Charles Hays Secondary School, Prince Rupert, BC
Grant term, 2025-2026
When I saw the opportunity for this grant I wanted to give it a try as I believe every school could use extra support, I also decided I was going to share the grant with Megan Cooper our amazing foods class teacher if we got it. Sure enough we did and she bought a very much needed freezer for her class. Everyone just loves her class, she teaches them so much and she is always doing great things teaching nutrition, the importance of food, safety, box challenges, life skills, helping cook for school events, so beneficial to all that attend her classes. I knew she had some needs for her class as well as my program needs, so very grateful.
Being that I go harvest different types of seafood at times with students and bring in seafood for the school, and yes we are pretty lucky that way we have a lot of community connections to be able to have salmon, crab, different types of cod and oolichans which we harvest on the Skeena River. I decided I could use a few more fishing nets and chest waders so we don’t get wet going in the river and the nets are for scooping the fish out, sadly we couldn’t get out there this year as the highway was too treacherous for the bus and safety of our students came first and then spring break happened. Ooiichans run for around three weeks of the year, but the students love harvesting them and eating them and when we catch enough, they get to bring home to share with their families.
Thank you for that, also a big thank you I was also able to purchase a few needed kitchen items, but the Biggest thank you would be having a gardening workshop for our students. I purchased so many berry plants, herbs, vegetables and roughly 170 students participated throughout the day. I invited Ts’ymsen Culture Society (they co-funded the event) and they brought two of their gardeners in. I also invited Eco Trust to assist, one of their workers maintains our school district gardens, also one of our local gardeners also came to lend her expertise for the day, as well as our district food coordinator.
Three classes came out at a time we had tables set up all around the courtyard beside the greenhouse. Each table had different events going on; they learned to plant seeds, repot the starters, learned how to make seed snails and took turns going into the greenhouse to pick plants, herbs, and flowers to bring home. The best part was everyone was so happy, Ts’ymsen Culture Society donated door prizes and played some outdoor games as well. We had information papers on how to care for the plants the students chose. I can’t put into words how grateful I am to be able to have the opportunity to do what took place. Everyone had the best time, the smiles laughter and the interest spoke for itself. We all touched base on how the importance of growing food is, the life skills the savings and just good old gardening therapy. I believe everyone got something out of it, even myself, I learnt about seed snails and my yummy chives, cilantro, sage, are growing so fast!
We had asked students to write down what does food mean to you? One student wrote: Food is not only nourishment for the body but also nourishment for the soul. Food connects cultures and people and is something that should be provided to every person. Food is life!!
I hope to make it an annual event at our school. Thank you to everyone that made this grant possible.
Christina Leighton
Indigenous Food Sovereignty Mentor
Charles Hays Secondary School
