History
1984
On November 1, 1984, a young boy named Maurice Vien was tragically taken from his family, friends and community. His murder sparked the creation of the Missing Children’s Network.
1990
The Missing Children’s Network transported National Missing Children’s Day to European soil by organizing a special ceremony that brought together several organizations from Brussels, France and England.
1994
The Missing Children’s Network launched its Prevention and Education Program in Day Camps and sensitized thousands of children about the importance of keeping themselves safe.
1998
The Missing Children’s Network, in collaboration with McDonald’s Restaurants and Montreal Police, held an Identification Day on the island of Montreal.
2001
The Child Identification Day is now presented across the province, thanks to McDonald’s Restaurants and law enforcement in Quebec.
2004
The City of Montreal proclaimed May 25th to be National Missing Children’s Day.
2008
Twenty volunteers from the Network reached new heights as they climbed Mt Kilimandjaro and raised over $75,000 in aid of our critical mission.
The Network published Operation Vigilance, a series of three brochures that contain a wealth of safety advice for parents of children 0-17 years-old.
2011
The Missing Children’s Network, in collaboration with ADR-TV, launched Child Alert, an application that allows parents to record and store their child’s profile directly on their smart phones.
2014
The Missing Children’s Network launched Develop Sweet Reflexes, an awareness campaign designed to sensitize parents and children about the importance of developing sound safety strategies, while at the same time raising funds through the sale of the Candy Catcher, a Halloween bag with reflective tape.
2016
The Missing Children’s Network, in collaboration with Groupe Jean Coutu and UPS, hosted a province-wide awareness campaign entitled, Together for Safety.
Over 25,000 activity booklets were distributed to local schools by law enforcement.
2018
Creation of SIGN4L, an application that can save the life of a child and official launch of the SHINE program across the province, following a generous contribution from an anonymous donor.
2020
Missing Children’s Network celebrated its 35th anniversary.
1986
National Missing Children’s Day was commemorated for the very first time at the Old Port in Montreal. Over 5,000 balloons with photos of missing children were released.
Terry Di Monte of CHOM-FM hosted our first Radiothon of Hope and helped raise over $72,000.
1992
Thanks to Debbie Kolokythias, a 15 year-old Montrealer, the Gazette invited the Missing Children’s Network to run its operations, free of charge, in their building.
1996
The Missing Children’s Network was awarded le Prix du Partenariat by the Montreal Police Service.
The Missing Children’s Network inaugurated its Garden of Hope at the Montreal Botanical Garden.
2000
The Network launched its Prevention and Education Program in local schools in the Greater Montreal area.
2003
The Missing Children’s Network is invited by the RCMP, SQ and Montreal Police Service to implement the Amber Alert program in Quebec.
2006
The Missing Children’s Network, in collaboration with Montreal Police and En Marge 12-17, published Coming Back to Stay, a manual for parents whose children have run away.
2010
Jean Coutu Group became the new partner of our Provincial Child Identification Day and hosted a clinic in over 180 participating pharmacies – in all, 14,998 ID booklets were distributed and completed.
2012
Canada Border Services Agency, Aéroports de Montréal and the Missing Children’s Network joined forces to raise awareness about missing children by displaying photos of 16 children on over 100 LCD screens at Montréal-Trudeau Airport.
The Missing Children’s Network received the prestigious Our Missing Children Award of Excellence in recognition for its leadership and excellence in working together to bring home missing children.
2015
Total Logistics Group of Companies joined our Corporate Partner Poster Campaign by featuring posters of missing children on their trucks. This unprecedented initiative allows thousands of people all across North America to be on the look-out for these children.
The Network collaborated with Facebook Canada in the launch of geo-targeted Amber Alert notices to Facebook users all across Canada.
2017
Implementation of SHINE, thanks to an anonymous donor, a province-wide program aimed at preventing runaways and the sexual exploitation of youth.
Thanks to Montoni Group, the Missing Children’s Network moved into their new office.
2019
Translation of SHINE into Translated SHINE into Mohawk, Cree, Inuktitut and Innu.