Article by Acting Det. Colin Simpson
A couple of years ago, I was approached by the staff of Malcolm Tweddle school about whether some police officers would be interested in playing a floor hockey game with the teachers, against the Grade 6 students. When the first group of us showed up, the game transformed from teachers/police versus the kids, to police against the kids.
The Grade 6 students charged their classmates $1 or $2 to watch the game and the money was donated to the Red Cross Haiti Earthquake relief fund. That year the police won.
A year quickly went by and I was approached by the school again and told that the new batch of Grade 6 students had been practising and couldn't wait for their chance to beat the police during their game. I was able to organize another team, with many members returning from the previous year, and the game was on. The money that year went to the Youth Emergency Shelter Society.
The gauntlet was yet again thrown down this year and I was told that the students were using their lunch break to train and were finally going to win. When I sent out the request for players, the response was immediate. On Feb.1, we played an eager group of students who raised money for the Youth Emergency Shelter Society.
We have been honored to help out in way we can and the students of Malcolm Tweddle should be commended for their efforts to help others in the community. Kids doing things to help kids...I don't know if it gets any better than that! We always have so much fun playing with the kids. To give the game a different twist we’ve used brooms, tennis rackets, rubber chickens and this year, even a vacuum cleaner.
I believe this is a great opportunity for the students to see police in a different light and for us to have an impact in the community. This year's Grade 5 students are already telling us to get ready for next year.