The Importance of Children

I had the opportunity, as a Board Member of Big Brothers/Big Sisters here in Victoria, to meet with the new Representative for Children and Youth (Province of BC) today. Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond is a woman of vision for our children in this Province. A number of points that I took from the meeting is that we as a society must put children first—kids really matter—and it is imperative for our society to give them a status of importance.

In of her role, she sees that she needs to push for an independent, non-partisan (i.e. non-political) plan for children with some measurable targets and indicators to show how we are doing as a society in this area. Too often children are being lost within our systems because we have not set some goals to strive for. One area that comes to mind is how the children in care in this province are doing poorly in educational outcomes. The ministries involved in these children's lives are seemingly acting independent of one another.

One of our points at the meeting and what I have been writing about fairly consistently is that mentoring is an important part of children's development. Another important part that Mary Ellen mentioned is the role of an advocate in children's lives.

I look forward to seeing what positive things that Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond will bring to help us work towards a better society for our children.