Wealthsimple Foundation

We wrapped up Wealthsimple Foundation Week, showcasing our impact, giving a big shout-out to the Wealthsimple volunteers who made it all possible, and gearing up to create even more impactful programming! 💪 🎉 The highlights: - Listening to Wealthsimple RESP clients (Vaishali Kaverimanian, Fatou Balde, Joe Fowler, RSE) share their experiences planning for their families' educational and financial futures. Learning first-hand what matters most to the people we serve! - Engaging with Wealthsimplers to highlight our mission, honour our Volunteers of the Year (Joann Lai, Jay Young) and energize us for the work ahead! - Celebrating our amazing community of volunteers and kicking off the long weekend on the Wealthsimple rooftop! Thank you to everyone who joined in and made this week special. You're helping us make education more accessible for everyone! Leen Li, CPA, CMA Emily Naddaf Gina Skočaj Zhané Stimpson Maryam Jawansheer Sarthak C. 📸 Hardik Khetrapal

How do we ensure our work in making education more accessible for all remains grounded and impactful? Yesterday, we launched Wealthsimple Foundation Week with an RESP Client Panel, where we heard directly from the clients we serve as they plan the educational and financial futures for themselves and their families. We learned that reaching out to our communities to promote education savings and financial literacy is more crucial than ever. Parents are navigating numerous complex challenges when planning for the future, while students and young people are seeking immediate resources to kickstart their paths to financial freedom. Every Wealthsimple client has a story. Thank you Fatou, Vaishali Kaverimanian and Joe Fowler, RSE for sharing yours with us. The vibe was incredible—full of laughs and touching stories that reminded us why we do what we do. Your insights are helping us create education savings programs that truly connect with more people on their journey to financial freedom. 🎓🚀

Our funding partner Wealthsimple just launched a new scholarship... Paying for post-secondary can be complicated, Wealthsimple wants to keep it simple. That’s why Wealthsimple has launched Canada’s Simplest Scholarship: a $5000 scholarship to help one Wealthsimple RESP beneficiary pay for their next semester. No essays, no transcripts, no lengthy application process. Just have (or open) a Wealthsimple RESP and apply. PLUS when you open a Wealthsimple RESP, you’re automatically applied for the Canada Learning Bond. A $500-$2000 government grant to help you cover education costs. ⅔ of youth under 21 are eligible - yet thousands are leaving money on the table. We want to help you get what’s yours. Apply for Canada’s Simplest Scholarship by July 4, 2024. 🎓 💸 https://lnkd.in/gBqGhGYZ.

Everyone has to file their taxes, so why do they always feel so daunting? We hear it from community all the time - tax season is NOT something people look forward to or enjoy. But, really, it should be simple. Filing your taxes means you get access to important benefits, and hopefully, a nice little return from the CRA. So, each year, we try to make it better. And this year, we saw a BIG demand for our tax workshops, underscoring the critical need for accessible financial education in our communities. This year we: 📚 Educated 195 people on tax basics 🖋️ Delivered  tax training to118 filers 📂Filed 68 tax returns 🎓 Supported 308 participants, including 76 students Thanks to our partnerships with outstanding organizations like YWCA Toronto, YWCA Metro Vancouver, Ernestine's Women's Shelter, McMaster University's MAC Money Centre, The Leacock Foundation, Federation of Black Canadians, and several others, we've been able to scale our programming to support +20% more events this year and +400% more people. Special thanks to our dedicated volunteers: Dorra Bouchiha, PhD, Clint Lacroix, Fazi Kiani, Celine M., Jackie Izzard, Tyler Hamilton, Guy Tsror, Lucas Yang, Natasha Anzik, Victoria Hale, Sudarsan Ramesh, Manuel Agudelo, CIM®, FCSI®, CAMS, Manvendra Singh, Nathaniel Bates, Claudia C., Your commitment and expertise has been invaluable to making these programs happen!

Had an amazing ~tea~ time with our friends at Say Somaali! A perfect #foundationsfund event focused on community, care and connection. If you have events in your community that need sponsoring and support young Canadians shoot us a DM! We provide financial literacy and education savings support and resources that integrate with YOUR programming.

Happy International Women's Day, everyone! Here at Wealthsimple Foundation, we're lucky to be an all-women team, and we're all about breaking barriers and lifting each other up. 🚀 This Women's History Month, we're continuing to focus on making a real difference in communities across Canada. This month, we're working with some incredible organizations like North York Women's Shelter, Ernestine's Women's Shelter, YWCA Toronto, YWCA Metro Vancouver and Federation of Black Canadians to continue to bring accessible financial literacy, tax clinics, and career programming to students, mothers, immigrants and women across Canada. Let's keep building a future where every woman can reach her full potential and unlock financial freedom. 💸 If you have a partnership you think we should explore send us a DM! #InvestInHer #WomenSupportingWomen #EmpowerWomen #InternationalWomensDay

We're blown away by the creativity and enthusiasm of our community! Thank you Mohazzama Muhtaj for inviting us to this awesome event, and Narges A. for supporting the work that we do support families through their education saving journeys. 🎉 #FoundationsFund #community #CanadaLearningBond

Super proud what we have accomplished together last year! Huge thank-you to everyone who has supported the Wealthsimple Foundation. ❤️ Special shout out to Rachel Lam who made this beautiful report! To Jay Young and Joann Lai , the Volunteer of the Year for lending your time and expertise! And to my wonderful team Emily Naddaf Gina Skočaj Maryam Jawansheer and Zhané Stimpson! Let’s work together to make a bigger positive impact in 2024! 🙌

In 2023, inflation pushed living and tuition costs to new heights, increasing strain for students and families. The need for our work at Wealthsimple Foundation has never been clearer. We see education as key to unlocking potential and opportunity. Last year, we experimented with programming and service delivery to help underserved communities access education grants and we learnt a lot from the experience. We grew our online presence to connect with people across the country, worked with new and existing partners to deliver financial education and support, and increased access and awareness for the Canada Learning Bond (CLB). If you want to read more about our work, you can check out our 2023 Impact Report: https://lnkd.in/dF3dumbQ 2023 Highlights: 💸 Helped 3422 Students Receive $2.2M in Canada Learning Bond Benefits 🤝 Engaged 4,965 people through 99 tax clinics and financial literacy activations 🎓 Delivered $36K in bursaries to 11 students We couldn't have done it without our amazing community of supporters, volunteers, board of directors and advisors, and our core community partners. Wealthsimple, Michael Katchen, Caroline Gayle, BSc, MBA, Susanne Gillespie, Aliza Lakhani, Mallory J Greene, Luke Connell, Leen Li, CPA Toronto Community Housing, Covenant House Toronto, The MINA Project, Federation of Black Canadians, McMaster University, Toronto Metropolitan University, ScholarshipsCanada #WealthsimpleFoundation #FinancialEducation #Community #PostSecondaryEducation

It’s #GivingTuesday! We're not just celebrating generosity, we're wearing it! Wealthsimplers lined up today to snag our exclusive #GivingTuesday merch drop, with 100% of proceeds going directly to supporting Wealthsimple Foundation's mission: breaking down the barriers to education 📚✨ A huge shoutout to our talented designers, Rachel Lam and Zhané Stimpson, for using their creativity to bring this drop to life! Want to show your support? You can donate to Wealthsimple Foundation and 100% of your donation will go to supporting bursaries for students in need. #givingtuesday #financialfreedom #notforprofit https://lnkd.in/dTczEyU7