North Cedar Middle School
If you drop into the North Cedar Middle School gym any morning between 8:30 and 9, you’ll find most of the kids participating in a fitness program led by their fellow students and supervised by the Vice Principal, Darren Dickie and Roger Douglas, the Principal. Roger has been starting each school day with fitness programs since his first day of teaching 33 years ago...

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Jodi Crawford
Jodi Crawford is a Grade 7 teacher who, along with her students, is working with the Our Hidden Heroes Social Responsibility Program, a program that evolved out of this column over the past six or seven years...

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Karen Miller
When I first started writing this column, I assumed I would be flooded with emails and phone calls from people wanting me to write about one or more of their former teachers because almost everyone I know has had at least one teacher who has made a dramatic impact on their life but that hasn’t happened … until recently...

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John Barsby Life Skills Class
The Life Skills class at John Barsby Community School runs a Snack Shack selling chips, pop and candy at lunch time and before and after school. Each week they make a tidy little profit from their enterprise...

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Bruce Mitchell
For many of us our best friends are Hidden Heroes but all too often we don't tell them.

"I'll tell them tomorrow," we say but "tomorrow" never seems to come...

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Hidden Heroes Education Society
Now that our Hidden Heroes Education Society has officially joined forces with School District 68 and the Malaspina Education Department, the school-based Hidden Heroes Project has gained renewed energy and rapid new growth and I can't stop myself from bragging a little about the recent work done at Chemainus Elementary Community School...

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Ruth Malli (L) and Colleen McGuff-Dean
I participated in a four-day Appreciative Enquiry workshop at Malaspina U-C last week. Appreciative Inquiry is based on the assumption that every human being and every human system is good at the core and that when we draw out that good, positive change happens...

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Marie Harel
It's a joy to see Marie Harel, the principal of Uplands Park School, walking down the hall greeting children, parents and teachers. It's easy to see she loves her job and that she's good at it ... really good at it...

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Chris Tamm
Today's Neighbourhood Hero is Chris Tamm, head of the math department at Dover Bay Secondary School. Chris has nurtured an ember of an idea brought to the school in the mid nineties by, John Miller, one of his students, and fanned that ember into a blaze...

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Linda Janes
When Sandra Grimes nominated Linda Janes as our next Neighbourhood Hero, her description sounded almost too good to be true, but when I talked to her boss, Mike Paquette, and a long-time Boys and Girls Club co-worker, Teresa Pring, their description was even more glowing...

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Harewood's Hidden Heroes Wall of Fame
Last Wednesday afternoon the South Side Teen Club, part of the Fifth Street Boys and Girls club, was crowded wall to wall with Neighbourhood Heroes and their friends...

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Shelly Beleznay and John Barsby Students
As I said a few weeks ago in a column focusing on Coach Rob Stevenson, good things are happening at John Barsby Secondary, really good things...

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Rob Stevenson
Great things are happening at John Barsby Secondary School. The Chef's Program is second to none, the school-wide literacy program is beginning to pay huge dividends and the Barsby Bulldogs football program is nothing short of amazing...

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Betty Dillabaugh
"I didn't realize how much it meant to have you here until now when I'll soon have to learn what it's like not to have you."

That's what Grade 6 student, Sarah Bateman, wrote in a memory book the students at Uplands Park Elementary School gave to Betty Dillabaugh last week when she retired as their school librarian...

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Les Annesley
We've set a new Neighbourhood Heroes record.

Recently Gary Ford nominated Les Annesley as today's Neighbourhood Hero and eleven other people added their name to that nomination. They include: Ray Kulai, Tom Krall, Neil Dillabaugh, Stella Robinson, Jan Bracewell, Pat Ford, Lenore Socal, Les Dickinson, Heather Chase, Ann Marie Hewer, Sue Gueulette...

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Terri Mack
Ten years ago, when Terri Mack learned she had a severe allergy to flour, she was forced to give up her nine-year career as a baker. That loss led to her finding her true self and all the strength and power that comes from such a discovery...

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150 Ways to Show Kids You Care
Paul Grey's Grade 5 class at Coal Tyee and Noreen Keen's Grade 6 class at Uplands Park are the first School District #68 classes to begin piloting our new Hidden Heroes WebQuest (www.nhero.org) and, from the early results, I think you'll be hearing a lot about them in this column over the next few weeks...

