This year's walk, to be held Oct. 9 from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., marks the 30th time the Scarborough students will cut class to make the hike from their school atop the Scarborough Bluffs down Brimley Road to Bluffer's Beach. Through community sponsors the student body is seeking to raise $30,000, half of which will be donated to Canadian Jesuits International, who will use the money to support the efforts of Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) in the Middle East.
“Of course you are going to be walking for your own school community and to raise funds for the very important things that you'll be doing throughout the year,” Krista Tasala, CJI's youth outreach co-ordinator, told the student body during the first of two assemblies held at Newman on Oct. 2. “We are also very grateful that your school has decided to raise funds for a very special cause to support people on the other side of the world, people that you don't know.”
Currently JRS is supporting Syrian refugees in the countries neighbouring the civil war-torn land. JRS is working to provide Syrian refugees with emergency relief, education and health care as well as providing accompaniment and psychosocial support.
“They also advocate and speak out about the situation they are witnessing,” said Tasala. “Their staff are Jesuits and also many lay people and they are working right now inside Syria in a war and also in neighbouring countries. They are serving all people who are displaced.”
About six million Syrians “are in urgent need ... because of the war,” with about four million within the country forced from their homes and two million already out of the country. Tasala said about 75 per cent of the displaced are woman and children.
Last year Newman student council president Melissa Andrade witnessed first hand the pain Syrian youth are experiencing because of the conflict.
“I was helping out an ESL (English Second Language) class last year as a peer tutor and one girl actually came from Syria,” said Andrade. “She had mornings where she just sat down and she looked like she was going to cry. It is upsetting because we take everything for granted sometimes.
“It is so saddening and my heart just goes out to them.”
Student council vice-president Christian Young is also saddened by the effects the Syrian civil war has had on its people.
“It just makes me so sad that we have to sit by and idly watch these kids go through these big obstacles,” he said. “They are denied access to school, they are denied access to water, they are denied access to food or even shelter and I just think as a human being you should expect those rights. It saddens me to hear that these children are being denied those things.”
By restoring these things to the Syrian refugees through JRS, Talasa said the students at Newman are also restoring hope in the people.
“Refugees leave with almost nothing,” said Talasa, but “the refugees outside of Syria have hope. So as we think about the people in Syria and we shout out for peace we can have hope.”
The money collected will be presented to CJI on Nov. 13.