All smiles at Grandview
Oshawa Generals, Smilezone Foundation help revitalize Grandview Children's Centre
Everyone was showing their pearly whites for a funding announcement from the Smilezone Foundation and the Oshawa Generals at Grandview Children’s Centre. The centre is receiving $5,000 to go toward improving treatments and activities.
By Joel Wittnebel/The Oshawa Express
In a room filled with sunlight, the smiles shone brighter.
Local organizations, dignitaries, Grandview Kids and their families recently gathered in the newly renovated Grandview Children’s Centre to celebrate the work that went into sprucing up one of Oshawa’s key efforts in helping children with special needs.
The Smilezone Foundation, along with a $5,000 donation from the Oshawa Generals, renovated eight key spaces inside the centre in an effort to better improve treatments and activities for the kids that rely on them.
“Personally, it is just something that is dear to my heart,” says Rocco Tullio, owner of the Oshawa Generals, who was on hand for the event. “When we bought the organization eight years ago, we wanted to give back to the community…This was a perfect fit for us.”
The Oshawa Generals, a hockey club known for its community outreach, also had captain Anthony Cirelli, Mitch Vande Sompel, rookie Jack Studnicka and Riley Stillman present for the event to visit and sign autographs for the kids in attendance.
“It’s a huge honour for me for sure, and the rest of the team just to be here,” Cirelli said. “We just try and do as much as we can for the community.”
As part of the renovation, eight spaces inside the centre – the pool, clinic room, hallways, the main atrium and four treatment rooms – were revitalized with new floors and paint jobs. The work also includes the instalation of additional equipment for the kids with sensory panels, tactile tables and iPads all being added to the centre’s repertoire.
One of the treatment rooms that got a facelift was the treatment room used for botox. The treatment is used to help with the muscle problems faced by children with cerebral palsy. Derek Rogers, 11, has lived with erebral palsy all his life and has been attending Grandview since he was 15-months old. He was elated to hear about the renovations.
“It felt good to know that they are trying to make things a little easier for me and other kids like me,” he said during his speech at the event.
The Smilezone Foundation was founded by former NHLer Adam Graves and Scott Bachly and has revitalized and created a total of 44 “Smilezones” in facilities across the province.
Graves and Bachly were joined at the event by former Gen and NHLer Eric Lindros.
Lindros, a dedicated supporter of Easter Seals, an organization also helping children with special needs, says the efforts of the organizations are very much interwined, and he was happy to support the event.
“Many kids get dealt a really tough hand and to have a place while they’re in the situations that they’re in so they can get away a little bit and take their mind off what the current situation is, to be kids, to have fun, to explore, to be creative, to do arts and crafts, video games, whatever the case may be, it’s wonderul,” Lindros says.
The work at Grandview’s Oshawa location is the second Smilezone renovation Grandview has received with the first coming in August 2015 with work at the organization’s Abilities Centre location in Whitby. Grandview serves 5,000 children with special needs and their families across Durham Region.