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Cheryl Garrett
At the age of thirty-one, with three small children and pregnant with a fourth, Cheryl Garrett's marriage ended...

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Dover Bay Secondary School Leadership Class
Laura Harrison, a teacher at Dover Bay Secondary School recently presented her class with a Neighbourhood Heroes certificate that read, "I nominated this Grade 11/12 Leadership class (first ever at Dover Bay) because of their incredible gift to inspire others through their hard work, smiles and sincerity. They are truly making a difference in our school and community as they "Spread The Love" each and every day. These amazing students have demonstrated that they have the desire and the power to lead the way by setting a positive example for others..."

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Dr. Pat Ross
Think back to when you were ten or eleven years old. If you are pretty happy with your life today, chances are there was someone or some organization that had a positive influence on you during those years; a teacher, a coach, a neighbour, a relative, a church group ... or a Boys and Girls Club.

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Lisa Robinson
"I have never met a more positive, devoted educator than Lisa Robinson," Lois Russell wrote when she nominated the Dover Bay Vice Principal as today's Neighbourhood Hero...

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Rotary Zimbabwe Project
Whenever they stop to think about it, I'm sure the students at Mountain View School realize just how lucky they are. They're surrounded by beautiful open fields, have a new $20,000 playground ... and they have a whole lot of wonderful desks, chairs, books, rulers, erasers, pencils, pens and paper...

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Ray Schlitz
Ray Schlitz, a Grade 6/7 teacher at Park Avenue School, is cool, kind and extremely patient. He just keeps going until his students get it and he always makes work fun and easy for his students...

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Gordon Howe
Most of today's column was written by Thomas Thierstein, Erin MacDonnell and Daniel Ekstrom, three students from Mary-Lynn Epps' Grade 8, Textiles and Crafts class at Cedar Community Secondary School...

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Sharleen Lapadat
We all know that great teaches can have a lifelong, positive impact on their students. If you had seen the look on their faces as Marcus Negrin and Nick Lawrence interviewed their Neighbourhood Hero, school librarian, Sharleen Lapadat, you would know that she is one of those teachers...

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White Rapids Summer Swim Club
"How was the meet? How did you do?" Those were the first questions Eric Robinson asked his granddaughter as she walked through the door...

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Lindy Edgett
I saw a top ten list of fears recently, fear of death was number seven, fear of public speaking was number one. Lindy Edgett is committed to helping people overcome that number one fear...

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Sally Norris
Ashley Robertson, a 14 year-old student at Wellington Secondary School, wrote today's column. A talented poet, singer and writer, Ashley reviewed our Neighbourhood Heroes WebQuest program designed for students and then interviewed and wrote this column about Sally Norris, today's Neighbourhood Hero. I've never seen anyone do a better job on a first effort of this nature.

Here is Ashley's column:
When I first saw Sally Norris, the First Nations Elder in Residence at Dover Bay Secondary School, she was literally glowing...

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Marie Hutton
When I met Tom Hutton (last week's Neighbourhood Hero), I also met his wife Marie Hutton and Sounder (this week's Neighbourhood Heroes).
Marie and Tom are both teachers who retired from NDSS in 1996. That's when Sounder joined their family. Sounder is a Golden Retriever...

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Tom Hutton
Most of us have had at least one or two teachers that have had a major impact on our life, yet after seven months of writing this column, no one had nominated a teacher as a Neighbourhood Hero...

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Ian Patterson
"Ian Patterson is the kind of guy that proves the old saying, 'You can't judge a book by its cover'". That's what the nomination form from Nanaimo Youth Services said about him...

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A Class Full Of Heroes and Hero Hunters
We are fortunate to have so many exceptional teachers working with our children and then there are teachers like Trish McKinlay whose light shines even brighter than most, a light that is reflected and multiplied many times over by her students...

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Bill Pineo
At the age of 81, Bill Pineo is doing everything he can to help students get the kind of education he was unable to get. Chances are he would have got a great education had penicillin been discovered in 1926, the year his father, a Port Alberni druggist, caught pneumonia...

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Aggie Frenchy
When I first walked into Aggie Frenchy's home, she hugged me from across the room with her gentle smile, her sparkling eyes and her generous spirit...

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Bob Bayless
Although he loves the game and plays it well, for Tyson Mereweather, the words "fun" and "hockey" seldom came together in the same sentence but then coach Bob Bayless came along and things changed…

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