St. Martin de Porres High School in Airdrie has recently received a $10,000 grant to enhance the school’s breakfast program this year, allowing the school to offer a greater variety of healthy choices and educational material.
According to Michaela Hashiguchi, second-year principal at St. Martin de Porres, the school’s breakfast program has been operating for many years, relying on donated items from local businesses to provide a healthy start to the day for its students.
She said though the school still benefits from donations from local businesses such as COBS Bakery, a new grant from the President’s Choice Children’s Charity Power Full Kids program will go a long way to enhancing the program this school year.
“Ever since you’re young, you’re trained that the most important meal of the day is breakfast – it sets you up for success,” Hashiguchi said. “We want to make sure every student in our school is able to sit during the day and have a full tummy and have energy.”
She added many St. Martin de Porres students are working part-time jobs or have extracurricular obligations such as involvement in sports or babysitting, all while balancing full course loads.
“We know it’s a challenging time right now for kids and we just want to make sure that when they come into our building, we always greet them with a hello, and we offer them different [food] choices,” she said.
The President’s Choice Children’s Charity seeks to remove hunger as a barrier to a happy life, and to educate young people about food and nutrition through its Power Full Kids program, which reaches approximately 1,100 communities every day, according to the Loblaw affiliate’s website.
Hashiguchi said last spring, two teachers at the school applied for the grant, answering questions about the school community.
As a result, the school was awarded $10,000 to purchase food and educational material for this 2022-23 school year, with any remaining funds to be carried over to next year.
“[$10,000] is huge... it’s so generous. We're so grateful for the President's Choice Children's Charity. I'm thankful for their sponsorship and for choosing our school,” Hashiguchi said.
The principal added the school had to wait until approximately the middle of September for funds to arrive, but as soon as they did, staff began planning and providing for its students, budgeting exactly how much could be spent each week toward the $10,000 total.
“You feel like that’s such a huge amount of money, but we’re in school for 10 months. $250 a week is what we spend on food, and we have 500 kids here,” she said.
“You think, ‘Oh my gosh, we got so much money,’ but it... goes fast. It only goes so far, but we know the students who need a breakfast can get it at our school.”
Hashiguchi said the breakfast club committee (consisting of five staff members and student volunteers) meet and come up with a menu for every week, including something different on offer each day. Menu items have included French toast, yogurt parfaits, smoothies, bagels, fruit, and cheese.
According to the St. Martin de Porres administrator, the breakfast committee is trying to provide the student body a well-rounded breakfast that includes plenty of protein and fruit options, as well as satiating options such as cheese, pepperoni, and crackers.
“We always offer pepperoni, crackers – things like that in little Ziploc bags so students can eat those during the morning and not just before school,” she said.
“We do all the shopping at Superstore because it’s the President’s Choice Charity... and we combine regular meals and snacks,” she added. “We always have a bowl of [fruit] available for the students and we’ve also purchased some [snack] kits so they could eat them during the morning.”
She added the President’s Choice Children’s Charity website also provides the school with resources and activities to help engage the student body and educate on nutrition. Staff will send that information home to parents, hoping they will continue discussing healthy breakfast choices with their kids.
Hashiguchi said the breakfast program already seems to be growing since the recent arrival of the grant, and through word of mouth, students are lining up to grab their breakfast bundle in increasing numbers.
“We’re just starting to figure out what’s popular as well,” she said. “Smoothies are really popular because that’s an easy one... they just grab the cup.”
“We really wanted to make sure that it is inclusive for everyone – that everyone felt comfortable approaching and grabbing something. And we don’t ever ask questions. We don’t ever judge.”
She added one particular student often picks one of everything when he stops by the breakfast kiosk in the mornings.
“He’s a growing teenager and he’s on one of our sports teams, so I’m like, ‘Go for it, help yourself,’” she added with a laugh.
