Adventure Canada is a proud partner, sponsor and supporter of the Ayalik Fund, a charitable foundation dedicated to helping Inuit youths from Nunavut meet the significant challenges of growing up in Canada’s most remote communities. Every year the Ayalik Fund sends a number of Inuit youths—this year more than twenty, from eight different communities across Nunavut—to programs such as Outward Bound, Encounters with Canada, Brigantine Tall Ship Expeditions, plus other camps and canoe trips in the North. Working with community representatives on the ground in Nunavut, the Ayalik Fund identifies youths who fit the criteria: they will benefit from the opportunity, they need the boost in self-confidence, and they do not otherwise have access to such programs.
Founded on the basis of successful real-life experience, but born out of tragedy, the Ayalik Fund was established in memory of Eric Ayalik Pelly, from Cambridge Bay, NU. Eric benefited from participation in several different youth programs of this sort, which were fundamental in helping him develop his own self-confidence and self-esteem. Despite myriad challenges, he grew up to be a fine young man. Tragically, Eric died in his sleep in 2014, at age nineteen, of sudden cardiac arrhythmia. The Ayalik Fund and all of its participant youths honour Eric’s legacy, by following his lead. You too can help make a difference, one youth at a time.