Providing milk and hot lunches and reversing its lunch schedule have earned Neil M. Ross Catholic School an award for nutrition innovation.
The Nutrition Innovation Award is presented by a partnership between Alberta Milk, Breakfast for Learning Alberta, Dietitians of Canada and Ever Active Schools. It is given out annually to seven schools around the province.
The award supports schools that are dedicated to improving their students’ eating habits and was presented to the St. Albert school on Monday morning.
Neil M. Ross stood out from other schools because it has “quite a few different initiatives and they are really involving the students and incorporating them into their school culture,” said Carrie Rae with Dietitians of Canada.
Vice-principal Cheryl LaBuick said one of the major changes the school made in the past year was introducing the reverse lunch.
Instead of going for lunch first, students play outside for half an hour before eating.
“We find that when they come in from outside they are hungry, they are ready to eat. We have parents reporting that they are not bringing half of their lunch home,” LaBuick said.
“They also have a good time to calm down and then they are ready to learn after.”
The school also introduced hot lunches on Fridays. The meals are served by the Lunch Lady, a catering service that provides schools with lunches that come with a choice of vegetables, yogurt or milk-based smoothies.
And speaking of milk: the school’s grade 5 and 6 students created the Milk Distributor Incorporated (MDI) team in the past year, advocating for healthy choices among younger students and delivering white and chocolate milk to the classes during lunch hour.
“They also talk about different recipes and things that can be done with milk,” LaBuick said.
“And they write little jingles they perform and promote (milk) that way and they’ve been really pushing milk and healthy eating.”
In June, the school intends to evaluate its success with the reverse lunch by conducting a survey. Thanks to the award, Neil M. Ross can now put another $1,000 towards its health initiatives.
