Big Brothers
Big Sisters of North Durham’s (BBBSND) Executive Director, Margaret (Margie) Ayres,
took on the responsibility of being a mentor to Matthew in March 2013. “I
wanted a better understanding of how the programs benefited the children and
ultimately, I wanted to be a mentor for the same reason as everyone else: I
wanted to support a child in our community” says Margie.
Margie and
Matthew started out in the In-School Mentoring (ISM) program in the last few
months of Matthew’s grade 6 year. During their time together, they’ve done a
bunch of different activities including cooking pizzas and baking cookies,
painting bird houses for Father’s Day, playing hangman and Dogopoly, playing
basketball, and sometimes just sitting and chatting. Margie’s favourite pastime
in their match is when Matthew is putting together a Lego sculpture “he’s so
good at it, reading all the instructions carefully, and patient with it, too,
unlike me” says Margie. Margie thinks Matthews favourite thing to do is play
Dogopoly “because he always wins and takes all my Monopoly money” Margie jokes.
Margie says
she likes spending time with Matthew because he’s very appreciative of her
coming every week and he’s always so polite. “He’s also got quite the sense of
humour, he’s quite sarcastic, but always making me laugh,” says Margie. Margie
explains that Matthew’s dad is also very kind to her “Every time I call
Matthew’s dad, he’s always very thankful for me hanging out with Matthew, and
so that’s really nice to hear.”
In July of
2015, Margie and Matthew semi-transitioned to the Traditional Program, meaning
that she mainly sees him once a week in the school, but she can see him in the
summer outside of school. Their first Traditional outing was to Joyride 150 on
Matthew’s birthday! Margie brought her son and a couple of his friends to ride
around with Matthew. Margie said they rode their bikes around for 7 hours and
they all loved it! Margie plans
on bringing Matthew along to a lot of BBBSND events so that he can see what it
means to give back to the community.
When asked
about what kind of relationship she thinks they have, Margie said that they are
friends. She has fun with him and can count on him, and vice versa. “I think he
really enjoys it when I come see him. He always wants me to stay longer than
the 1 hour I’m supposed to stay,” says Margie.
Even though
Matthew has recently been matched with a Big Brother who has more time to spend
with him outside of school, Margie and Matthew are going to continue seeing
each other in school, as well as occasionally outside of school.
If you're interested in learning more information about our mentoring programs, please call Cheryl Holmes at 905-985-3733 ext 2.
Photos were taken by the amazing Daniel Cullen.
If you're interested in learning more information about our mentoring programs, please call Cheryl Holmes at 905-985-3733 ext 2.
Photos were taken by the amazing Daniel Cullen.