Every child deserves a chance to thrive. Thanks to the generosity of The Morris & Rosalind Goodman Family Foundation, its gift of $80,000 will enable Ometz to help children from financially vulnerable families access learning supports through the Ometz Give Attention to Prevention (GAP) Fund.

Ometz works tirelessly to help families respond to the needs of their children who have been identified in screenings and assessments as being in need of specialized psycho-social and pedagogical help, occupational and speech therapy. For many of these families, the cost of these services makes access impossible. The Ometz GAP Fund provides subsidies for academic and therapeutic supports such as speech therapy, occupational therapy, psycho-educational assessments, auditory processing assessments, tutoring and counselling.

The Morris & Rosalind Goodman Family Foundation’s generous donation, along with new funding from Federation CJA, will allow Ometz to offer critical learning supports to a greater number of students and to ensure that their needs are being adequately addressed.

“We are proud to support Ometz in its efforts to respond to the needs of families and children in the community,” says Shawna Goodman Sone, President of The Morris & Rosalind Goodman Family Foundation. “Our intent is that this funding will allow Ometz to make key resources accessible to our community’s vulnerable children at the time when this early intervention can have the greatest impact.”
Close to 25% of our school population currently exhibits difficulties or needs that may diminish a student’s ability to reach their academic and/or social-emotional potential. These may present in the form of learning problems, classroom behaviors that interfere with learning or social emotional symptoms that color interpersonal relationships either in school or at home.

“Ometz has as its overall mandate to help build communities by ensuring that individuals and families have the supports and resources they need to be strong, resilient and healthy,” says Ometz CEO Gail Small. “The participation of The Morris & Rosalind Goodman Family Foundation will help more students who are experiencing learning difficulties to remain in their school and use the GAP supports in order to achieve their full academic potential.“