Our History
Avante for English-speaking women who
live in isolation
It was in June of 1997 that 5 women in the Brome Missisquoi region founded Avante Women's Centre. In Italian Avante means to “move forward”. This tenet perfectly embodies the centre’s philosophy.
At first, Avante was a drop-in centre on River Street in Bedford, offering the occasional workshop. In 2000 we moved to the Regroupement Organismes Communautaire building where we stayed until 2004. We received our first grant from the Agence de la santé et des services sociaux de la Montérégie in 2001. During this period we worked alongside, and developed partnerships with, the other organizations housed there.
It was during this phase that we hired our first paid coordinator and hosted regular monthly workshops. It was also when we began learning more about the resources in our area and built up our referral service. Because we are in a rural area we offered free transportation, and daycare for a nominal fee, to women who wanted to make community connections by attending a workshop at the centre or by simply dropping in to visit with other women.
We soon saw, that with our growing membership and the limited space at the R.O.C., we would need a larger centre.
2004 to 2008: Thanks to increased funding from the ASSS we were able to move from one room to four at 2, Adhémar-Cusson. This larger space and increased funding gave us the opportunity to hire a part-time secretary and increase the hours of the other two employees.
At the end of 2008, we have a coordinator (35 hours/week), a secretary (30 hours/week), a program director (28 hours/week) and a social worker (14 hours/week). This team, along with our volunteers, is what keeps the centre running smoothly.
We offer a wide selection of services which include an open door policy, library, referral service, daycare, transportation, accompaniment, mental health support group, internet café (15 sessions), individual and family counselling (37 meetings in 3 months) and, less formally, someone to lend an ear (32 in person, 32 by phone).
We also have many programs such as:- Popular education workshops that inform women on a particular theme, allowing them to acquire skills and work on their personal development. 273 women participated in the 22 workshops given.
- Coffee Breaks which allow women to have friendly discussion on varied themes. 136 women participated in the 10 coffee breaks.
- Outreach to Ville de Lac Brome in the form of monthly coffee breaks; 58 women participated in 6 coffee breaks.
- Antidote: a 5 week program that explores the impact the feminine role can have on women’s mental health. It addresses the need for women to free themselves from social conditions that dictate and limit their behaviour in order to expand how they might live. The program works to unearth each woman's individual identity by raising self-esteem and developing assertiveness, including the productive use of anger.
- 20 beginner computer classes were attended by 31 participants who learned the basics of Microsoft Office and the Internet.
- Afternoon Delight is an interactive cooking class with the guest shares her knowledge of certain foods and gets the participants involved with the preparations.
- Open ‘til 8 is new on our calendar this year. In order to better reach as many of our members as possible, it was decided that the centre would be open one evening a week until 8 o’clock. This year the staff took turns hosting these evenings with a variety of topics.161 participants came to these evenings.
- Seniors & Traditions – Youth & Technology. This project, which brought together senior women from the community and Secondary 1 girls from the local elementary school, was extended from the previous year.
Special activities were organised to mark commemorative dates and raise awareness for women’s issues. This year Avante held the following events: - 10th Anniversary: We celebrated our 10 years in style by dining with the founding and present Board of Directors followed by cake and champagne at the centre with twenty seven members.
- Quebec Women Centres Day: ten participants came to celebrate the 5th edition of the Quebec Women’s Centers Day on October 2 under the theme Poverty: a political decision.
- National Day of Remembrance of Violence against Women (December 6): six women attended a daytime viewing of the CBC production “Road to recovery”. In the evening members turned out to her a first-hand account of a woman who was present at Dawson College during that shout out.
- International Women’s Day (March 8) was, for the first time in our history, celebrated bilingually with five other local women’s organizations.
- The Career Transitions Symposium was the result of a long-standing (about two years) request from many members who expressed a frustration with the process of moving forward with their careers, after the age of 45 in particular. Although the available options are not well-known. Therefore we invited public service providers and hosted a “one-stop-shop’ format.
- Cultural Outings allowed our members, and their families, to attend four outings for which they may not have had the chance otherwise enjoy for various. We were very fortunate to receive funding from Townshippers’ Foundation to subsidize these excursions which were enjoyed by 144 participants.
The following are courses that the staff and/or board members attended: - Colloque sur la prévention de la violence Brome-Missisquoi
- Feminist Intervention
- Process of conjugal domination
- Website building
Representation in our community: - Table régionale des centres de femmes de la Montérégie
- Health & Social Services Steering Committee
- Health & Social Services Partners Committee
- Table de concertation et de prévention de la violence conjugale et sexuelle de Brome Missisquoi
- Politique Familiale de Bedford
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