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Coaching Association of Canada - Chevrolet Continues to Make Dreams Possible

- Latest Community Club Coach Grant Recipients Announced

• Nearly $1 million dollars donated to Canadian coaches through the Making Dreams Possible program
• More than 18,000 coaches and nearly 196,000 athletes in 165 communities across the Canada have been touched by the program

Oshawa (ON) – Today, Chevrolet presented an additional 51 Canadian community sport clubs from across Canada with a grant of $2,000 each for coach training and development activities. Since inception in 2006, Chevrolet Making Dreams Possible has donated nearly $1 million to Canadian coaches at all levels of competition.

“GM has a long history of supporting Canadian athletes,” said Tom Laurie, GM of Canada's Olympic Partnership Manager. “Making Dreams Possible is major grassroots commitment by Chevrolet designed to help coaches get the right kind of training that results in children having positive first experiences to encourage a lifetime love of sports.”

Over the past three years, GM's direct support of coach education and development through this program has impacted over 18,000 coaches and 196,000 athletes in 165 communities across the country.

“Since the inception of Chevrolet Making Dreams Possible, the response from clubs across the country has been fantastic,” commented John Bales, Chief Executive Officer of the Coaching Association of Canada. “This program provides more community and high performance coaches access to valuable training through our renowned National Coaching Certification Program (NCCP). As Vancouver 2010 will inspire more Canadians to participate in community club sports, it is very important that our athletes are trained by certified coaches. The Chevrolet Making Dreams Possible program helps make that happen.”
“On behalf of the Innisfail Minor Hockey Association, I would like to take this opportunity to thank General Motors of Canada and the Coaching Association of Canada for selecting us as one of the grant recipients under the Making Dreams Possible program,” says Mark Dowler, director of hockey development, Innisfail Minor Hockey Association. “The grant proceeds will be put to good use in offsetting our costs incurred in hosting a Hockey Canada Development 1 coaching clinic. Our association coaches and, in turn, our athletes will benefit greatly from the additional knowledge and training afforded by this clinic.”
Chevrolet is an Official Vehicle of the Vancouver 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games.
Click here to view a complete list of recipients.

About Chevrolet's Making Dreams Possible Program
Making Dreams Possible is a program developed by GM in partnership with the Coaching Association of Canada, the governing body of Canada's coaching education program and is designed to support coaches of Olympic and Paralympic Sports at the high performance and community club levels.
Chevrolet's Making Dreams Possible program will provide a minimum of 100 grants of $2,000 each annually for coach development in local communities, and ten grants of $10,000 each annually to high performance athletes and their coaches. These grants will be used to fund special projects that develop the skills and abilities of high performance and community level coaches. Application forms are now being accepted. Visit www.coach.ca/makingdreamspossible for more information.

About the Coaching Association of Canada
The Coaching Association of Canada (CAC) is a not-for-profit amateur sport organization with the mandate to improve the effectiveness of coaching across all sports and at all levels of the sport system. With a mission of enhancing the experiences of all Canadian athletes through quality coaching, the CAC and its partners deliver a leading edge coaching system that has a goal of reaching 100,000 NCCP-trained coaches who will impact 1,000,000 athletes each year by 2010. Visit www.coach.ca for more information about coach education and training.

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Contacts:
Adria Mackenzie
GM Canada
(905) 644-1824

Michèle Dion
Communications Coordinator
Coaching Association of Canada
(613) 235-5000 x.2384

Coaching Association of Canada
141 Laurier Avenue West, Suite 300
Ottawa, Ontario K1P 5J3
Telephone: 613-235-5000
Fax: 613-235-9500
coach@coach.ca