In a show of school spirit, A.E. Peacock Collegiate has been encouraging various classes to partake in a little friendly competition within the school. The goal of the competition is to bring students and the community closer together.
One of the school’s recent initiatives has been the food and clothing drive in support of the Moose Jaw Food Bank and the Riverside Mission.
“We’ve had various challenges throughout the semester. Right now, it was a Halloween competition, in terms of how many (students) are wearing Halloween colours or a Halloween costume,” said Peacock Collegiate’s principal Tana Arnott.
“It’s some friendly competition to get kids more involved, show our school spirit, and building up our school culture,” she added.
The competition had students in each second period class compete and see who could raise the most food and clothing items for charity.
“We actually have a tie right now, between our Grade 11 ELA class with Ms. Gardner and one of our Grade 9 classes with Mr. McKay,” Arnott announced on Oct. 31.
The friendly competition was organized by the school’s Student Leadership Council (SLC).
The SLC has around 12 students who meet on a weekly basis to organize activities within the collegiate to build and maintain school spirit. Their goal is to make Peacock a space that is safe, supportive, and where all students are welcome to participate in school activities.
“(O)ur (SLC), along with our nurses who are interns here with the school right now… coordinated a food and clothing drive based on the needs of the Food Bank, as well as needs in the community with the cold weather that’s coming,” Arnott said.
The Food Bank was chosen after a recent advertisement requesting more donations. To ensure all items were as helpful as possible, students followed the charity’s wish list. “We thought that would be a great place to start,” Arnott said.
The SLC helped purchased some diapers in hard-to-find sizes such as five and six, which were requested for the Food Bank donation. To gather items, each class was given a BINGO card with various items they had to collect. Once the card was filled out, students would bring it to the office to confirm their task was completed.
Another initiative launched by the SLC has been the school’s ‘Peacock Pantry.’
“The SLC has coordinated what we call the ‘Peacock Pantry.’ It’s just an emergency area where we have some items for students, if they are going through a crisis at home or something is happening, and they need a few boxed food items to take home for the weekend. (This includes) toiletry items that they may need, warm clothing, etc.,” Arnott explained.
The SLC wanted to recognize the need that exists within the school as well as the community.
“That’s what came with the Peacock Pantry. Not all of our students can bring a donation for the Food Bank, and in some situations that’s something they may need. We felt it was very important to have that emergency stash here at the school as well,” Arnott said.
The food and clothing drive is an annual event at Peacock. In 2022, Peacock’s students partnered with the My Place Program, and the timing was extremely helpful as last winter’s fire on Caribou Street saw displaced individuals suddenly needing warm clothing and other items after the campaign was launched. The school donated around 35 backpacks filled with warm clothing and other necessities.
Students also donated a fair amount of children’s clothing this year, and the school is reaching out to local elementary schools who currently have a need for these items.
“As of right now, I have about 40 grocery bags full of food. I think it’s a pretty good amount that’s going to be donated and it’s great to see our (students) supporting that,” Arnott said about the food drive.
The donation will be made to the Food Bank later this week after the final count has been made.
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