In November 2017, A Way Home Kamloops, Katherine McParland, co-founded the B.C. Coalition to End Youth Homelessness (BCCEYH) in partnership with Fred Ford of Pacific Community Resource Society.
Vision
Thriving Youth: Housed, Healthy, and Heard
Our mission is to centre youth voices in systemic solutions to youth homelessness, through advocacy, collaboration, and the relentless pursuit of equitable access to housing and supports.
Our Values
We elevate youth voices and youth engagement is the center of our work together
We are courageous and relentless - equity work within a coalition takes courage to speak truth to power
We understand that youth homelessness can only be solved by looking at how equity and justice issues are at play in creating youth homelessness.
We collaborate and support each other in our expectation that no youth should become homeless and all youth should have the opportunity to thrive.
1. Youth Voice- Elevate and center youth voice in all of our internal and external work by magnifying the voices of youth with lived expertise
2. Capacity & Collaboration- increase funding for coalition work that supports the capacity and collaboration of current and new coalition members and ensures strong representation across the province
3. Government Relations- actively engage with multiple provincial ministries providing strong advocacy and policy suggestions that move the provincial government to create a youth-specific housing strategy and shift the focus to supporting youth to thrive
4. Advocacy & Communications- be a loud entity both virtually and in person, that is recognized as a valuable source of knowledge as it pertains to ending youth homelessness in BC and that ensuring youth thrive.