CNCK Fall 2009 Newsletter

Fall is here, hard to believe but true.... children are back to school. Our summer picnic day luckily was not a rainy day and fun was had by all. It was great to see new families come out as well.

Here at CNCK, we would like to inform you of our upcoming events. Feel free to contact one of us through our emails if you have questions, new ideas or know of new families who would be interested in joining our group. The more the merrier as we can see from the positive turnout to our family events.

June Bread and Honey Race recap

As usual Ellie has worked very hard with her running club volunteers to organize the Bread and Honey Race for the marathon runners of the Credit Valley Marathon Club. As most of you know, this event is our major fundraiser to plan and carry out our yearly events that are free of charge to our families. We want to thank our families that volunteered their time on this early Sunday morning to enthusiastically participate in handing out drinks or shoe chips and encourage the numerous runners. We’d like to remind you that every year we need you to volunteer at this event to make it possible for us to carry on our event planning the rest of the year.

“Designer Genes” DSAO Annual Fall Conference

The Down Syndrome Association of Ontario is proud to once again provide the fall conference in Peterborough this October 16-18th. Please see the DSAO website for all details on the informative workshops offered. The following topics such as understanding your child’s IEP, vision issues, RDSP explanation are included. Two keynote speakers, Barbara Hall, Chief Commissioner of the Ontario Human Rights Commission speaking on the topic of the right of Inclusive Education as well as Brian Skotko M.D. and author will speak on siblings issues. All details on location, registration and times can be found at: www.dsao.ca.

Down Syndrome Awareness Week Bowling Event.

On Thursday, November 5th, 2009 at 6 pm we will celebrate Down Syndrome Awareness Week with our annual bowling fun! Join us for pizza, bowling and family fun at Streetsville Bowl, 128 Queen Street. Please RSVP with your number of family members attending to Francesca at bellfrancesca@sympatico.ca.

We will also be conducting a short Annual General Meeting at this time. Please forward any nominations for the positions of President, Vice President, Secretary, Treasurer and Events committee leader to Lisa at: drummondl@hdsb.ca.

We are looking forward to have new members join the executive. We always need help to run the Caring Network. Please consider applying or nominating someone for the following positions.

President: The president organizes meetings, coordinates with the executive members to carry out planning events. At times, he/she visits homes of new members to deliver the Parent Package and introduce the function of the group.

The president writes and creates the newsletter in collaboration with other members.

Vice President: The vice president assists the president with the above tasks and other new endeavors offered to the group.

Secretary: The secretary takes minutes at the meetings, makes calls needed to coordinate locations for events and assists the president and vice president.

Treasurer: The treasure collects and dispenses finances, keeps records of all transactions and reports to the accountant once a year.

Events Committee Leader: We want to have more than one events coordinator, to plan different events, make calls and shop. We need co-ordinators for the Annual Christmas Party, Bowling Party, Bread and Honey Race. We are also looking for volunteers to start up some new initiatives such as a tween and teen members get together and a mothers group. Suggestions are always welcome for new events.

Media Co-ordinator: The media co-ordinator would be responsible for organizing the quarterly newletter by contacting members for articles, news and interesting pictures.