Features

On August 27, a dreamcatcher with a tiny orange beaded shirt in its center was placed at the Kamloops Indian Residential School monument. A note below the dreamcatcher said: ‘Made in honour of the residential schoolchildren who never returned home, by the Pathways Indigenous brothers at CSC Joyceville Minimum Institution.’

The Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) is proud to work with thousands of members of the public in various capacities across our organization. They help (CSC) fulfill its mandate by bringing a community perspective to our work and contributing to the successful rehabilitation and reintegration of offenders.

The Rev. Dr. Carol Finlay, a retired educator, has always had a passion for helping others and giving back to the community. In 2008, while searching for life’s purpose, she found herself reaching out to Correctional Service Canada (CSC) Collins Bay Institution in Ontario, to propose a new program: a book club for inmates. Carol got the idea from scholars she met online in London, England who had started book clubs in their local penitentiaries.

Michelle Moore, an Institutional Parole Officer at the Correctional Service of Canada’s Matsqui Institution in Abbotsford, British-Columbia, observed a face-to-face meeting between an inmate, under her supervision, and the mother of the young man he had shot and killed.

Recently, Stony Mountain Institution has launched a beekeeping initiative with the help of CORCAN and community partners, fuelled by staff ingenuity and inmate participation.

When Eva Goldthorp put an orange paper heart in her living room window in Chilliwack, British Columbia, she had no idea that hundreds of orange hearts would soon hang in windows across Canada.

Every fall, since 1981, William Head on Stage (WHoS) has been attracting audiences of up to 2,500 over 15 nights.

In 2018, the CORCAN employment and employability program started a beekeeping initiative as part of the re-opening of the penitentiary farms at Collins Bay and Joyceville Institutions.

From April 18-24 2021, the Correctional Service of Canada celebrated National Volunteer Week.

One morning during the summer of 2019, Dawne Flaborea received an unusual phone call. A North Atlantic right whale had died, and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans wanted to bury it on the property of one of the Correctional Service of Canada’s CSC east coast institutions.  

A group of correctional officers from Edmonton Institution (EI) established a workplace fundraising committee in response to the needs of families whose loved ones perished or were injured in the line of duty as correctional officers. Even though this cause was the drive behind their initial efforts, the EI Relief Fund has contributed to a variety of charitable organizations and causes since its inception. The EI Relief Fund fundraises through a variety of ways including receiving donations, activities such as BBQs and 50/50 draws.

In recent weeks, residents at Okimaw Ohci Healing Lodge (OOHL) made 25 quilted baby blankets to give back to the community. The Star Blankets will be donated to parents who have, unfortunately, lost their newborns during either the birthing process or post-natal.  The OOHL residents were compelled to make this offering as they themselves are mothers, Aunties, Kokums (grandmothers) and they understand the importance of children amongst Indigenous culture.