My experience with CanTeam
Blog written by Victoria, student volunteer and a member of the CanTeam Crew at Bedford Academy
Introduction
I first participated in CanTeam in June of 2024, after I heard about it from one of my teachers. I learnt that it was an event that promoted sustainable eating practices that reduce food waste, food hunger and plastic consumption through student led community meals. At first, I chose to participate just to help people out, however after I attended the event I realised that it was actually great fun and taught me a lot of transferable skills. At the event, I helped put up decorations to make the environment more welcoming as CanTeam’s goal is to promote inclusion within the community. After families started to arrive, I had been put in charge of serving drinks with one of my peers which allowed me to interact with the adults and children that came to the event. Through this I was able to interact with my community better, to help promote my school as a safe space for families that need additional support in the area. After families started to leave, I helped clean up and caught up with my peers to discuss what we had done to help and how we found the whole event.
My CanTeam journey:
As I’m more introverted, I wasn’t too keen and felt anxious about the event however over my journey through it I learnt that I can push myself to step out of my comfort zone and I found that it was actually quite fun and interesting meeting so many new people and catering to their needs. Over the course of CanTeam I gained skills in communication as I conversed with many people I usually would shy away from and I also learnt team building skills as I had to work within a group to not only decorate the event but also help hand out drinks. My biggest challenge I would say was overcoming the idea of doing something out of my comfort zone however through this event I learnt that I can work in new environments with new people and still be a valuable part of the team. I also gained self-dependency skills through talking to the members of the community.
Final Thoughts:
Overall, I would recommend participating in a CanTeam event to any student as its an easy way to not only leave your comfort zone but also gain important life skills. I would suggest if given the opportunity, everyone that can, should sign up as it also gives a sense of pride to help cater to people in your community even if it’s just through providing food and a good time for not only adults but also children of all ages. For me personally, it was a very positive experience as I got to get more involved with the community and help out in areas I wouldn’t be able to any other day.
It was very sociable and a fun activity to be involved in.
Background:
CanTeam is an after school social dining initiative co-designed with young people that encourages students and their families to enjoy nutritious, delicious and diverse foods together.
Launched by Future Foundations in June 2023, CanTeam aims to embed a transformative food culture within schools, enabling young people to learn and thrive.
Over the first 6 months of the initiative, CanTeam was funded and supported by the Big Change Big Education Challenge to develop the concept, consult beneficiaries and test the idea. In January 2024, CanTeam was announced a winner of the Big Education Challenge and is being supported by Big Change to scale across the UK.
In partnership with HEART Academies Trust and Bedford Academy Future Foundations delivered a two-event pilot of CanTeam. The first was focused on Year 7 and 8 students and the second was opened up to local primary school families. The catering was provided in-house by Russell Abbey, Head of Catering Services at HEART Academies Trust. Many of the ingredients were kindly donated by Allmanhall.
We are excited to continue developing CanTeam and the impact we can have on the health and wellbeing of young people and their families throughout the UK.
BIG NEWS – CanTeam, is a winner of the Big Education Challenge
Future Foundations, the organisation behind CanTeam, has been awarded £225,000 to develop and pilot at scale the idea. The £1m prize fund is the first of its kind run by education charity Big Change and was set up to identify, support and reward bold ideas with the potential to transform education and learning in the UK. Click here to find out more.
Find out more:
- Read an article published by Bedford Today about the launch of CanTeam at Bedford Academy here
- Read about the Challenge here
- Read about CanTeam, our BIG idea for change here
Get in touch, if you think you can help…
- Email: jon@future-foundations.co.uk
We are looking for schools and partners who share our vision and can help us pilot CanTeam at scale.