Supporting Our Communities Through        
Time, Talent and Treasure
 

Sidoo Family Giving Scholarship

Congratulations to Emerson Bauer who is the recipient of the Sidoo Family Giving scholarship!  

My Son Jordan Sidoo, who is a passionate soccer fan and former student athlete, and I are very excited to continue to support young student athletes, who have special talents, reach their potential and ultimate dream. Emerson will be able to display his talent in the UK for all to see. Good luck to him and the Supra team.  

“We continue to support those young student athletes that are very talented but unable to afford to go on life changing trips. Experiences like this” 

– David Sidoo

David Sidoo

David Sidoo – Sidoo Family Giving and Kids Play

Sidoo Family Giving is proud to be supporters of the Kids Play Foundation. It is a wonderful organization helping kids enjoy sports of all kinds. Thank you to Kal Dosanjh for making this wonderful Foundation happen!

Dylan Sidoo, Jordan Sidoo, David and Manjy Sidoo Support Old Yale Elementary School’s Emergency Weekend Food Fund

David-Sidoo-feeding-the-poor5-300x169With the recent school year coming to a close, David, Manjy, Dylan Sidoo and Jordan Sidoo recently received a heartfelt thank you for their significant contribution to the Weekend Food Program that has been supporting 17 vulnerable, low income and highly at-risk families with children attending Old Yale Road Elementary School in Surrey.

20% of the families of children attending the school are defined as low income and many students arrive at school with little or no food. The reality for many of these children is that they have little access to nutritious food at home. Though the Food Bank does provide a resource for families, often it is not enough or the families are unable or unwilling to access those resources.

sidooIn order to support those families in need, Old Yale Road Elementary started an Emergency Weekend Food Fund to provide emergency non-perishable food items to those most in need and in times of crisis.

For the Pilot Project 17 families were selected based on who would benefit the most and who was in the greatest need. Each Friday they would attend the school to receive two huge bags of groceries to carry them through the weekend. In the case of a few families who were unable to attend the school, some of the school staff would deliver the food to their homes to ensure that they were taken care of.

With the support of David, Manjy and Jordan Sidoo, the Emergency Weekend Food Fund has provided Old Yale Elementary with the “realization…that anything is possible, and that (they) are more than just a school; (they) are a community.”

David Sidoo and Manjy Sidoo Supporting and Working with the KSF

PRESS RELEASE

Applications open for KSF: Artists of Choice Awards 2016

The KSF has announced the launch of this year’s KSF Artists of Choice Awards, their flagship funding and mentoring initiative for emerging artists in the genres of Theatre, Dance, Film and Musical Theatre. Applications are open to artists resident in the UK, USA; and for the first time this year, Canada made possible by a partnership with KSF and Manjy and David Sidoo and the support of The Sidoo Family Giving Foundation.

KSF Artists of Choice Awards will be made to four UK-based, four US-based and four Canada-based artists or companies, each will receive up to £10,000 or $10,000 in funding, year-round in-kind support from KSF and an industry mentor.

2015 UK recipient Robby Graham of Southpaw Dance Company said of the Awards, “It isn’t just a pot of money, it is more importantly a package of support tailored by people who are passionate about artistic development and who believe in your work.”

Applications are open now on the KSF website closing on Friday 4 March 2016. Applicants will then be shortlisted and in-person interviews with an industry panel will take place in early May 2016. The Awards are open to emerging artists in Theatre, Dance, Film or Musical Theatre who have an exciting, creative and unique project. Those applying will also be required to provide an industry referee that knows their work as well as examples of previous projects or reviews.

Founder of KSF said:

“Last year’s recipients have proven to be accomplished artists and have benefitted hugely from the support of my foundation and their individual mentors. I’m very much looking forward to reviewing this year’s applications and seeing what creativity comes our way from Canada as well as the UK and USA.”

Steve Winter, Executive/Creative Director of KSF, said:

“It has been massively satisfying to not only see the work develop but also the relationships between the artists we’ve supported. I know they have been inspired by each other and the commitment they’ve shown to developing their craft. I feel certain this year’s applicants will be just as enthusiastic and inventive with their project applications.”

Manjy and David Sidoo, Founders of the Sidoo Family Giving, said:

“We are pleased to be supporting and working with the KSF and supporting the arts in Canada. We are excited to see this year’s applicants from Canada.”

A panel of respected creatives will help select the recipients. Last year’s panel included film director Andrew Haigh (Weekend), Head of BBC Films Christine Langan, Director of Europe for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Carola Ash, Atlantic Theater’s Artistic Director Neil Pepe, American Ballet Theater’s Artistic Director Kevin McKenzie, actor Cush Jumbo (The Good Wife), theatre director Jamie Lloyd, actress and singer Laura- Michelle Kelly (Finding Neverland), English National Ballet’s Tamara Rojo, actress and singer Cynthia Erivo (The Color Purple), musical director Ted Sperling and choreographer Wayne McGregor,

The Foundation launched the KSF Artists of Choice Awards in 2015 receiving over 1,200 applications. Awards were made to nine emerging artists. With the expansion of the award to Canada the Foundation hopes to build on its previous success, highlighting the rich diversity of talent there. Previous recipients of the KSF Artists of Choice Awards include:

DANCE USA: Stefanie Batten Bland of Company SBB. The company presented their work Patient(ce) at Harlem Stage, New York, last year. The piece introduced crowds to a performance that examined the critical relationship that the musical, physical and visual arts have with space and time.

