Recognizing Happy, Healthy Heads

I made the following statement today in the House of Assembly:

I stand today to congratulate the students and staff at St. Andrew’s Elementary School and, in particular, Kindergarten teacher Mrs. Susan Jackman, on their successful efforts to access funding for their "Happy, Healthy Heads" project.

Last July, Mrs. Jackman applied to the Awesome St. John's Foundation for funding to purchase 100 helmets for students at St. Andrew’s Elementary, a centre city school in St. John's North.

The trustees of Awesome St. John’s, who fund initiatives through their own donations, awarded a $1,000 grand prize to Mrs. Jackman's proposal at a public event at the Rocket Bakery in August.

Canadian Tire's Jumpstart program gave significant support to the project as well by donating an additional 255 helmets as well as an assortment of knee pads, elbow pads, t-shirts, and sports bags.

In the end, this excellent school-based initiative provided each St. Andrew’s student with a helmet and other safety equipment.

Because of the generous support from the project sponsors, Mrs. Jackman and her students had enough helmets left over to donate some to another school in the neighborhood.

I ask all hon. members to join me in congratulating Mrs. Susan Jackman and St. Andrew’s Elementary on their awesome community initiative.