On Friday mornings, before the first bell rings at Waconia High School, dozens of students are already gathering across the street at Koch Bus Service.
The doors open at 7:20 am, and breakfast is served. Students fill their plates with a generous breakfast and connect with classmates and friends while an icebreaker warms the crowd. After a hot meal, they open Bibles, provided at each seat, to follow along as a speaker shares a message of hope and encouragement. Around 8 am, after a closing prayer, students walk together across the parking lot to the high school.
It is part breakfast, part connection, and part encouragement for whatever the school day ahead might bring.
For parent Stephanie Armstrong, that combination is exactly the point.
The idea for Waconia Breakfast Club came from a similar parent-led club in St. Michael-Albertville, where hundreds of students regularly attend, for more than a decade. Stephanie and her husband, along with many others, watched the STMA Breakfast Club grow and eventually connected with the organizers to learn more, wondering if the concept could work in Waconia, too.
“Knowing how much stress and social pressure the average teenager faces, they wanted to create a place where students felt welcomed and loved, with a simple but consistent message: God sees you. God knows you. God loves you.
From the beginning, Breakfast Club was bigger than the Armstrongs. Over six weeks in spring 2025, a group of local parents met and rallied around the same vision, working together to turn the idea into something tangible. They considered launching in fall 2025, but Stephanie says the logistics quickly fell into place, and they agreed to launch with a preview of Breakfast Club on May 30, 2025, three months earlier than planned.
Still, no one knew whether students would actually come.
Just one week before the first gathering, organizers launched an Instagram account, encouraged their own kids to spread the word, and sent plenty of texts to other parents. On the final Friday of the school year, 180 students showed up.
“We were blown away,” Stephanie says.
That first morning also offered an early glimpse of how quickly the broader community would embrace the idea. A local restaurant supplied hash browns. Community members donated roasters, volunteered to serve, and helped prepare food.
That support continued throughout the club’s first year. Attendance averaged around 150 students each week and reached a high of 188. Some students rarely miss a Friday; others come depending on sports, activities, or their schedules. New faces continue to show up.
And organizers make a point of noticing them.
Volunteers intentionally welcome students as they walk through the door, learn their names, and make sure no one is left standing alone.
“We don’t want anyone to slip in unnoticed,” Stephanie says. “We want everyone to feel seen and welcomed.”
That sense of belonging can matter deeply during the high school years. Volunteers have watched students connect with classmates outside their normal social circles and discover shared interests or beliefs. She has also seen students arrive while navigating grief, difficult diagnoses, academic pressure, and the everyday stress of being a teenager.
“Our prayer is that Breakfast Club can become a refuge for any student, and a place they feel comfortable bringing their friends. We offer a great breakfast, yes, but more importantly, we want to offer them hope for their soul through the truth of God’s Word and a community that loves them, “ Stephanie says.
Of course, feeding roughly 150 hungry teenagers every time is no small undertaking. Volunteers have created systems for everything, from breakfast preparation to weekly RSVPs, so that organizers can plan carefully and steward donated funds well.
That preparation includes a team of aptly named “monkey bread makers,” who turn out six batches each, delivering the students’ favorite menu item before 7 am, while another volunteer makes the Friday morning hash brown run to a local restaurant.
Businesses and individuals have also stepped in to sponsor breakfasts, including Martin Cole, a financial advisor with Thrivent in Waconia.
“I originally heard about the Breakfast Club up in St. Michael-Albertville and was amazed at the growth of this club,” Martin says. “When I was told that they were starting a Breakfast Club in Waconia, I wanted to support these efforts any way that I could.”
For the Waconia Breakfast Club team, that community investment is pivotal to what makes the club possible. Parents tell organizers that Friday mornings have become a meaningful part of their children’s high school experience, after just one year. Churches have provided volunteers and financial support. Others donate, prepare food, arrive at 6 am to set up, stay to tear down afterward, or simply spread the word.
As Breakfast Club enters another school year, organizers hope even more parents and community members will join them and support this team effort.
With roughly 1,200 students at Waconia High School, there are plenty of young people to reach, and Stephanie hopes every student knows that Breakfast Club is a place where they are known, seen, and loved — by volunteers and by God. “We never want a high school student in Waconia to graduate and think nobody knew me and nobody cared,” she says.
In a community where families value that small-town sense of connection and hope, Breakfast Club offers another place for students to experience it… one Friday morning, one serving of monkey bread, and one familiar face at a time.
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