by Scott Hayes
Tyler Gilmore will be entering Grade 6 at Muriel Martin Elementary School with a heartwarming story about what he did on his summer vacation. The 10-year-old boy collected a truck-full of pop cans and bottles to help buy backpacks and supplies for Edmonton’s homeless community.
It was all part of an extracurricular project spurred on by his school’s interest in We Day activities.
“We brought home a note for summer telling us to think about something to do for We Day,” he said, referring to the international movement that gets schoolchildren to think and act on global social initiatives. One of Tyler’s friends volunteered at a seniors’ home.
He had a different idea of how to help people though.
“We went to a friend’s house – he’s a police officer. He told us that in Manitoba (homeless people) really appreciate backpacks. He’s said that he has seen them five years down the road and they still have the backpacks that he gave them.”
Gilmore’s mom, Cindy, said that her son took on the project himself, first distributing flyers to neighbours. One Saturday morning, he went out on his scooter to bring in the recyclables.
“He figured that there would only be a few bags to bring up. He had a wheelbarrow. He came back and said, ‘Oh … I think we need the truck.’”
He even got permission to scour a campground looking for extra empties. The whole collection period took a few weeks and it resulted in enough bottles and cans to fill the bed of the family truck.
The smell?
“Yeah. No.” he said, sarcastically scrunching his nose.
The bottle depot offered him $200 for his returns and some straight cash donations brought his total somewhere around the $350 mark.
“Some of the people that he went to when he was talking about doing this for donations, they just gave him money to go and help pay for it. They thought it was a great idea,” Cindy noted.
The money allowed him to purchase 50 backpacks, a fresh pair of socks, a toothbrush and tube of toothpaste for each bag.
They will be delivered to Edmonton’s Hope Mission on Tuesday. Cindy said that she’s proud of her son’s hard work and is pleased that the social agency was excited to hear news of the gifts.
“They said that they were quite short right now.”
As for Tyler, the project was easy to undertake and has a relatively high payoff, considering the amount of work and the number of people who stand to benefit.
He said he’ll probably do it all again too.
“It was quite fun. Sorting the bottles was kind of a pain though.”
