Three educational institutions from Donetsk, Mykolaiv and Sumy oblasts received prizes for participating in the World School Milk Day competition.
A printer, three TVs and a mixing console were delivered to Yelanets Lyceum No. 1 in Mykolaiv oblast, two printers, a laptop and two basketball backboards were delivered to Romny Secondary School No. 11 in Sumy oblast, and 14 tablets and a laptop were delivered to the Akademichny secondary school in Kramatorsk.
“All the gifts are very necessary for primary school pupils and for holding various events. As part of the competition, teachers organized a sports and dairy quest, cooking classes, dairy master classes, implemented educational projects and even organized a butter extraction challenge. Not only pupils and teachers joined in, but also parents who actively supported us. Next year we are definitely planning to take part in the competition again,” said Valentyna Kravchuk, principal of the lyceum in Mykolaiv oblast.
The Akademichnyi school from Kramatorsk was almost the only one to submit its work in a remote format and managed to win. Despite online learning, participation in the competition was active and widespread. Students of the Kramatorsk school submitted creative works about the benefits of milk and dairy products, conducted experiments with milk, studied the history of milk, and talked about milk during lessons of physics, biology, health, safety and well-being, natural science, chemistry, and “I Explore the World” lessons in junior high school.
“The gadgets will make our lessons more interactive and help primary school teachers to develop calligraphy skills. The tablets and laptop will become indispensable assistants in technology, art and design lessons. In the future, we plan to use the equipment provided for the integrated STEM course, optional animation and animation courses,” commented Inna Strashko, director of Academichny secondary school.
Milkshakes, cheesecakes, cocoa, pancakes and cheese pizza were prepared by pupils of Romny Secondary School No. 11 in Sumy oblast to win the competition. 23 classes were involved in educational activities on the benefits of milk in a healthy diet.
“After participating in the competition, our students not only know how to cook delicious dishes from milk and dairy products, but also know all about their benefits in a healthy diet. It was a good educational experience and we are sincerely grateful for the gifts we received. We really need them in our educational process,” said Victoria Zelenska, the school’s director.
For the third year in a row, the Swiss-Ukrainian QFTP program has been supporting initiatives to introduce the tradition of celebrating the World School Milk Day in Ukraine, which falls on the last Wednesday of September.
“In our activities, we engage national and international experts, as well as representatives of various institutions in EU member states in a roundtable format to learn from the experience of School Milk programs and accompanying educational activities, such as competitions for the World School Milk Day. It is very important that such an initiative is supported by the flagships of the Ukrainian dairy sector, which prepare excellent awards and gifts for the most active educational institutions. However, for the first time such a large number of participants in 2023 prompted us to revise the contest’s Regulations and, with the support of the Embassy of Switzerland in Ukraine, QFTP announced three additional winners from the regions most affected by the war. Although the celebration of the World School Milk Day in Ukraine remains a private sector initiative, the most important result today is that every 5th participant of the competition is from the territories where military operations are (were) conducted,” says Iryna Vysotska, coordinator of the Dairy Sector component of QFTP.
Read more about the evaluation criteria and results of the competition here.
Additional prizes from the Astarta agro-industrial holding were awarded to:
– Gadyach Lyceum No. 1 named after Olena Pchilka, Poltava region – acoustic systems and equipment for it.
– Gymnasium No. 315 with in-depth study of foreign languages, Kyiv – acoustic systems.
– Kindergarten-nursery No. 1 in Chortkiv, Ternopil region – an interactive whiteboard and a short-throw projector.
“When we say that children are our future, we have to take responsibility for these words and look for a variety of ways to help the younger generation grow up healthy. For Astarta, the topic of milk is organic because we are one of the largest industrial producers of it. We guarantee the quality of our products, their safety, and make a lot of efforts to popularize the consumption of dairy products by both adults and children. Children are a priority. It is for them that we and our partners organized “milk contests”. This is the best educational format to learn as much as possible about the benefits of milk, taste it and start drinking it on a daily basis. We are impressed with the results of the contests, as they covered almost all of Ukraine and involved hundreds of educational institutions, both schools and kindergartens. And through children, we reached their family members. These are millions of Ukrainians,” said Lilia Marachkanets, Head of Corporate Partnership and Communications at Astarta.
Special gifts from the partners in the form of dairy products were delivered to three educational institutions:
– Nikopol City Children’s Hospital (Dnipropetrovsk oblast) from Milk Alliance.
– Zaporizhzhia Gymnasium No. 89 (Zaporizhzhia) from Loostdorf.
– Kryvyi Rih Lyceum No. 119 (Kryvyi Rih) from TM Kaniv.
– Hlukhiv Secondary School No. 1 (Sumy oblast) from Molokiya.
The competition on the occasion of World School Milk Day was held from 1 September 2023 to 27 September 2023. Its main goal is to raise awareness among children and adults about the health benefits of milk and dairy products, to draw attention to and actualize the issue of healthy eating with a focus on milk and dairy products, and to create a public demand for quality and safe milk and dairy products.
A total of 284 educational institutions from 19 regions of Ukraine took part in the competition and held thematic activities in their schools, kindergartens, and communities.
The events were organized by Loostdorf, Milk Alliance, Molokia, TM Kaniv, and Astarta agro-industrial holding with the information support of the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine and in cooperation with the Ukrainian Institute for Education Development, with the support of Switzerland, within the framework of the Swiss-Ukrainian program “Higher Value Added Trade from the Organic and Dairy Sectors in Ukraine”, funded by the Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL, Switzerland) in partnership with SAFOSO AG (Switzerland).
Photo provided by educational institutions.
