Community & Employee giving

Our commitment to diabetes prevention, awareness and care

Since we announced our commitment to diabetes in 2012, we’ve focused our support on diabetes awareness, prevention and care, and have committed over $46 million globally. We are committed to slowing the advance of diabetes and its related complications by aiming to improve the health and wellness of our communities, clients and employees.

Team Up Against Diabetes grant program

Sun Life’s Team Up Against Diabetes grant program aims to provide programmatic support to 501(c)(3) charities that focus on the following areas:

• diabetes prevention, awareness, education, and care
• diabetes management
• recovery and support from diabetes-related complications
• obesity prevention
• nutritional programs – education, management, and awareness

Our Team Up Against Diabetes grant program is open for applications from January 1 – March 31 each year.

Learn more

Boston Celtics Fit to Win and #SunLifeDunk4Diabetes

Sun Life U.S. teams up with the Boston Celtics to fight diabetes through two programs:

• Fit to Win: an incentive-based community program which promotes physical activity and health habits with kids from YMCA’s in New England.
•  #SunLifeDunk4Diabetes: a social fundraising and digital marketing campaign in the month of November in support of the YMCA of Greater Boston’s Health Habits program. The campaign has raised over $700,000 to-date. 

Kansas City Royals Strikeout Diabetes and ‘Fun at Bat’

Did you know that every 23 seconds, someone in the U.S. is diagnosed with diabetes? To raise awareness, Sun Life donates $23 to a local Kansas City organization for each strikeout by a Royals pitcher.

Sun Life and the Royals also partner together on the Fun at Bat program, a baseball and softball education curriculum created by USA Baseball, and part of the Royals’ Crown Schools program. Fun at Bat is designed to introduce students to the games of baseball and softball to engage them in programming at the Urban Youth Academy and in local leagues, which aligns with Sun Life’s commitment to promoting healthy living.

Employee Giving & Volunteerism

At Sun Life, giving back to our communities in which we live, work and do business has always been embedded in our culture. Throughout the year, we encourage our employees’ strong tradition of giving back and provide them with opportunities to support the organizations that they feel most passionately about.

We support our employee-driven efforts through our You Give We Give Program. Each year, our employees are allocated funding that they can use to support their communities in whichever way they feel is best – either through a traditional donation match, a donation for their volunteer time, or a donation for participation in a charitable walk, run or ride event. We recognize that community support may look different for each of our employees, and our You Give We Give program provides the most flexibility in supporting our employees’ passions.

Through this program and Sun Life’s support, we provide hundreds of thousands of dollars each year to our local communities, and thousands of hours of volunteer support.