Shane Homes and Ernest Manning High School have an 11 year partnership with a mandate to expose students to the construction industry through both classroom and hands-on experience.  This partnership grew last year with the addition of two new partners, Sir William Van Horne High School and Excel Homes. 

This will bring a total of three playhouses donated to the Kids Fund with the first playhouse raising over $6,200 in the Spring of 2008. (Results of this year’s auction were not available at press time.)
The two playhouses sold this year are the “Boys Fort” and the “Girls Dream Dollhouse”.  The Boys Fort was designed by a grade 10 student at Ernest Manning from the Design Class and the grade 12 Construction Services class at Van Horne built it from scratch.  The Girls Dream Dollhouse was also built by Van Horne students. 

The Boy’s Fort Playhouse is all about fun. Featuring a climbing wall and slide from the second floor deck, it is the perfect playhouse for the active child. The Boy’s Fort was auctioned on CJAY starting June 15 with all proceeds going towards CJAY’s Kids Fund.

The Girl’s Dream Dollhouse is a playhouse-sized version of a dollhouse and includes French doors, cedar shake exterior with pink trim, and abundant windows with curve detailing.  Inside, a raised ceiling, with a skylight and multitude of windows allows in plenty of natural light.  It was auctioned on Vibe 98-5 starting June 15 with all proceeds going towards Vibe’s Kids Fund.

Shane Wenzel, Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Shane Homes adds “We’re very proud of our long standing partnership with Ernest Manning.  Our goal of exposing kids to drafting, design and the construction industry is certainly happening with the playhouses, and now on a far more reaching scale than we had initially planned with our involvement with Van Horne.  Being able to raise money by auctioning the playhouses and donating it to the Kids Fund is a nice side benefit that we are proud to be part of.”