Herald School is pictured on Friday, August 23. The school is one of four that announced it's provincial school nutrition program will not immediately be returning this fall (Photo by Ross Lavigne)

By Charles Lefebvre

Nutrition Program on hold

Provincial nutrition program at public schools on hold this fall

Aug 23, 2019 | 5:41 PM

MEDICINE HAT, AB — A provincial program that ensured children at several schools did not go hungry will not be available in the Medicine Hat Public School Division when classes start in September.

The School Nutrition Program, which was brought into place by the previous provincial government, was active at four schools in the Medicine Hat Public School Division; Herald School, Southview School, Vincent Massey School and Elm Street School. It provided breakfast and lunch programs to area schools for students who needed it.

An identical message appeared on the Facebook pages of the four schools on Thursday, noting due to an uncertainty in government funding, the program would not be available immediately.

“It’s actually a jurisdictional decision that was made in response to the budget reality that we face,” said Mark Davidson, superintendent of the Public School Division. “That program is a grant program, or had been a grant program, that wasn’t really connected directly to the funding manual and the traditional funding process in school jurisdictions or from the government.”

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The Medicine Hat and District Food Bank will be stepping up in the interim, expanding its Brown Bag Lunch Program to the schools. Parents will still have to contact the schools to sign up their children for the program.

“We’ve had a long-standing relationship with the Medicine Hat Food Bank, and they provided that level of programming in those schools prior to the Nutrition Program being announced,” said Davidson. “They’ve agreed to step up, and we’ll slide right in there and provide meals to kids right away in September.”

Davidson noted the division budgeted for the nutrition program being funded in its spring budget. He adds uncertainty over the provincial budget is difficult for school divisions.

“Any time you have funding uncertainty is challenging,” he said. “Certainly, beginning the school year without knowing what your funding will be causes you to reflect on the way you structure your programs, and it requires a board to be prudent in terms of the commitments they make before they get their grants.”

Davidson says school divisions across the province are hoping for a stable funding model when the budget is tabled this fall, along with adequate funding for programs.