The Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver (JCC) named a recipient of the Lieutenant Governor's Arts and Music Awards

The following is excerpted from the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver.

Thanks to a citizen who got the ball rolling with a passionate letter of nomination, the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver (JCC) has been named a recipient of the Lieutenant Governor’s Arts and Music Awards. This prestigious one-time honour, marking the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, recognizes organizations like the JCC that have excelled in fostering wide community engagement through a robust spectrum of arts and culture programs. Most important: the Award emphasizes the JCC’s unwavering commitment to diversity and inclusivity.

It all begins with the words of Heather Schneid, whose daughter Sarah discovered “a previously untapped creative passion” in the Art Hive and Theatre Lab classes she attended among other programs run through the JCC’s Inclusion Services. Writing to the Honourable Janet Austin, Lieutenant Governor of British Columbia, Schneid stated: “The quality of the arts and culture programs is unlike anything we have found elsewhere. They are professionally delivered and of the highest caliber, and yet individualized to meet the special needs of the diverse participants.” In particular, Schneid praised the JCC’s annual Jewish Disability and Awareness Inclusion Month (JDAIM).

For a growing number of Vancouverites from all religious and ethnic backgrounds, and across all ages and abilities, the calibre and staggering range of the JCC’s work is well-known. A schedule of performing and fine arts programs coincides with an array of sport, leisure, and fitness options inside a facility that houses a theatre, art gallery, library, gymnasium, and pool. The Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver is also widely known for its annual Jewish Book and Chutzpah! festivals—both occupying a key place in the city’s cultural calendar—alongside more practical community services including pre-school and toddler daycare. 

In addition to all this, the JCC sponsored and hosted BC’s first Terry Fox Run and has provided financial assistance to those in need for its camp, daycare, and sports programs. It also offers physical rehabilitative programs and assistance to seniors while successfully focusing a portion of its work on programming for adults and children who face other barriers. 

In short, the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver has unequivocally met the standards set out by the Lieutenant Governor to “promote social equity, equality, inclusion, and to enhance the well-being of communities of all sizes and citizens of all ages.” Since its inception in 1928, and under the visionary leadership of current Program Director and Inclusion Services Coordinator Leamore Cohen—praised in Schneid’s letter as a “rare individual”—the JCC has been a champion of multi-ethnic and multi-cultural life in Vancouver, open to all, and dedicated to the cultural growth and well-being of the city.