Cindy Smith - Inspiring Youth

Cindy Smith is an English and Leadership teacher at College Heights Secondary School. Throughout her teaching career, she has gone above and beyond her teaching job to provide opportunities for youth to make a real difference in our community locally, provincially, nationally and internationally. She has been a proactive role model, spending many weeknights and weekends (literally thousands of out of school hours) working side by side her students.

Working with her students, she has raised thousands of dollars for many worthwhile non-profit charitable organizations including Relay for Life, COPS for Cancer, the Kordyban Lodge, the Terry Fox Foundation, the Northern Uganda Development Fund, Free the Children, and Camp Good Times.

One of the supporters for Cindy’s selection as one of the Citizens of the Year wrote: “I believe that her commitment to creating youth volunteerism is an integral part of why Prince George is the volunteer capital of Canada.”

Her activities with youth are broad and include one-on-one mentoring, organizing regional and provincial leadership conferences, working with the Yellowhead Rotary Club of Prince George to establish a junior Rotary Club in the school, known as Interact, and being a founding member of “Happy is Healthy - Kids Helping Kids”, a mentorship model to promote healthy choices.

Not only does Cindy dedicate many hours as a volunteer through her professional work, she has consistently volunteered in the community at large including being a leader within Scouts Canada, a soccer coach with the Prince George Youth Soccer Association, and co-chairing the volunteer recruitment committee to find the more than 45,00 volunteers needed to host the 2015 Canada Winter Games in Prince George.

Cindy’s work motivating and developing tomorrow’s leaders as an educator, as well as taking on leadership roles in the community with her volunteer efforts, has earned her the recogniton as one of Prince George’s 2016 Citizens of the Year.