What Does Giving Back Really Mean?

Typically, the holiday season is one of the busiest times for most non-profit organizations – not due to need, but due to those looking to help.

Calgarians have been inspired to support their neighbours though donating time, food, and funds to help those less fortunate in our communities. Especially when facing such an unprecedented economic downturn, we hear of stories every day praising the generosity and resiliency of Calgarians to help one another.

This phenomenon was mirrored at PMDC when we started collecting food donations for our Annual Food Drive in support of the Calgary Food Bank. The very first thing we did to kick off our campaign was to ask our dance families to bring in boxes to collect our donations. To our delight, we received dozens of emails and phone calls from families within the first hour of our request saying they had boxes we could use.

After a month of our campaign, our dance families had donated over 150 pounds of food items – which actually matched our donation from last year. At a time when many families are cutting back and being more conservative with expenses, it was thrilling to see such an amazing response to our campaign.

“I am so proud of our dance community and the donations we were able to provide to the Food Bank,” said Nicola Kozmyk, President & Artistic Director. “Not only does giving provide an immediate response to a problem, it allows us to show our youth the impact we can have on our community. Giving our dancers the opportunity to take the message of philanthropy home and share with their families and friends is an invaluable way for us to prove how important it is to help our neighbours and be community leaders”.

Although PMDC’s campaign is officially wrapped up, we would still like to encourage you to help our community throughout the rest of the holiday season – as well as year round! Donations can still be accepted online any time of the year.

So now it’s our turn to ask you: What does giving back really mean to you?

Share your insights and connect with us on Facebook or Instagram.