In early April, three student-led organizations joined forces to put on a fundraising concert that not only showcased their artistic talents, but also raised over $9,000 for Atira Women’s Resource Society in Vancouver.
Feeding It Forwards, The StrongHer Society, and Lower Mainland Music Students’ Association put on an eclectic all-student program. It featured bands performing pop songs sung by Annie Lennox and Coldplay, contemporary dance, a saxophone quartet playing a medley of Disney songs, a Mongolian dance balancing rice bowls, as well as a series of piano pieces by such composers as Maurice Ravel, Ludwig van Beethoven, and Johannes Brahms.
“The three of us, the three organizations came together and wanted to do more for our community,” explains Elliana Sun, 16, a grade 10 student at Crofton House.
She heads LMMSA, which organizes regular music concerts at seniors’ homes so that students can share their music and connect with seniors. The group has also held smaller scale charity fundraisers for North Shore Women’s Centre and Lions Gate Hospital.
“But Feeding It Forwards, The StrongHer Society and LMMSA wanted to do more, instead of just selling donuts, for example. We came together and found Atira Women’s Resource Society and felt this was a really good idea and executed it,” Sun says.
During this concert held at Koerner Hall in the Vancouver Academy of Music, she was not only one of the emcees, but also performed Rondo à la Mazur in F major, Op. 5 by Frédéric Chopin. Her younger brother Gabriel also dazzled the audience with Franz Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody No. 11 in A minor, S244/11.
Sun has been playing the piano since she was six years old and is currently working towards her associate diploma (ARCT) from The Royal Conservatory of Music.
“Specifically about piano, I think it’s a way for me to express my emotions outside of any other activity,” she says.
St. George’s student Max Wang knows Sun through school debating, which is how he got involved in the concert. His non-profit, Feeding It Forwards, rescues food from bakeries and cafes, and groceries from supermarkets and delivers them to hospital workers and shelters in Vancouver.
“I talked to Audrey [Sung of The StrongHer Society] a few months back about working together on a fundraiser, and asked Elliana if she wanted to join. It was more efficient for us to do it this way,” he says.
Wang, 15, pitched the idea of raising money for Atira, the non-profit that helps women and children affected by violence. FIF has donated unused food to this organization in the past.
While he says they as organizers didn’t have a particular fundraising goal in mind, they sold all the concert tickets, raising $8,600. Then, donations during intermission bumped the total to $9,187, which surpassed their expectations.
In 2024 Wang started FIF after he was inspired by his Grade 6 teacher who also had a similar food-rescue non-profit. Today FIF has a team of volunteers who do everything from organizing logistics and sending out emails to bakeries, cafes and supermarkets. Others pick up leftover food—from bread and pastries to fruits, vegetables and meat—and re-distribute them to groups in need.
For Audrey Sung, 16, combining her musical talent with charity is something she has done since she was around nine years old.
“I really like using the piano or music as a tool to help other people,” the Crofton House student explains, though this recent fundraising concert was on another level.
“Initially it started only as a discussion, but then we imagined to have something bigger, because I don’t think we’ve ever seen an entirely student-led charity concert, or at least at this scale, and we wanted to be like the first group [where] three organizations that could come together and reach that scale.”
She says the students who performed were either classmates from Crofton House or St. George’s, or piano teachers who suggested their pupils take part in the concert.
Almost two years ago, Sung together with classmate Ashley Wang co-founded The StrongHer Society, a non-profit that aims to empower girls in sports, health, and wellness, as well as support women.
Sung grew up in Hong Kong playing rugby at school, so when she moved to Vancouver to study in 2023, she was surprised to find not many girls playing the sport. Wang is a badminton player.
“We were thinking first about how men still have a very big presence in sports that we both play. So we were thinking of incorporating that into our cause which led to our name to be ‘The StrongHer Society. It’s like a play on words stronger and strong-her,” explains Wang.
The group has assembled and donated healthcare kits with menstrual products for women in shelters in the Downtown Eastside, and arranged self-defence workshops for girls.
For Sung, helping the community began when the COVID-19 pandemic began in Hong Kong. She saw how elderly homes were impacted and started putting together and distributing hygiene packages for the senior residents.
“It’s something I’ve always been very passionate about, which is why I want to be labelled more as a philanthropist, rather than just a pianist, and it has to do with my upbringing,” says Sung.
“My mom always taught me to give back since I was a child. I traveled a lot when I was around eight years old and started performing at Carnegie Hall [in 2019], and I’ve gone all over Mainland China as well.
“And during each of my trips, my mom brought me around to many different communities to show me, like, how different people have it [live],” she continues.
“She [my mom] wants me to be really grateful for what I have, especially with how much resources I have available to me, but also like the connections and like the network I have to support me, especially when times get really stressful.”
Bernice Chan is a Vancouver freelance writer and former senior reporter at the South China Morning Post. She also co-hosts of the award-winning podcast Eat Drink Asia in Hong Kong. Follow her on X @BernUnitHK. Follow Pancouver on Instagram @PancouverMedia, on X @PancouverMedia, and on Bluesky @pancouver.bsky.social.
