For any school, food and dining are essential to student life. Students gather in dining areas, eat meals and snacks together, talk about their days, and form meaningful connections. Schools like Havergal College, an independent school for girls in Toronto, provide healthy environments and promote positive experiences around food. Chartwells, one of Canada’s premier food service providers, is integral to this achievement.
Havergal College’s unique food service needs
Havergal College has a day and boarding program, and it serves approximately a thousand students from Junior Kindergarten to Grade 12. The school has a distinct culture, which means there are unique food service needs that can be challenging to meet. “We have enormous catering needs,” says Laura Sims, chief operations officer at Havergal. “We have to feed lots of students every day. We have kids who come from many different age groups, each with their own eating habits and preferences. We also have many catered events for our community that are a vital part of our school culture.”
Partnering with Chartwells
Havergal College required a partner to help meet its special food service needs. Luckily, Chartwells fit the bill, providing creative and innovative solutions to Havergal’s food service challenges. And doing so in a way that reflected the school’s unique culture. “From day one,” says Sims, “Chartwells helped us get students, from JK to Grade 12, engaged with food in many different ways. They also helped our staff engage with food.”
Chartwells’ student engagement initiatives
Chartwells helped Havergal provide the kind of student dining experience that fit the school’s culture nicely. “They are a collaborative thought partner,” says Sims. “They implemented various student engagement initiatives and brought to life a dining experience that captured our unique community and student experience.”
Chartwells’ Teaching Kitchen offering, for starters, was a big hit at Havergal. As one of Chartwells’ signature programs, it provided a fun and interactive culinary classroom for students to explore food, acquire nutrition literacy, and enhance their cooking skills. Students at Havergal were given lessons on how to cook in healthy ways, and some who were more experienced even participated in the teaching. “The Teaching Kitchen,” says Sims, “helped students learn important life skills and have positive experiences surrounding the preparation and consumption of meals and snacks.”
Chartwells’ innovative Good Mood Food program was similarly effective. Through this initiative, Havergal students were educated about food and learned to reflect on their moods and the choices they make around eating. What food do you eat? When do you eat it? Why do you think you’re making certain food choices? Through exploring questions like these, the Good Mood Food program helps students form healthy attitudes about and behaviours toward food. It also promotes and encourages healthy eating and empowers students to be mindful in their choices surrounding food.
Chartwells also introduced a pop-up cart at Havergal as part of their Activate Your Taste program. Every Wednesday after school at 3:30 p.m., Upper School students can purchase a snack on their way home. “The pop-up cart was a revelation,” says Sims. “Much to students’ delight, it offers new and adventurous menu offerings, is something to look forward to, and helps them leave school in a great mood—feeling positive about their day.”
The takeaway
Together, Chartwells’ student engagement initiatives, combined with Havergal’s unique cultural needs, gave Chartwells an opportunity to provide an optimal dining experience for students. Students are learning to enjoy gathering around food, eating, and forging intimate connections while dining. They are also developing healthier attitudes about food and are becoming more knowledgeable about their eating choices, which often sparks an improvement in their physical and mental health and their overall well-being.
“Thanks to Chartwells,” says Sims “our students are engaged with and knowledgeable about food, nutrition, sourcing, and sustainability. What’s great is that many of them learn about food through the curriculum, and then they learn more about it when they go to the dining hall and eat meals and snacks with their friends each day.”
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| Shaun Baldaia, Director of Business Development | |
| [email protected] | |
| www.compass-canada.com/our-companies | |
| www.linkedin.com/showcase/chartwells-canada/ |
