Over 300 elementary, high school and university students packed into the Bill Comaskey Wellness Centre Feb. 12 to participate in a youth resource fair spearheaded by the Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak (MKO).
This event was designed to expose young people in both Thompson and surrounding communities to programs, services and job opportunities that are available through organizations such as Vale, the RCMP, Apprenticeship Manitoba, University College of the North (UCN) and the Keewatin Tribal Council.
Grade 12 student Hunter Beardy was the head organizer for this fair, and told the Nickel Belt News that it served as a natural extension of his position as a career focus leader for MKO.
“What I do is I try to find programs and I try to help youth such as R.D. Parker students find employment,” he said. “I do resume-building with them and all that, so having these opportunities to show students of UCN and R.D. Parker [what’s out there] really helps a lot.”
Even though he’s never put together an event of this scale before, Beardy said he was satisfied with the end result and hopes that this kind of large turnout leads to similar events in the future.
“It makes me feel great, because I love doing this, helping our youth and our people,” he said. “In the north we don’t have that much programs as down south, so having events like this will help give information to our youth.”
Now that he is on the cusp of graduating from R.D. Parker Collegiate, Beardy has his sights on pursuing a political science degree at the University of Manitoba.
