Waterloo pharmacy students visit elementary schools during Pharmacy Appreciation Month

Viktoria Cubelic (Rx2025) and Megan Taylor (Rx2025) at an elementary school.

For many years Waterloo Pharmacy students have co-ordinated an educational outreach initiative in the Waterloo community during March, Pharmacy Appreciation Month (PAM). Students volunteer to visit elementary schools across the region.

This year, 16 pharmacy students were involved in planning the activities and 21 students visited seven schools in Kitchener-Waterloo and Cambridge with approximately 630 elementary school children engaged.

Chiquitah Paul (Rx2025) and Cassy Van Drunen-LaChanse (Rx2025) shared their experience visiting the school’s this year.

“This generation of children were born into the COVID era,” Van Drunen-LaChanse says. “It’s important for them to know and understand how to take care of themselves and protect others.”

Pharmacy students tailored the presentations in a visual way to incorporate hands-on activities for students from kindergarten to grade seven. Activities included the importance of handwashing, understanding allergies and the importance of medicine.

A kit including giant microbe plush toys.

“Going out into the community empowers us as pharmacy students to get out there and spread the word about what pharmacists can do,” Paul says.

Seeing the children excited to learn, ask questions and connect their thoughts is a wonderful way to connect with the community and share the importance of the pharmacy profession.

Thank you to pharmacy clubs UW CAPSI, UW PPAG and RxPRN for their involvement and all the students involved this year!