We have had the pleasure of running many interesting projects over the years. Created and developed to benefit the youth and our Cowichan community as a whole. Check out some of our past projects below!
Girls Empowerment
Girls Empowerment was an 8-10 week series where youth were invited to join us for a group that included discussion, art, yoga, sharing, games, music and fun! A group for girls 12-14 years of age and for older girls age 15-17 years of age.
Throughout the series youth had the opportunity to connect with peers, express themselves, be heard, learn and create!
Some topics included feelings, boundaries, relationships, inner strength, coping and so on!
The Cowichan Valley Youth GSA
COS has been proud to offer the only GSA group for youth in the Cowichan Valley for many years.
Unfortunately, we don’t have the funding or the staffing to continue providing this awesome group at this time.
We will keep you posted if anything changes!
The COS Gay Straight Alliance is a safe, peer support and discussion group for GLBTQ youth and their friends. Our primary focus is supporting GLBTQ youth from the Cowichan Valley in feeling connected to the community, to other GLBTQ youth and to just have fun. GSA meets weekly with youth aged 14-19.
Links to recommended websites:
Transitions Workshops for Teens
Thanks to Coast Capital for sponsoring our Transitions Workshop Series. Over the past
year workshops designed for youth seeking independence were created. Topics included:
Health Relationships, Grounding/Self-Regulation, What is your personality?, Power of your thoughts, Leisure-
Wanna have fun?, Communication 101, Budgeting and Nutrition.
Workshops were presented by Facilitators from COS and were in-house, and at various alternative schools in the Cowichan Valley. The participants received life skills training from the over 70 interactive sessions.
Comments from some of our participants:
“I like how informative it was and how we all got to talk”
“I learned a lot and it was interesting”
“Great topic! Thank you!! :)”
Employer Youth Engagement Project
Community Options Society (COS) engaged in a project to research local barriers/resiliencies to youth unemployment. The Employer-Youth Engagement Project (EYE) involved conducting two surveys in the Cowichan Valley to capture youths’ and employers’ experience. Information from the surveys was compiled into a research report and two resource guides were developed – one for employers and one for youth. The project was funded in part by the Government of Canada’s Youth Awareness Program with some additional funding from Vancouver Island Coastal Health (CALL Out).
Setting the Stage
Setting the Stage project is a community collaboration between Community Options Society (COS) and Safer Futures / CWAV Society to look at identifying barriers-institutional and other factors-that affect the personal and public safety of youth and young women in the Cowichan Valley. This project started in 2013 and runs until 2015. To date, project staff has engaged in a host of activities to address youth safety in the community.
Generations
“Generations” was a project sponsored by Community Options Society (COS) in partnership with Volunteer Cowichan. The concept was to integrate youth and older adults in intergenerational activities and programs.
A small committee made up of youth from the alternate schools, a young adult and a local retired senior worked with us to determine an initial program. The ultimate aim of this project was to secure funding so that the initial program could be launched and other intergenerational program ideas implemented. The project ended when no further funding became available.
There’s always something new happening at CVYS!