Canadian school leaves ‘no student out’ by creating a buddy bench

A newly installed ‘buddy bench’ is changing the way students play at a primary school in Canada.  

Willowgrove School in Saskatoon have created a safe way to include all students in the playground by installing a green coloured ‘buddy bench’.

The bench is a place students can go if they have no one to play with, the idea being that other pupils should go over and join them or ask them to play.

“If you can’t find your best friends, and you don’t know where to go play, you sit on the buddy bench, and somebody will come and find you,” seven-year-old student Matthew Henkelman said.

The impact on the school has been incredibly positive with students speaking about the program in high regard.

“Since we’ve installed them, before I seen people walking around by themselves and since we got these I seen a lot more people with friends to play with,” another student told CBC Saskatoon.

Since the video was shared on the CBC Saskatoon Facebook page, it’s been viewed over 12 million times.

“There are times in my life when I could use a buddy bench. People of all ages are lonely at times. It’s a simple, transformative idea,” a Facebook user wrote.