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As the 2024/25 school year wraps up Halton Food for Thought’s staff and board members reflect on another successful year. This year we are proud that we have been able to launch five new Student Nutrition Programs across Halton - increasing our reach by over 1,000 new students. This brings our total number of partner schools to 157, which provides over 96,000 students with access to nutritious food daily during the school year.
We are also proud that this year we have been able to expand our work into all four of the publicly funded school boards across Halton:
Halton Catholic District School Board
The expansion to these new schools was made possible in part by generous community funders including the Burlington Community Foundation and Halton Region as well as corporate partners like CanLift Equipment Rentals. Through grants and donations, we were able to add these new programs throughout the year, helping us increase our reach and get closer to our goal of having a program in every school across Halton.
In addition to new programs, Halton Food for Thought is proud that we raised the largest amount of funds in 15 years at our annual Breakfast Bash to support the strength and stability of our work. With over $98,000 raised at the event in May, the staff and board are blown away by the support we had to help us accomplish this. From our sponsors, marketplace vendors, donors to our volunteers, we could not have done this without you!
These funds are more important than ever as our programs continue to face increased costs due to the rising prices of food, thanks to the generosity of our supporters our programs can continue to offer a variety of nutritious and healthy food to our students throughout the school year.
“It has been an incredible year here at Halton Food for Thought, among increased demand and costs for our programs the community has rallied behind us to show how important our students are,” Eleanor Ramuscak, Halton Food for Thought Board Chair reflected. “Ensuring students have access to nutritious food at school helps them each day at school with a positive long-term impact on their health and well-being and we are proud to play a role in that.”
As Halton continues to grow, so does our vision of no student going hungry at school. Our team continues to work with our school board partners and, in the community, to work towards raising the funds needed to continue to expand and maintain our programs across the region. “Being able to expand to five new schools in one year is a testament to the hard work of our staff and the relationships they build with our school community,” Aliya Khawari said when asked about the growth this past year. “We are proud of what we have accomplished this year and continue to look forward to the years ahead, Halton continues to build schools, and we are working towards programs in every school. There is a lot to be proud of, however, we still have a lot of work ahead of us to reach our goal and will continue to build partnerships in the community to help us achieve this.”
We would like to thank everyone who helped us achieve these milestones this year including our school partners, volunteers and donors – we could not do what we do without your support!
If you are interested in partnering with Halton Food for Thought to support an existing program or help us expand to a new school, reach out to info@haltonfoodforthought.com or visit our Corporate Sponsorships page to learn more.
