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Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION

Costumed students out for a Harvest Halloween

By: Nick Martin

Posted: 10/10/2012 1:00 AM | Comments: 0

WAYNE GLOWACKI / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS From left, teacher Karen Wiebe and students Zachary Dark, Brooklyn Friesen, Shafagh Daneshfar, Hongru Ren, Violeta Bekovcki and Andrew Lee hold banner calling for clean drinking water in north.

OK, let's establish up front that it's cool for Grade 12 students to dress in costumes, grab a bag and go door to door on Oct. 31.

And no, they are so absolutely not defying the province's nutrition program by stuffing their faces with sugar and saturated fats on Halloween.

At Fort Richmond Collegiate, 79 students will hit the streets to collect food for Winnipeg Harvest.

"We'll be collecting non-perishable food items," explained student Shafagh Daneshfar, who chairs the school's Free the Children Committee.

It's called We Scare Hunger, and it's part of this year's We Day campaign to get students involved in service.

Students will go around their neighbourhoods a couple of days before, letting residents know that when these tall trick-or-treaters show up on the 31st, homeowners might want to consider donating. "We don't want to surprise them" on Halloween, Andrew Lee said.

And they'll go in costume. "We've got to," laughed Hongru Ren.

They'll be among 18,000 students from more than 380 schools attending this year's We Day celebration Oct. 30 at the MTS Centre.

Two days later, FRC is going to get buried in food for Winnipeg Harvest, much of it collected by the 79 students, some of it brought to school by the other 1,000-plus students.

Supervising teacher Karen Wiebe kiddingly shuddered at the thought her classroom will get a lot smaller Nov. 1 with all that food piled up.

If you live near FRC, don't worry that all 79 will come to your door. "We'll designate streets and areas," Brooklyn Friesen said.

Working for Free the Children is a full-year effort for the Fort Richmond students.

"Every year we adopt a country," Daneshfar said. The students raise money to build a school in countries such as Haiti, Kenya, India, or Sierra Leone, and in the spring, they march to The Forks to raise awareness.

The students are encouraging everyone at the school to send a postcard to Ottawa demanding clean water as a basic right for Canada's reserves.

Among its fundraising and service efforts, the Free the Children group organizes a toy drive for low-income daycare centres and a craft sale next month.

nick.martin@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition October 10, 2012 B3

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