Have you got game? If you do, you could help Serve!

Bay Street Hoops is Toronto’s premier corporate charity basketball tournament. Held on March 29-31, 2007, the event brings together men’s and women’s teams from leading professional firms, financial services firms and corporations for three days of exciting basketball. Serve! is one of the beneficiaries of the tournament proceeds.

If your company wants to help Serve! and have employees that play basketball, then why not consider putting together a team for the tournament. All teams play in a three-game, full court 5-on-5 round robin tournament with experienced referees. The tournament also includes:

• Mazda Shoot Out: win a chance to shoot for a brand new Mazda CX9.
• The Investors Group Long Distance Shoot-Out: Each team can send one player to a three-point shooting contest and win great prizes for their whole team.
• The Sport Mart Kid’s Clinic: a free clinic that teaches kids 12 years of age and under the basics of basketball, and is led by an experienced children’s basketball instructor. Local sports celebrities often join in and all participants get a loot bag
• The RBC Direct Investing Post-Game Party and Charity Auction: all players are entitled to attend the Post-Game Party and charity auction following the championship games on Saturday, March 31, 2007. The Party will be held at the fabulous Steam Whistle Brewery and includes dinner, trophy presentations, and prizes. A charity auction charity will be held during and after the party.

There were lots of smiles at the Church of St. Stephen-in-the-Fields on College Street on January 11, as the latest participants in Serve!’s Experience This! program graduated.

From July to December 2006, the participants, who adopted the name Team Genesis, enaged in the Experience This! program’s curriculum of team building, personal development and working in the community. Throughout the summer and fall, the team worked with children at The Nook at the Christie-Ossington Neighbourhood Centre and assisted seniors at Dixon Hall. They also worked at the Toronto Botanical Gardens and the City of Toronto Green Roof Project. A key component of their work will be to implement the workshops on hate-motivated crime created by last winter’s team in the Expanding Minds to End Violence project.

At the graduation ceremony, family, friends project partners and supporters of Serve! gathered to honour the commitment and contribution the six team members made. There were a number of presentations by and for the youth participants. There was also a presentation from Patricia Landry of the City of Toronto (Natural Environment and
Horticulture), and Serve!’s Board of Directors chair Christopher Cutler ended the night on a high with his storytelling. Most of all, though, it was a night for the members of Team Genesis to shine.

“Graduation is a time to thank those who helped you make it through the six months.” said the team’s Valedictorian, Tasha. “(It’s a time to thank) parents, friends, facilitators, staff, volunteers, board members, project agency partners, and funders but mostly team members because, all the accomplishments wouldn’t have been done without the team. I am here to tell all of you that being a friend and supporter to someone is the best gift that you can ever give them.”

Congratulations to Jamila, Tasha, Raymion, James, Kim and Rosemary on completing the program!

George Stroumboulopoulos, host of The Hour and a long-time friend of Serve! was on the holiday edition of CBC’s The Gill Deacon Show where he played in their “Cranium for Ca$h” segment. Naming Serve! as his charity, George spun the big wheel and managed to win $1250 for Serve!

For details on the holiday edition of The Gill Deacon Show, view their blog. If you missed it, don’t worry-- the episode repeats on Sunday, December 24 at 11am.

Thanks to George for supporting us!

Serve! is pleased to have Jennifer Hollett as the guest speaker at Serve!’s Annual General Meeting on November 16, 2006.

Jennifer Hollett is best known to youth as “that redhead chick from MuchMusic”. While a VJ at Much, Jenn interviewed many big names - from Canada’s Prime Minister Stephen Harper to Beyonce.

Jenn recently travelled to East Africa as a volunteer with CARE Canada, where she documented the stories of Kenyan youth facing various issues, including HIV/AIDS and violence against women. This video was part of a multi-media speaking tour that visited secondary schools across Canada in spring 2006. Jenn will be speaking at the Serve! Annual General Meeting about her volunteer work.

The Serve! Annual General Meeting will be held on Thursday, November 16 at 5 pm at the 519 Community Centre (1st Floor, New Wing), 519 Church Street, Toronto. The meeting is open to the general public. Contact us for more information.

To find out more about Jenn Hollett’s work with CARE Canada, visit the YouthCARE website.

The latest issue of Momentum, Serve!’s newsletter, is now available! Our venerable publication received a bit of a facelift this issue, and there are lots of articles and features about Serve and its work, including:

• Travelling the Road to Malvern: a look at Serve’s new summer program in Scaborough
• Postering Up The Summer
• Doing something about hate crime
• Barenaked in Rosedale 2006 is taking care of business
• An interview with a recent Serve! graduate, plus a profile of a Serve!’s current Experience This! program and a donor profile of Jays Care Foundation
• And more!