On Monday, November 28th, Cowichan Valley School District staff met with Nourish Cowichan to mark the donation of $308,344 from BC’s Student and Family Affordability Fund.
Through in-depth community consultations, Nourish Cowichan was identified as a key community partner that continues to provide exceptional service to students and families in the Cowichan Valley. As such, $308,344 was allocated to them from the district’s total allotment of the BC Student and Family Affordability Fund.
“We know what an incredible service that Nourish Cowichan brings into our schools. Making high-quality, delicious food available for any child in the district takes incredible community support. By allocating these funds, we are helping to do our part in bolstering Nourish Cowichan’s efforts,” said Cathy Schmidt, Chair of the Board of Education for the Cowichan Valley School District.
“These funds come at the most crucial time, when we started this school year, we started with the knowledge that the number of students we support would be going up. what we didn’t expect was to see it raise to more than 50%,” said Fatima Da Silva, Executive Director and Executive Chef Nourish Cowichan Society. “Due to the rising cost of living, more families are struggling and every week our numbers continuing to go up. For the very first time, our new forecasted budget for the year is approximately $1,000,000.00. Our gratitude for this gift and growing partnership is immense.”
Remaining funds were allocated to schools to best support their students and families throughout the year.