In Fort Good Hope, N.W.T., the kids are all right making pizza

Students at Chief T'Selehye School in Fort Good Hope, N.W.T., are making and selling pizzas to earn credits and raise money for tours of post-secondary schools and sports trips.

The school recently reopened its pizza cafe as part of a new baking program.

Fifteen-year-old Jaydon Kakfwi helped build the stand for the pizza oven. He's now taken a lead position in the group cooking the pizzas, which is organized by teacher Paul Boisvert.

"You've got to enjoy what you're doing if you're going to make a good pizza," said Kakfwi. "I enjoy it.

"It motivates me to keep doing this because it's getting funding for my school so I can travel on sports trips, travel to other places in Canada."

Community shows support 

Kakfwi is a fan of the pizza, too, saying it's the best pizza he's ever tasted.

"It's better than Pizza Hut. It's better than store-bought pizza. It's just the sauce, the way it tastes, the way it is, the way it's made. When you taste it you'll be like 'holy, that's the best pizza you'll ever taste.'"

Whole pizzas sell for $40 and individual slices for $5. Teacher Boisvert, who learned baking skills while working at a bakery in London, Ont., says that the group "gets a lot of community support," and that demand has increased to the point where dough needs to be prepared the night before to keep up with demand.

The students in the baking program are also making homemade bagels, which Boisvert says are starting to catch on in the community. Currently, the cafe is open five days a week at lunch, but there are tentative plans in the works to explore evening or weekend openings.

Boisvert says that the program provides practical skills to the students participating — he brings in a new group each day to help with preparing the kitchen — but the skills base it provides is much broader than learning how to cook a pizza.

"We're really trying to focus on an entrepreneurial program, to show kids what it's like to run a business," says Boisvert. 

"It's not just a case of taking the flour out... and making a pizza. There's costs that are involved, there's customer service involved. 

"We're also trying to give these kids skills. So if and when they try to go to college, or university, or just move down south, it's literally something that they'll be able to put on their resume, that they worked in a proper kitchen."