IMPACT REPORT
Q1 2025 (September-November)
IMPACT HIGHLIGHTS & PRIORITIES
Nutrition for Learning kicked off the fiscal year in on September 1, 2025 in coordination with the 2025-2026 school year. As expected, the start of the year has been a challenging one. Funding continues to be precarious and the needs in the schools is increasing, due to many factors including economic uncertainty, the rise of food insecurity, and more families accessing food support services.
The goals of Q1 included a) launching and beta testing our Junior Ambassador Program, b) elevating the school food experience for students across the region, including more social stations (ex. yogurt parfait and soup stations), and c) working to onboard and re-start programs at schools currently without an N4L program.
With the help for our donor base, as well as several significant contributions from corporate partnerships, we have successfully met or exceeded our Q1 targets. We could not run these programs without the ongoing support of each and every one of our donors! We will serve over 2-million meals this school year, so every single gift we receive helps achieve that goal, showing nearly 100,000 student in the Waterloo Region that they are important, valued and deserved to feel NOURISHED!
Thank you for your support!
Schools with Student Volunteers
In October, a survey indicated of those who responded 43 schools are currently using student volunteers to deliver their N4L program.
The Programs and Engagement Team are actively working to improve this metric in Q2 through the launch of the Junior Ambassador Program.
43
11%
Schools with Social Stations
11% of schools with N4L programs include a social station or hot food options. 6% host hot food stations on a regular basis; 28% of schools indicate they have hosted a hot breakfast in the past year.
In Q2, the N4L team is dedicated to elevating the food experience of more schools across the region.
New School Food Programs
Since the beginning of the 2025-2026 school year, Nutrition for Learning has onboarded or re-started programs at 7 schools.
This increase means that we are now in 100% of the schools in Cambridge. We are focused on elevating the food experience at all of our 180 schools.
7
GRATITUDE & MILESTONES
Back-to-School Campaign
In September, our Development and Communications team launched the “Just One Meal” campaign across our digital marketing channels.
The goal of the campaign was to highlight the impact that “just one meal” can have on a student who’s basic needs are not being met.
The campaign was a huge success in bringing in new donations and building awareness for our program. The website saw a 75% increase in traffic. On Instagram, we saw a 500% increase in views.
The campaign also resulted in 23 new monthly donors, representing approximately 4,300 meals for students this school year!
Thank You, Hendrix Genetics!
Once again, our friends at Hendrix Genetics stepped up with their unbelievably generous employee campaign. They raised $90,006 over the course of the campaign for Nutrition for Learning and Children’s Foundation of Guelph and Wellington. We were delighted to join them at their head office in Kitchener for a beautiful cheque presentation (and some yummy snacks!).
We can’t thank Blair, Lidia, Samantha and the entire team at Hendrix for their ongoing support and partnership! They are true champions of student nutrition!
STROM’S FARM
Nutrition for Learning and the Children’s Foundation of Guelph and Wellington were the joint recipients of proceeds from the Strom’s Farm Harvest Fun and Corn Maze. We got the opportunity to meet with hundreds of community members at the farm and received an incredible donation of $3,524.67 from the Strom’s team.
Thank you, Stroms!
GREAT BIG CRUNCH
On October 16, World Food Day, we kicked off our Great Big Crunch Campaign in partnership with the teams at YMCA of Three Rivers, YMCA GTA, Children’s Foundation of Guelph and Wellington and Halton Food For Thought. Community leaders from across the region “made some noise for school food” by crunching with some flair!
BREAKFAST CLUB
Our friends at J.F. Carmichael Public School graciously invited us to attend one of their breakfast services to highlight the program for the teams at Breakfast Club of Canada and UniglassPlus. WRDSB Director of Education, Scott Miller, Chair Maedith Radlein, along with Trustee Carla Johnson and Superintendent Michelle Newlands joined the service as well.
We have so much going on at N4L! To keep up to date on all our events, activities and your impact, follow us on our socials or sign up for our e-newsletter.
YOUR IMPACT!
If you have any questions about the organization, our programs, or your impact, please reach out to our Development and Communications team.