Tyler Sommers' Blog

The Canadian Youth Assembly (CYA) in partnership with Canada’s World will be running a contest to test just how much you know about Canada!

This is a very simple task, all you do is get everyone you know (don’t forget to do it yourself!) to click the following link and follow the appropriate link!

http://www.canadasworld.ca/

Those who get 100% (you can do the test many times, so keep trying and keep learning!) will be entered into a draw for a $100 Amazon gift card.
You will also receive the “Canadian Knowledge” badge to proudly display on the CYA forum and have a feature in The Representative!

The contest will run from Friday August 27th until Friday September 11th (2 weeks).

The draw will take place on as soon as we tally all the results! Likely the following Monday.

There’s one catch! We have to get at least 100 different people to take the quiz or we won’t be able to hold the draw! So be sure to take the quiz and get everyone you know to take it! It only takes a couple minutes (if that)!

Go here for more info: http://cya-ajc.ca/forum/index.php?topic=1713.0

Tyler

Could the CYA incorporate as a charity without sacrificing any of it's goals?

Seems like it. The Youth Action Network is a charity (the first link didn't work, so go to the following link and search "youth action network" - http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/ebci/haip/srch/advancedsearch-eng.action)

They do much more direct advocation than the CYA and seem to be less focused on creating a dialogue, though I'm sure that this is something they do strive to accomplish! Young advocates for change may want to check them out, maybe get involved.

So, could the CYA incorporate as a charity without making sacrifices to what we do? It seems so. What would this involve? A slight change of our goals (don't worry, just wording, nothing would actually be removed) would be about it!

We'll have to see... charitable status could be just around the bend..

Tyler

Alright, so I'm finished my exam (Professor Fruchtman, if you read this, please give me an A

I set up a few of the blogs that were pending (everyone get blogging!)

We've been talking to an organization (http://canadasworld.ca) - they want us to run a program where we get members to do their quiz, and if we get enough we'll have a draw for a $50 gift card (not bad for a couple of minutes). We're just sorting out the last details and hopefully that will be underway soon!

I updated some things on the CYA site and the volunteering site.

I'm going to try to update the CYA site a bit more, maybe add in some different things to try to get people to poke around.

We're still planning the conference, though we're not sure if there is going to be enough attendance! Allison came up with some great ideas regarding where to have it, so I'm going to look into that and get the information out ASAP (it'd cut costs big time!).

Fun times.

TS

Hey, things have been a little slow.

I'm writing a paper and studying for an exam, so is Allison.

A couple volunteers are getting ready for school and doing other sorts of personal things, so we're struggling to get in our CYA time.

Now, I spoke with Allison about the conference and she mentioned booking a room at the University of Ottawa and that it would lessen our costs dramatically, so she's going to look into that for us in the near future. She's also working on a grant application (though it's Toronto based funding, so it will be for a Toronto based event - conference/workshop anyone?).

After I'm finished with my exam (A week this wednesday) I'll be back and doing more.

We have a few people helping out with a full CYA document for volunteers/candidates. We'll take parts of that out for regular participants.

Just to clarify: If you are running in the CYA election - YOU CAN VOLUNTEER. There are 3 options:

1) Run for CYA elections and don't volunteer
2) Run for CYA elections and volunteer on the side (you'll be acknowledged as contributing, but won't officially be a volunteer)
3) Become a full CYA volunteer and not run in the election (full volunteers must be impartial)

The only restriction is that you won't be able to do things that would be conflict of interest (officially outreaching for the whole of the CYA, if you're partisan, doesn't really work, etc).

So if you want to help out, don't think you're disallowed. You are allowed. You are encouraged to volunteer. Email me (sommerst [a t] cya-ajc.ca (remove spaces, replace with @) if you want to know what you can do. There's also a post on our forums at http://cya-ajc.ca/forum

TS