help even more this year.

Lea has all three kids in some form of martial arts now. With the funding, she only pays about $50 a month for it.

She definitely thinks it’s worth it.

“As soon as I put (my daughter) in karate it put her into the centre of all the attention, and it was all positive. I look at her report card today from last year to this year, and what a huge change that is. She feels like she has a voice because of the power she’s been given. She feels like she’s somebody.”

And her youngest? When he joined karate he would melt down, pulling his eyelashes out, hitting his head on walls. She was scared to take him to the dentist.

He sat in the dentist’s chair recently for a filling. Didn’t even need sleeping gas.

“A year ago he was too busy hitting his head off the wall to let anybody into it,” said his mom.

“They teach my kids things that I wouldn’t be able to — not just karate, but in life.”

To find out more about KidSport or to apply, visit kidsportcanada.ca to find the Medicine Hat and Redcliff chapter.

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