'Fall and get back up': Girls in Montreal learn hockey basics in free, 10-week inclusion program (CBC News - Montreal)

CBC News - Montreal - February 3, 2023

28 elementary school students, all girls, get chance to learn and play hockey for free.

Nishika Venkatachalam has been ice skating for years but, up until recently, the 11-year-old had never played hockey…

She is one of nearly 30 students at Cedarcrest Elementary School in Montreal's Saint-Laurent borough — all of them girls — that are getting the chance to learn and play hockey, free of charge, as part of a Canada-wide initiative to remove barriers to the sport. READ MORE >

How hockey can open doors and foster inclusivity for newcomers (Scotiabank)

Hockey 4 Youth founder Moezine Hasham, left, and Khaled Al Mouktaran, right, at the 2022 Tim Hortons NHL Heritage Classic in Hamilton, Ont.

Khaled Al Mouktaran first heard about hockey when he and his family arrived in Canada as refugees from Syria. The then-14-year-old was checking into a shelter at a Toronto hotel in March 2016 with his parents and three siblings when the front desk receptionist mentioned the sport.

“I thought hockey was something to do with shoes you run around in,” Al Mouktaran recalls. “Like baseball or badminton or something like that. I never imagined hockey meant having to skate, on metal blades. That was out of my imagination.” READ MORE >