Some grads received cards and flowers, others scholarships – but Isabella Sousa couldn’t believe her luck when she received a car to mark this milestone.
Cambie secondary Grade 12 students were asked to write an essay about what it would mean to get a car upon graduation. The school staff then vetted the essays and drew one name from a couple dozen finalists.
Sousa was watching the ceremony from home at her dinner table when she heard she had won the car – a 2015 sky-blue four-door Nissan Versa Note.
She was so excited, she lost her voice shouting for joy.
“It was a very surreal moment,” she said.
The car was donated by Applewood Auto Group as a joint effort of three departments: the sales department donated the trade-in – which had only 80,000 kilometres on it - the parts department donated parts to fix it up and a senior mechanic donated his time to recondition the car.
Applewood has been involved with the school in different ways – doing Breakfast with Santa and helping them with their food drives.
But, given the extraordinary circumstances around the COVID-19 pandemic, the dealership wanted to step it up a notch, explained general manager Leon Cheliadin.
“We wanted something more substantial, a little more sizeable, a little bigger impact, for the graduating class, knowing it’s been a really difficult year, couple years, for graduating students,” he said.
Sousa said the car will get her to work this summer – she is working at summer camps at City Centre Community Centre - and then to school in the fall when she starts her bachelor’s degree in arts at UBC.
