I need help Watering the Webb.

For the past three years, I’ve been transforming my Saskatoon home into a learning sanctuary for children and families who need something different.

What started as a few students around a kitchen table has grown into WebbSprout Learning Programs: a relationship-based learning environment designed for kids who struggle to thrive in traditional settings. The library, sensory spaces, flexible classrooms, garden, resources, and even the resident cats all play a role in helping students feel safe enough to learn, connect, and grow.

This winter, I planted the seeds for WebbSprout’s next stage.

Registration for Summer by Design is now open. New partnerships are forming. Families are finding us through word of mouth. I’m planning daytime support for students who are not attending school full-time. After three years of slowly building toward sustainability, new growth was finally beginning to emerge from the soil.

Then the storm hit. ⛈️

The strange thing is that this storm mirrors the same systemic barriers many of my students face: systems that struggle to accommodate people whose lives do not follow the expected path.

I spent twenty years teaching in South Korea instead of building a conventional Canadian career. I returned home and created WebbSprout because traditional classrooms often failed the very students I wanted to support. When existing systems were not flexible enough, I built something different.

Now those choices have led to an unexpected challenge.

My Korean National Pension is being treated by social services as income that must be used immediately, which means losing my disability support. If I had spent those same years paying into CPP, I could wait until retirement to access those funds. Because the pension comes from another country, different rules apply.

As a result, I may be forced to spend the very resource that could secure WebbSprout’s future.

But this storm also brings an opportunity.

The pension I earned in South Korea could become the down payment on the house that makes WebbSprout possible. Instead of disappearing into rent and short-term survival costs, it could secure the physical foundation that allows this work to exist.

WebbSprout is not separate from the house.

The house is the infrastructure.

It is the library where students discover books they actually want to read. It is the sensory spaces where overwhelmed children can regulate. It is the garage classroom where conversations happen in circles instead of rows. It is the garden where curiosity grows alongside vegetables and flowers. It is the safe, welcoming environment that allows students to show up exactly as they are.

The storm will not bring enough water on its own.

To secure this space, protect what has already begun to grow, and help WebbSprout become sustainable for the long term, I need your support.

You can help by donating, sharing this campaign, making connections, offering practical assistance, or contributing your story to the Story Seed Bank.

Every contribution helps strengthen the roots.

Some things are worth watering so they can bloom.

Thank you for helping Water the Webb.

Briane Jennifer Webb

Founder, WebbSprout Learning Programs