Elaine: #HealthySnack SuperHero To The Classes @BellsCornersPS #FarmToSchoolMonth

Meet Elaine Super Hero to the Classes! 

Profile of a Healthy Snack Super Hero!

I met Elaine more than a dozen years ago when our kids were in elementary school. Since then we have spent countless hours together organizing events, fundraising and volunteering at our kids schools. 

No one I know puts in more love time and effort than Elaine. 

My guess is few people realize the true extent and impact her efforts have had on hundreds if not thousands of students over the years. But if your child attended a school during a time when Elaine volunteered it's unlikely they weren't positively impacted in some way by her efforts.

One of the ways Elaine gives back these days is by starting and running the Bells Corners Public School Healthy Snack Program. 

This programs offers the students of Bells Corners P.S. a free healthy snack on school days. Each day with the help of parent and student volunteers, Elaine organizes the food orders, picks recipes, prepares and delivers by way of trolleys snacks to the approximately 175 students who choose to participate in the Healthy Snack Program. 

Some of the Benefits of a Healthy Snack Program: 

• A healthy snack is provided to those who do not have a snack or a healthy option. Kids learn better if they aren't trying to do so on an empty stomach.
• By composing and providing a mostly litter-free snack the amount of packaging and garbage produced at the school is reduced. 
• There are teaching opportunities, such as showing students how to root and grow celery with the end of the stalks leftover from healthy snack.
• Elaine is always on the look out for new recipes and snack options, and she tries to share those recipes with the students and parents. This gives parents new healthy snack ideas they know their kids like. 

On October 22nd, I was invited to attend a Farm to School Month Celebration hosted by Elaine, Bells Corners Public School, Growing Up Organic and the Ottawa Network For Education. 

The goal is to "celebrate ways that schools, farmers and communities are working to bring more healthy, local and sustainable foods to schools and classrooms" 

At this event Grade 2 and 3 students had the chance to make a mural using paint and stamps made from vegetables, and participate in a Q & A Session with local farmers Roshan and Tim Aubin from Aubin Farm. (Aubin Farm delivers produce weekly to BCPS for the Healthy Snack Program)

Local Farmers from Aubin Farm answer student questions
about how the vegetables are grown and how they get from the farm
 to their Healthy Snack Program.

The event was a huge success, and I don't think the kids will ever eat a vegetable again without thinking about how it gets from the farm to the Healthy Snack Trolley. 

Yep, just me Cathy thinking out loud about Healthy Snacks and Farm to School Month.

Note: I was not compensated for this post. The purpose of this post is merely to share with my readers. All opinions are my own.