Help is always welcome and wonderful, no matter what form it arrives in. Financial support, of course, is essential in helping us maintain our programs and services, and we are so grateful for the generosity of our financial supporters. Ernst & Young LLP is our Founding Corporate Sponsor of CPSAP, and we wouldn’t be where we are today without all their amazing support and assistance.

But we’re not writing about E&Y today because of dollars and cents. Ernst & Young has also provided us support of a very different kind, which is more valuable than the monetary variety. As the Founding Corporate Sponsor of the service delivery of CPSAP – You Can Go—our advisory program, in which our access workers help students explore post-secondary educational opportunities, Ernst & Young volunteers serve as invaluable mentors, sharing their own perspectives, stories, and educational backgrounds with You Can Go participants. Their commitment to help underrepresented students succeed is contagious and it has been already materialized through a strong volunteer presence in several places across Canada!

In an opinion piece published in the Globe and Mail a little while ago, Ernst & Young’s chairman and CEO, Lou Pagnutti, explained why this kind of involvement was so important:

 When education is not widely accessible, the effect is to perpetuate, rather than to alleviate, inequity.

Young people in low-income and underrepresented communities need to know that postsecondary education is not only a desirable option, but a viable one, too.

And this is why it’s no longer enough for corporate Canada to take an arm’s-length approach to education. We need to do more than merely donating funds and funding scholarships. It’s time for us to invest our considerable resources—our people, our time and our knowledge—in support of educational programs.

 We couldn’t agree more.