Community involvement

This week I would like to give a shout-out to a few business owners who donated their time to help with student mental health and made big donations to community organizations.

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Last week Grade 10 students at Centre Wellington District High School participated in My Best Self Day for one period in the afternoon. They could choose which activity they wanted to participate in, be it art, martial arts, bike repair and more.

Two local business people also donated their time.

Meredith Blackmore of Studio Here in Fergus ran a workshop during which students were asked to draw charcoal chaos. Many students participated in the workshop and they were all talking and comparing their drawings once completed. By using charcoal they dirtied their hands and participated in an activity they likely wouldn’t get to do in their everyday school life.

The other business owner who donated her time was Evelyn Gould of Jester’s Fun Factory in Fergus. She brought a variety of board games for the students to try out.

Having walked through the majority of the activities in the My Best Self Day, I must say the Jester’s board game workshop was one of the most well attended and all the students were engaged and having fun in their activities.

Thank you to the business owners and the teachers who ran these activities. The idea that students got to spend a period enjoying themselves doing an activity of their choice is wonderful. It’s so nice to see the community coming together to make this happen.

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Tim Hortons on Thompson Crescent in Erin donated $4,997 to East Wellington Community Services. Of 250 Tim Hortons franchises, the Erin restaurant raised the eighth highest amount of money through the Smile Cookie fundraiser with support from local Remax agents.

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Shaman Seth Financial Services Inc., in Elora, with the help of other local businesses, raised $6,500 for the Canadian Mental Health Association Waterloo Wellington.

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Heads up downtown/BIA businesses in Wellington. Digital Transformation Grant applications are due on Dec. 31.

The program is funded by the Province of Ontario in partnership with the Ontario BIA Association and will help small downtown businesses across Ontario improve their adoption of technologies to better promote themselves online, sell online and run back-office processes online.

Participants must first complete an online survey of their technology use now and then develop a Digital Transformation Plan based on a provided template.

To help make the plan happen, businesses can apply for a one-time grant of $2,500 to help with the costs of adopting the new technology. For more information visit https://digitalmainstreet.ca/digital-transformation-grant/.

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Don’t forget to email questions/news tips to businessleader@wellingtonadvertiser.com.

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