A chapter at your school

A chapter needs a room at lunch, a Teacher Advisor and students who commit. It builds its own list of farms in the area HQ assigns, writes to each farm with the Teacher Advisor copied, records every reply, and hands every yes to a food bank that collects it. Students run the session, and the Teacher Advisor is copied on everything that leaves it. HQ supports it with a written method.

The target is 8 to 12 members. A chapter may start with 4, and members always work in pairs. The roles page names the six roles a chapter fills: Chapter Lead, Deputy Lead, Outreach Editor, List Builder, Follow-up Clerk and Records and Hours Clerk. A new chapter starts with three. Each member holds one, and the weekly work is described on the weekly session page.

Students hold named roles in a school club and keep a standing weekly session through the school year. They learn to write to businesses, keep records, and see a piece of work through from a list of farms to an introduction a food bank can act on. The school hosts a club whose work sits under three UN Sustainable Development Goals, and the page on how a chapter works shows what a week inside one looks like.

It goes from the farm to a food bank or food rescue organization that collects it with its own vehicle. The farm donates it, the chapter makes the introduction, and the receiving organization collects it. The default is Second Harvest’s From the Farm program, which publishes free farm pickup across Canada. A local food bank is named to a farm only after it confirms in writing that it can collect from that area. The produce never passes through a student’s hands. The how we work page sets out the operating model, chapter by chapter.

Students first get the principal’s written approval and a Teacher Advisor, then send HQ the Chapter Application Form. HQ acknowledges it within 3 school days and decides a complete application within 15 school days. Once the application is accepted and the Chapter Agreement is signed, HQ assigns the chapter its area. Nobody beyond the founding students is recruited until the Chapter Agreement is signed. Any eligible high school in Canada can apply to open a chapter, and each one follows the same written method.

Students run the session, under a Teacher Advisor. The Teacher Advisor is a staff member at the school, is copied on every outside message, signs forms, and is the first person to go to with a concern. Members hold named roles, write to farms in pairs, check each other’s work and keep the records. HQ never contacts a student one to one: all contact with a chapter goes to the Teacher Advisor or copies the Teacher Advisor.

45 minutes, once a week at lunch, through the school year. Sessions run to a fixed shape so they start and finish on time. The work is done in the session, never as homework. The chapters page explains how an area is assigned. HQ assigns each chapter its own area, so that two chapters never write to the same farm. The founding work is in Ontario, and the model is built to work in any province. Canada has 189,874 farms (Statistics Canada, Census of Agriculture 2021).

One question: Do you have surplus or grade-out produce this season that you cannot sell? A contract falls through, a buyer’s specification changes, a crop comes in heavier than the market wanted, or the fruit is the wrong size for a supermarket shelf. It is edible and already grown. A chapter gives every farm that says yes the contact of an organization that collects it.

The Deputy Lead runs the session. Every role has a second, and the session happens whoever is in the room, because the shape of it is written down.

Goal 12 on responsible consumption and production, Goal 2 on zero hunger, and Goal 13 on climate action. Food sent to landfill is food that fed nobody and warmed the planet on the way out. Our commitment page sets out all three goals in the UN’s own wording, with the targets we work to.

8.8 million tonnes of edible food is wasted in Canada every year, according to Second Harvest and Value Chain Management International, 2024.