When the Winter Olympics open next month in Vancouver there will be 16 youth and two doctors involved in the WestView Primary Care Network who will have their own magical memories created when they carried the spirit of the Olympics through the final kilometer of the Torch Run in Vegreville earlier this month.
“I’ve been smiling since Tuesday and it was so awesome that it finally all worked out,” says Katerina Rain, a member of the Paul First Nation and one of the teens on the torch-bearing team. The team is part of the YAPP or Young Ambassadors for (Diabetes) Prevention and (Health) Promotion which was formed in 2007 as a partnership between the WestView Primary Care Network and Physician Collaborative in the Westview region with Paul First Nation Health Services and local high schools in the Stony Plain and Spruce Grove areas.
“Really, the whole thing is run by the kids,” says Dr. Allan Bailey, Physician Lead for the WestView PCN who was also one of the torchbearers. “Every term they come up with projects... they’ve had 20 events for the promotion of health. The idea is the kids learn about this stuff, they involve their families and it spreads from there.”
Events have evolved from a number of different ideas ranging from sports tournaments to hip-hop dancing to educational sessions focusing on diabetes prevention and healthy choices. As another way to shine a light on the positive effect of healthy living, the group submitted an application last year to the SOGO Active/Coca-cola torch-bearing committee. Imagine their thrill at being selected for the honour of carrying the Olympic Torch for the 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver.
Gary Michaud is a St. Thomas Aquinas High School Vice-Principal. He was among the large crowd of onlookers who gathered to see the torch run – he wanted to be there to support the students and Rain as she lit the flame from the stage cauldron and began the first leg of the run. He says the collaboration between health and education is an important one.
“Without students being healthy what is the point of education,” says Michaud, noting the importance of partnerships such as the one behind YAPP. “The more we have of it, the more it grows and the better off our youth will be in the long run. We see them at the front lines in schools and to me partnerships with healthcare in schools should be there for a long time.”
YAPP project coordinator Stefania Iacchelli speaks highly of the students and is proud of their efforts. “The level of engagement of the youth is an accomplishment. You know that these kids aren’t going to forget these experiences. They’re getting skills not just about health but about life”.
Olympic torch-bearer and YAPP member Teri-Lynn Adams has made the move from high school student to nursing student. She credits the youth group and its organizers with inspiring her efforts. She says WestView PCN Chief Executive Officer Grace Moe helped her secure an internship with the hospital in Stony Plain. “I really love the adrenalin rush of nursing, the action that they are doing. I really like to help people and YAPP inspired me to do that,” she adds.
Adam thanks the PCN and other former YAPP members for making the torch run opportunity a reality. "This torch means a lot. It's not just a flame, it's more than that. Everyboday is connected by this thing, whether we're natives, whether we're Caucasians, different ethnicities and we're all conntected in a certain way. It's amazing."