THEATER (USA): Ghazi Albuliwi of West Bank Brooklyn Productions. His production of Highly Suspect debuted in December 2015 in New York starring the Obie award-winning actor John Douglas Thompson. The New Group and director Ian Morgan mentored the project.

FILM (USA): India Dupré. Stripped is a true story of family survival, matriarchal sacrifice and forgiveness. In 1979, after being lured to Australia with the promise of a better life and having her three young British children placed in work camps as part of a “Keep Australia White” scheme, a shy yet determined mother becomes a stripper to survive, kidnapping her children back and fleeing across Australia.

MUSICAL THEATER (USA): New York based artists John McGrew, Jonathan Karpinos and Joseph Varca are focused on developing new works exploring the intersection of storytelling and music. The Village of Vale is an original gothic fairytale told through music, art, the written word and performance. Four actors and an eight-person live band create the stories of villagers and strangers in Vale.

DANCE (UK): Robby Graham of Southpaw Dance Company. The company will debut their work Speakeasy at Dance City, Newcastle in March 2016. The piece is a modern interpretation of the classic tale ‘Faust’ featuring Breaking, Charleston and Lindy.

THEATRE (UK): Cressida Brown of Offstage Theatre. Re:Home focuses on the effect of austerity, regeneration, and the Olympics on the residents of the Beaumont Estate, East London; and is a sequel to their first play Home. Re:Home debuted at The Yard, London in February 2016.

FILM (UK): Michael Van Der Put of Broken Hearted Youth. Played out on a five-a-side football pitch Rage explores political anger and apathy felt in the aftermath of the London riots. The project will complete it’s filming later this year.

MUSICAL THEATRE (UK): Writer Chris Bush and Composer Matt Winkworth are developing a new work written in faux- verbatim style. The musical examines the events following the assassination of a controversial public figure.

Timeline:

  • Applications open: Now
  • Applications close: Friday 4 March 2016
  • Interviews: Monday 2 – Monday 9 May 2016
  • Awards Made: Early June 2016

Notes to Editors:


Contact: Steve Winter

 

ABOUT KSF

The purpose of KSF is to discover, train, fund and mentor emerging artists in drama, dance, music, and film as well as developing life enhancing theatre-in-education projects across the globe, in line with its vision statement to: ‘Send the elevator back down’.

KSF’s recipients are those seeking a career in the performing arts and film predominately – but not limited to – secondary school children, further and continuing education students, undergraduates (freshmen, sophomores, juniors and seniors), post graduates, graduates or those without formal education but the talent and drive to succeed.

Sidoo Family Giving Sponsors Breakfast Club in Downtown Eastside Vancouver Community

David Sidoo and Manjy Sidoo

Sidoo Family Giving Sponsors Breakfast Club

On Monday May 14, 2012, David Sidoo and Manjy Sidoo joined a number of smiling young faces at the Strathcona Community Centre to present on behalf of Sidoo Family Giving a $20000 donation to the Breakfast Club programs offered there. The Vancouver Sun newspaper’s Adopt a School program matched the Sidoo Family Giving donation.

The breakfast program at Queen Alexandra School and Strathcona Community Centre feed a healthy breakfast 200 of Vancouver inner-city children – and family members if needed – who go to school in the morning with empty stomachs.

Sidoo Family Giving has already actively sponsored Breakfast Clubs at David Sidoo’s alma mater New Westminster Secondary School in New Westminster, BC. In late 2011, Manjy Sidoo read an article in the Vancouver Sun’s Adopt-a-School series that detailed Queen Alexandra School and its needs. “The story just spoke to me. The programs there are so important to maintain and I said to David ‘this is a school I want to help as well as Strathcona,” said Manjy.

In the 14 years that the breakfast program offered out of the Strathcona Community Centre has been running, the number of children being fed has almost tripled.

David Sidoo was initially shocked to learn that children in his own backyard are going to school without a nutritious – or any – meal in the morning. “We all need to know this. We have to keep it in our conscience…” said David.

It can make an incredible difference in a child’s life to have a nutritious meal each morning. And it’s David and Manjy Sidoo’s hope that others will follow their lead and take action to support local breakfast clubs in their backyard.

 

 

David Sidoo
David Sidoo
David Sidoo
David Sidoo
David Sidoo

Sidoo Family Giving – David Sidoo and Manjy Sidoo

Dylan Sidoo, Jordan Sidoo, David and Manjy Sidoo Spread Warmth this Christmas

On December 15th, 2012, David and Manjy Sidoo and their two sons joined volunteers and members of the Association of South Asian Professionals (ASAP) in a Blanket Drive near Oppenheimer Park in the Downtown Eastside. The Sidoos and David Gadhia and family donated 300 blankets to the cause and were on hand to distribute them to those in need on that cold and rainy Vancouver day.

The Sidoo Family Giving manifesto is “Supporting our communities through time, talent and treasure.” With the line up of recipients stretching for blocks, the Sidoos and other ASAP volunteers saw clearly how much of an impact the Blanket Drive made on the lives of many in their community. “When you see such poverty you have to do something. After we’d handed out all the blankets and stuff we later saw a few guys sitting on a bench wrapped up in them and I told Jordan ‘take a look, that’s why we have to help,’” said David Sidoo.

Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/life/Adopt+school+Lord+Selkirk+Annex+gets+playground/7738790/story.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3a+canwest%2fF229+(Vancouver+Sun+-+News)#ixzz2Fz4rHaPl

Read more about ASAP and the day’s event here and here.

David Sidoo

The Sidoo Family and members of the Association of South Asian Professionals (ASAP) handing out blankets.

May this season find you wrapped in the warmth and love of those in your community!