Rankin Inlet's 6-week cooking and literacy program culminates with Christmas baking

The smell of Christmas baking was in the air at Simon Alaittuq School in Rankin Inlet during the last week of school, as the class in the kids cooking program prepared treats for all the students.

For the previous six weeks, 18 students in a Grade 5/6 split class had been learning kitchen skills from a red seal chef, as well improving their math and literacy.

"Those are all life skills that don't just help them through their program period, but throughout their lives," said Adriana Kusugak, literacy programs coordinator with Ilitaqsiniq Nunavut Literacy Council.

Ilitaqsiniq applied for the funds through the North West Company's new Health Horizons Foundation as a continuation to the Niqitsialiurniq project, where youth developed literacy and culinary skills for employment.

Kusugak said the idea was to bring some skills to younger kids.

"It helps them to feel really good about themselves in the role that they are taking as they are growing up to say that they can do these types of things."

At the school's Christmas concert, everyone in the audience received a bag of baked treats and on the last day of Christmas before the break, so did everyone in the school.

The students were building confidence throughout the program, said Kusugak.

"They became more comfortable and confident when it comes to measuring... they were very proud of themselves and the products they created," she said.

"It was really nice to hear over the course of the six weeks, some of the students were able to share that they took some of their learning home with them and recreated it in their own home."

Along with the literacy, Kusugak said nutrition and cooking is extremely important knowledge.

"We're losing those basic skills about how to make something from scratch, how to do something homemade... so it's really good to bring back some of those types of skills and learning," she said.

"They're realizing, quite quickly, that if they were to go buy something versus making it from scratch, it lasts a lot longer, their dollar stretches, they are able to feed a lot more people with that same amount of money."

Supporting the communities is one of the "most important things we do," said Derek Reimer, director of business development for the North West Company.

"We work, our employees work, they live in these communities. We want to give back to the communities."

The Health Horizons Foundation is accepting grant applications until Jan. 31, 2017.