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Whatever the Problem Call

By: Peter Slack
pslack@shaw.ca

In the early 1980s the dark secrets of child physical and sexual abuse in Canada started coming to light. Something had to be done. Kids in crisis needed a resource that provided them with a free, anonymous and confidential counseling service. In England, a service called Kids Help Phone caught the attention of the Canadian Children’s Foundation. Funds were then donated to create the service across Canada.

By the mid 1990s’ it soon outgrew the foundation, and blossomed into the Kids Help Foundation which was branded into The Kids Help Phone. (1-800-668-6868/ www.kidshelpphone.ca/en)

Now part of an international network, Canada is the leader in the number of contacts it has with young people seeking answers. Their slogan Whatever the Problem Talk To Us has resonated with Canadian kids. Recent surveys indicate 93% awareness of the Kids Help Phone.

Kathy Jagger, Regional Director for B.C. says, “we want Kids Help Phone to be the first number to call if they’re seeking a confidential and reliable service for support. Counselors answering the phones are paid professionals that can redirect the child to their local community. A resource of 37,000 Canadian Social Service Agencies can connect them to a local service in their own community.”

Jagger emphasizes that “the kids have to control the call and the conversation. In many cases this is the first time they’ve been in control and there is no pressure to have them give any information they’re not comfortable with. Callers are encouraged to call back as often as they wish, and do it at the beginning of a problem, not when the problem is huge and overwhelming.”

Kids Help Phone assists young people across a wide spectrum of circumstances and issues. In British Columbia there were 115,000 calls tracked in 2006. Thirty percent are children at risk – prone to dangerous behaviors such as self harm, eating disorders and depression. Seventy percent are kids who, for the most part, cope with the stresses of growing up, but are faced with a problem too big to handle on their own or dealing with the normal issues of growing up (puberty, dating, bullying).
Jagger said “something usually triggers this crisis like a death of a parent, grandparent or friend. Their world has been rocked, so they’re reaching out for support. It doesn’t take very many changes in a child’s life to have them move over to the high risk category when talking about gangs, drugs or everyday pressures. Kids Help Phone provides them with options.

Getting the message out to young people is a constant challenge. Jagger said, “the best way to get information out is peer to peer. We also partner with Much Music and other corporate sponsors that produce products children use, like Nestles chocolate, Boston Pizza and information on milk cartons.

Talking to potential adult donors and supporters, The Kids Help Phone promotes how much the service is helping the youth of the next generation and its importance. “The corporations in Canada have been very good to us,” said Kathy Jagger. “We were one of the first ‘cause related’ marketers in the country. Founding members of the Canadian Children’s Foundation were marketers, not fund raisers. We don’t have brick and mortar costs; the youth we are helping are anonymous.
They brilliantly came up with the idea of allowing corporate donators to use the foundation’s logo on their products and in their marketing. It creates good will and synergy between a good corporate sponsor and an outstanding charity.”

The Kids Help Phone has founding sponsors, companies and organizations that help fund its $10-million plus annual budget.

After 18 years, The Kids Phone Foundation is now getting into philanthropic giving.
Jagger said, “we are now into our first major gifts campaign. Not a capital campaign, because we don’t have a building or anything physical. Raising $7.5 million will allow us to expand and improve services and meet growing demand.”

So far in BC there is no government financial support for The Kids Help Phone. This is in contrast to Ontario that has provided funding towards bullying programs over the past three years.

Kathy says her greatest challenge is getting the adult population to understand how beneficial the service is to the youth in their community. She says, “it’s the normal, everyday kid. It’s not somebody else’s child. It’s the kid next door; it could be your own child. You don’t know because it’s anonymous and confidential. The callers trust us. Getting the adults to realize we are a valuable service to the youth of British Columbia is one of my major goals in 2008.”