For thousands on reduced lunches, meals are blessing

School district leaders believe they have an obligation to help the thousands of students who are missing out on school lunches during the corona virus pandemic shutdown.
Even more at need are the thousands of students who are on free and reduced lunch status.
Oregon City Schools is offering its “Caring for Our Kids” grab and go USDA sponsored breakfast and lunch for children ages 3-18 every Monday from 10 a.m. to noon during the school closing. Assistant Superintendent Dean Sandwisch cannot emphasize enough how important the program is.
“About 1,300 of our students are on free and reduced status, so it’s critical for some of these folks that they get their meals. I still think that we’re just touching the surface at this point because with 6,000 meals it’s about 350 students, maybe a little bit more than that,” Sandwisch says.
“People are appreciative, people are stepping up to help who are really trying to honor space and we’re doing a lot of this outside. As soon as the report we take everyone’s temperature and then we move on from there. It definitely feels very, very essential to us because we just see a lineup of cars that are picking up food. They need it. It’s very critical,” Sandwisch continued.
“I fell into the role on Monday, but we kind of do three cars at a time, and I’m kind of traffic manager at the head of it, telling them what will happen and then we take their name, they’ve already registered, we give them their boxes, and it’s  quick turnaround. It looks like NASCAR because we turn it around in probably two minutes or less and then the next three move up.”
Pick-up is drive-through style at Starr Elementary. Each student receives five breakfasts and five lunches for the entire week.
“It’s really going well,” said Food Service Supervisor Vicki Laurell. “You know, there is a lot we’ve had to put together in a short amount of time. We’ve served over 6,000 meals since this happened.
“We started doing it a week ago Monday, and if anybody called and they had the need we ran over and started making meals immediately. So, we’re into our second week and it went from 1,000 and we knew we were going to get more for the Monday serving because that was going to be our big serving for the whole week. Really, the number is 4,999 because I had one meal left.
“It just keeps growing. I want to be all-in for it the entire time that it is needed. My food kitchen staff and the administration have been just so overwhelmingly supportive. It’s just good to see everybody come together and work for a common cause.”
Laurell says they are limiting the amount of staff that helps to follow social distancing guidelines.
“Our staff has volunteers but we’re keeping it at a minimum. So, we’re using our teachers and our classified employees and what we’re doing is we are going to keep those same workers for the following week. They have to take their temperature and we’ve told them they can’t be sick at all. That way we don’t have to go over the procedures with everybody again, so we’re kind of keeping the same volunteers week by week so that minimizes the exposure so they are not getting exposed to different people every week,” Laurell said.
Sandwisch added, “We currently have four of our six kitchens in operation and they are trimmed down staff. It’s basically a couple at each one — Clay is the biggest one. We just have as trimmed of a staff as we can get, and they are coming in for three days a week.
“On Mondays, regular hand-out days, we have a total of about 12 people, all employees of the district and one volunteer, our food supervisor’s husband, that have all volunteered to come in and distribute the boxes. We have a pretty lean operation, but it seems to be working pretty well.”
When families drive up, she says you can see how much appreciate the food.
“It is complete appreciation. My husband said he even saw a lady with tears in her eyes,” Laurell said. “They cannot be more appreciative. An interesting fact, and this is something that is just a little bit different — we had a couple parents tell us that their children are appreciating just having the normalcy of a school meal. It’s not necessarily it’s a big, big need, because I do think there is, but just getting that school meal is making our kids happy because they are used to that school meal every day, so it’s kind of normal that their getting their school meal. That’s probably the best takeaway I’ve had from the whole thing is that we’re helping our kids deal with this by just giving them their school meal that they are used to.
For information, call the Oregon Schools hotline at 419-698-6030.
 
Waite
Waite High School is one of eight pick-up locations for Toledo Public Schools, and Jim Gault, executive transformation leader of curriculum and instruction, says it is the busiest location.
“Waite, in terms of our high schools, is the one we are seeing the most volume at. It’s just what Waite is — it’s a staple on the east side, parents and children have been very happy to see us and they can continue to come back and we’re happy for that,” Gault said.
At Waite, pick-ups are available daily.
“We’re working with the United Way 211 to give out free meals for children, whether they are TPS or not, and they get a lunch or a breakfast. They come through Monday through Friday from 11-1, and we give them a lunch for a day and a breakfast for the next morning,” Gault said.
“We started last Wednesday, and I think on a normal day we’re giving out about 600 meals, serving about 300 children. We have some cafeteria staff there and volunteers, so it’s a drive-through or you can walk up, come up and everything is prepackaged for you. We give you a bag if you are in a car depending on how many children you have, give you the corresponding meals, and we see you on the next trip. It’s going really well, and it supports the school district, obviously, in times like these.”
Within the school district, the need for these families to get meals is great, says Gault.
“On a normal school day at Toledo Public Schools, nearly 90 percent of our kids are on a free and reduced lunch. We serve around 21,000 meals every day and with schools being closed, we still have families and students that are looking for where that meal is going to come from,” Gault said. “So, the district is doing what the district does in times like this. We opened up eight of our sites for parents to bring their children, whether you are TPS or not, and receive our food.”
Gault says the online learning program within TPS during this school shutdown has seen its’ challenges as well.
“It’s going about as well as we can do. Unfortunately, not everyone has an internet connection, so it’s a challenge,” Gault said. “But we also have paper and pencil learning so we will be distributing more information out on April 6 in the event we are closed beyond the time the governor has closed us so far.”
For information about the meals program, contact Linda Meyers at lmeyers@tps.org.