Since taking on the role of Executive Director of Kids Can Fly in 2022, Becca McLellan has been driven to provide programs in areas of early child development and parenting support.
McLellan, who has strong experience in the non-profit sector, took over from founder Sharon Brooks. Brooks had helmed the organization for over two decades.
“We’re here to support families and all families, so we’re not targeted toward any particular demographic. We want to provide families with the support that they need to navigate the few years of childhood. If that means that a mom needs support with emotional wellbeing, we’re here for that or if a dad needs support in learning how to interact with their child, we’re going to help him,” she said.
However, McLellan has been focused on leading the transition phase of the organization.
“I’ve been able to stabilize the organization during that major transition…we’re still offering all the same services. I have helped make sure that there’s continuity [amongst] our donors, volunteers, [and] board of directors, even with a leadership change,” she explained. “We’ve also been relaunching many programs that had to be paused during the pandemic and trying to grow them now. So recently, we finished our first-ever strategic plan for Kids Can Fly. I spearheaded that initiative and worked in partnership with some board members and a consultant. And so now I’m working on fulfilling that strategic plan [which] is really about building up the organization’s foundation for unlimited future growth.”
Before joining Kids Can Fly, McLellan had worked at Why Not City Missions for close to seven years, an organization that continues to provide services like mentoring to at-risk and street youth in downtown Brantford.
“That work was really all about building up the organization so that we could help homeless and at-risk youth to reduce the crisis factors in their lives and move toward greater stability. The youth were dealing with things like homelessness [and] some were dealing with addictions. There were a lot of unplanned pregnancies, and many of them [coming] from abusive households. A lot of them had learning disabilities too and really struggled in school…so we just tried to be as much of a support to them during those vulnerable teenage years as possible,” explained McLellan. “We would try to help them to navigate housing [and] when I started, we only had dinner twice a week, but I rolled out daily meals so that every day they came in, they could get a warm supper. I also started a leadership training program, and I ran a volunteer program that was really successful. We had lots of partnerships with post-secondary institutions in particular, and so between community members and post-secondary students, we actually had a waiting list for people to volunteer with us, because we had a great retention among our volunteer base.”
Nevertheless, McLellan has always had a passion for helping others, especially when she came to Brantford for school and eventually settled in the area.
“I always was interested in supporting the community, even when I was a kid [and] I was doing fundraising …door knocking, and I volunteered mostly through church…[unfortunately] my high school had no social justice initiatives whatsoever [so] it wasn’t until my undergrad that I started to have a real opportunity to connect with the community,” she said. “I then moved to Brantford to come to Laurier and when I was 18, and pretty shortly after, I started volunteering in the community, and absolutely loved it. I started a program for concurrent education, which trained me to be a teacher, but I quickly customized it to include psychology and human rights and English, because I am also a writer [and] at that point I volunteered a lot. I got involved with the poverty round table while I was still in school [and] did a lot of volunteer work with Why Not City Missions.”
McLellan, who has also volunteered with other organizations in the community including Indwell and the Blessing Centre, has reveled in her time at Kids Can Fly and talks about Storybook Breakfast, which is an event focused on providing children and their families with a special opportunity to meet storybook characters in real life.
“It was honestly such a privilege to do Storybook Breakfast [which is] one of our biggest events [and] brought in 500 people this year…post COVID I had the privilege of rolling the event back out for in-person again for the first time in a few years, and it was beautiful. There was so much excitement and enthusiasm from all these kids who hadn’t ever been to anything like this before [and] hadn’t been to a gathering this large before,” said McLellan. “They came through and saw this gorgeous ballroom decorated to the nines and their eyes just lit up with wonder. And that was a really affirming moment for me. It showed me that what we’re doing really means something to these kids…because we’re really built on this idea that the first few years of a child’s life have a massive impact on the rest of their lives. And if we can invest in that critical period, we can alter their outcomes in terms of their learning, their career aptitude, their social-emotional wellbeing, their cognitive development [and] seeing that kind of action through storybook breakfast was amazing.”
Being in the non-profit sector for as long as McLellan has, she continues to want to do more especially in utilizing her experience.
“I’d would also like to provide more mentorship and coaching to other leaders in the nonprofit sector, especially smaller charities, because usually these are run by really lovely people, but who don’t necessarily have the training or background in running a nonprofit, and so I would really love to just provide some more support,” she explained. “But housing is another big focus of my mine moving forward…I want to see more innovation for housing that brings support to people with complex needs so that they’re successful in retaining their housing. Because it’s one thing to put someone in an apartment, [and] it’s another thing for them to still be there a year later.”
However, Brantford continues to be a big part for McLellan.
“This community is incredible. I find that there’s a wholesomeness to Brantfordians and people from the County [which] always warms my heart…I just find that this community has an enthusiasm…always showing up [and] getting involved…and I love it when kids are supported in learning about community work. I just find that this community has a hunger for good, and they work hard to see a lot of good happen,” she said.
