The Collingwood Optimist Club was formed in 1986 as the largest club ever inducted into Optimist International.  The 72 members of this service club focused on “Helping Kids in our community and around the world”. Since that time almost 250 members locally have raised money to deliver a wide range of programs for our youth.

The Club is extremely proud of its many achievements. One of our most recognized projects is the Collingwood Optimist Youth Bands. The Optimist Club raised funds and purchased ¼ of $1 million worth of Instruments and our incredibly talented young musicians have now earned a reputation of excellence. The band frequently travels around the world (Tokyo, New York, Vancouver) and was featured on the Rick Mercer Report.

Another of our outstanding club achievements is the Collingwood soccer program. The Club started the program and within a matter of years it grew to 1,500 young people playing soccer on 19 fields which our Club built. As the kids grew into adults, they continued to play and become coaches and referees of the league which is now known as “Collingwood United Soccer”.

The Club also worked with the local OPP in bringing to the elementary schools the remarkably successful D.A.R.E. program (a drug awareness program), and an anti-bullying program that focuses on cybercrime.

These are just a few of the many programs our Club supports to assist youth in our community. As an organization we like to focus on FUNd raising programs that continue to support novel and creative activities for the youth in our community. Some of our FUNd raising activities include the Mother of All Yard Sales and Pond Hockey a youth fishing Derby and our annual Canada Day pancake breakfast.

Our motto is “Just for Kids” and our hope is to provide all members an opportunity to become leaders in the community through the youth projects of our service club.