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THE CADRE, OCTOBER 22, 1974, PAGE 3

little People’s asks you to be «little People’s People

The Little People's is a project sponsored by Char- lottetown Youth Services which provides a program for the youth of Charlotte- town between the ages of 6 and 15. These kids do not fit into the.already estab— lished youth serving agencies and usually spend the major- ity of their free time on the city streets.

The program follows along the idea of a free flowing atmosphere, with the needs , of the children being tend— ed to, rather than emerging ‘ them into a‘structured pro- gram situation. The project started four years ago in‘ the fall of 1970 and was based out of Trinity Church using the facilities there such as the gym and class— rooms. In the spring of that year, 71, an OFY application was made for a summer camp but was turned down. The project closed and resumed again in the fall of 71 using the same facilities and same program. In the spring of 72 and OFY grant was attained which ran a summerjcampvat'Clear_Springs near Souris, R.E.I.yThere was a series of 4 ten day camps with 20 - 30 kids.

The campsite is 200 acres of land with both a rocky and sandy shoreline. There are fields and woods with various trails blazed through them with a fresh, clear spring from which wonderful drinking water is obtained. All in all it is comparable to a paradise on earth with the exception of a few insects..

The camp had moderate success due to the fact that the majority of the staff had limited camping exper— ience. In the fall of that year the project continued to work out of Trinity Church. In the spring the OFY grant was reattained to run Little People's day care camp at Rocky Point. The kids were taken every day via the Rocky Point - ferry for 10 days with a 3 day camp out experience at Rocky Point. The day care situation was not success- fUIl in that there was in- consistency in participation, and attendance but there

Was a relatively good response

t0 the camping out experience. The fall of 73 program

at Trinity was set up again and ran until the spring of 74 in which the kids raised $320. on their’own through coffee shops and dances to

be donated towards the 1974

a».

.Sﬂymer campgﬁeggthat

funding was attained for

a full time person to work year round in co-ordinating the project. For the third year there was an OFY grant to run Little People's summer camp at Clear Springs. The camp ran.basically the. same as the first year but this year stressed the en—- vironment and gave an opp- ortunity to live in the country as opposed to spend— ing the whole summer on the city streets.

'In addition to the 0FY,funds

were attained from the Sec— retary of State to hire 3 people to work in town to do. .f 91,191 pp, assassination

work with those children who could not go to camp, who were waiting to go to camp"and those who came back from camp. This project was daily, the aim being to

get the kids off the streets.

There were many trips to Rocky Point and Fort Amerst, 2 trips to Rainbow Valley, one to Fairyland and one to the Drive—In theatre as Well as various facilities around town. This program was fOund to be successful in that it helped the camp program out in recruiting kids for both programs and did not have

to deal with the problems the camp had such as home-

sickness, weather and insects.

For this fall the Little People's Project will be working in various program areas such as a good tutorial program for children having a hard time with their stud— ies in school, a sports or— iented program, arts and crafts program and possible week-end excursions to an indoor camp.

To carry out the project in these programming areas more volunteers could be very helpful to the project. If you are interested please contact Mike Doyle at 2-4289 or Louise Mould at 2-9863.