Fellow Blog Post – Week 1: New Beginnings at Bridgeway

June 11, 2024

Many new things are in the works at Bridgeway. As we start off strong with the beginning of our summer program and planning ahead for our upcoming 20^th year anniversary of our organisation, we are embracing the changes with creativity.  

The Bridgeway summer program spans over a period of 8 weeks. Lead by our staff member, Rachel Nicelley, the summer program will center around a theme each week where students participate in hands-on activities while they continue their learning from the regular school year. We kicked off the first week of the program with art week. This week, students exercised their creative ability by making self-portraits in different art styles. Rachel explained that this idea was inspired by a previous art piece that was displayed in the previous building. The art piece was a wall made up of unique ceramic portraits that gave the building a unique character. Though Bridgeway was unable to bring the ceramic piece into the new building, Rachel wanted to bring a different version of it through student-made portraits. These portraits enable our students to celebrate their unique individuality as well as exercise their leisure, sensory, and fine gross motor skills. Similar to how the ceramic portraits were displayed in the old building, we want to collect these portraits and compile them into a collage that will be displayed in our gym so that staff and visitors can celebrate the creative ability of our students.

In this way, we are using nostalgia from the past to create something new and true to our current identity. This is a reflection of how we want to approach our 20^th anniversary celebration.

From starting as the Helping Hands Center years ago to starting operations in our new building, we want to recognise the accomplishments and values that brought us to where we are today. Though we are using this anniversary to celebrate our history as an organisation, we want to use it as an opportunity to look into the future with optimism. We want to view our past as an indicator of our dedication to serve our community for the 20 more years to come.

With many events happening in the next couple months, communications becomes an important focus for the Advancement team at Bridgeway. The team met this week to create a content calendar for the summer to strategise best ways to communicate the stories and work that happens within the organisation. Needless to say, the many exciting projects will soon be showcased on our social media.