In classroom instruction may be suspended, but Penticton Secondary School and Princess Margaret Secondary are hubs of activity.
Staff are busy packing food hampers to meet the nutritional needs of 160 families in Penticton. The Okanagan Skaha school district is expanding its Starfish and Penny Lane backpack programs as more students struggle with food insecurity due to the economic uncertainty caused by COVID-19.
Previously, around 100 families were signed up to receive some form of support. “There are a lot of families struggling right now in our community and especially a lot of families whose parents are laid off, not working right now, and we realized that we are having to reach out to a lot more families than what we have in the past,”