Skip to content
Ryan's Rays

Canada

Inclusive therapy and recreation in our own community.

We at Ryan’s Rays believe that inclusiveness should not just be found in the classroom but in each one of life’s experiences, including therapy and recreational programs, and we are excited to support and partner with local organizations who share this same vision. To date, Ryan’s Rays has focused on supporting children and youth through two meaningful partnerships: McMaster Children’s Hospital and Muskoka Woods.

Through our partnership with the Hamilton Health Sciences Foundation, Ryan’s Rays supports children and youth served by McMaster Children’s Hospital – the hospital that cared for Ryan – and its Ron Joyce Children’s Health Centre in Hamilton. Our funding helps provide therapeutic resources and programs through the Developmental Pediatrics and Rehabilitation Program and the Autism Spectrum Disorders Program, supporting children and families as they navigate developmental and health challenges.

Ryan’s Rays also partners with Muskoka Woods to support its Exceptionality Program, which gives children and youth living with disabilities the opportunity to experience camp in a safe, inclusive and supportive environment.

Since our first Canadian project in 2019, Ryan’s Rays has provided support for:

  • Two Snoezelen (sensory) carts for therapeutic use at the Ron Joyce Children’s Health Centre, helping children improve visual and auditory processing, fine and gross motor skills, and confidence.
  • A three-year Music & Arts Life Skills Program at the Ron Joyce Children’s Health Centre – Rock Band with Melody Minds, music therapy for children who use augmentative and alternative communication, and small-group art therapy.
  • The Exceptionality Program at Muskoka Woods, which gives children and youth with disabilities an integrated summer camp experience – including program costs, staff training, one-on-one support workers and program facilitators.
Five people in masks standing either side of a new Snoezelen cart with a lit bubble tube and fibre-optic strands in a hospital therapy roomA man kneeling beside a Snoezelen cart, its fibre-optic strands spilling onto a blue matClose-up of the Snoezelen cart, with purple-lit bubble tubes and fibre-optic strands draped over the wooden baseTwo bubble tubes lit in violet, reflected in the cart’s mirrored panelA projector with a coloured effects wheel mounted on the Snoezelen cartA plaque reading “This cart was generously donated by Ryan’s Rays 2021” with the Ron Joyce Children’s Health Centre and Hamilton Health Sciences Foundation logosA laughing camper riding piggyback on a counsellor along a wooded path at Muskoka Woods