St. Catharines Collegiate students come together at Farmer’s Market

When the St. Catharines Collegiate students bring their goods to the Farmer’s Market on Thursday mornings, they not selling one thing. They are selling many.

Lisa Koster, a business studies teacher, made sure that she reached out in many directions to many internal departments so that the students could not only show a variety of different wares for sale, they could mingle with others in different streams.

“A lot of it is getting students to work as a team with other students they normally wouldn’t work with,” Koster told inniagararegion.

“A lot of times students gravitate towards others with the same interests as them but if you own a business, you need people with differing skills set.”

To that end, she got culinary students, woodworking students, Life Skill students, tech students and business students to work together on a common goal, coming together to the Farmer’s Market knowing how to, well, market their goods.

“Students have to first create the products and then create the marketing for them.”

When we stopped by on May 18, the selection of diverse products was exceptional. Everything from adult and child sized Muskoka chairs, planters from the horticulture students, iron garden wagons from the manufacturing class, wine racks, charcuterie boards, ornate wooden coasters, sugar body scrubs, handmade notebooks (done with love from the Life Skills class) and since it is a farmers market, from the culinary classes, frozen soup, pizza slices and pastry twists.

Being at the Farmers Market, Koster said, “Students get the see the reaction from the public of their final product. It shows them the skills they have today are marketable and for young people, understanding their value and what they have to offer is essential to motivate them, keep them creative.”

While the class had a booth at the market from 10 am to noon on Thursdays in May, tomorrow (May 25) will be their last day.