Thirty years ago, Suzanne Doyle-Ingram was a Linguistics student at the University of Victoria, and she was shocked to discover that there were members of the community who had difficulty reading and writing. Until that moment, she naively thought that illiteracy was something that happened somewhere else. Her passion for literacy enabled her to start a program called Students For Literacy at UVIC, where she recruited and trained 85 volunteer tutors and matched them with learners in the community. She ran that program for several years. It was through this experience that she learned several key beliefs that have impacted her life:
- You never know what’s going on in someone’s life and often people struggle in silence
- Every person can make a difference, even if it’s small and feels insignificant
- And lastly, her favourite quote by Dr. Seuss: “To the world you might be one person, but to one person you might be the world.”
Suzanne has always aimed to inspire her three children to think about others and to find ways to make a difference. As a family, they have travelled to over 10 countries and have often found volunteer opportunities both abroad and at home. She wanted to ensure that her children understand that we can never take food and housing for granted as there are so many for whom this is a daily struggle.
Suzanne is a firm believer that everyone deserves the right to safe and affordable housing, and she jumped right in when asked to support the Building Together project. Since 55% of children living with single parents on the Sunshine Coast live below the poverty line, this project could not come soon enough. Creating safe and affordable housing for 34 families is a good start toward alleviating our housing crisis.
