Sara Stadem | Editor
There have been many changes throughout the school districts this year due to COVID-19. Another area that has been impacted with COVID-19 changes are school meals.
The Food Services departments for both Tri-Valley Mustangs and West Central Trojans have implemented changes this school year in order to continue to serve their students and staff.
In the past, both schools have been able to provide a variety of foods with several available meal options. Tri-Valley Food Service Director, Stacy Blow, indicated they have previously offered a warm breakfast option for all grades and three lunch options for grades 5-12. Blow explained they are still able to provide the three lunch options but what changed was breakfast. “Breakfast is a grab and go, meaning they are served in the hallways as a grab and go meal,” Blow said. “We just altered the hot items for breakfast due to cooking temps.”
West Central Food Service Director, Victoria Wittrock, states, “We tried to streamline (options) in case things come up such as staff shortages or food shortages.” Prior to COVID, they were able to provide two breakfast options for the elementary and six options for the middle school and high school. In order to streamline, they have dropped the options to one for elementary and five for middle school and high school.
Wittrock said they are still offering a snack in between breakfast and lunch for grades K-2, for a cost, like in past years.
Lunch was also altered for West Central with these changes, according to Wittrock. Elementary grades K-2 have one meal option or a sub sandwich option. Grades 3-5, along with middle school and high school now have four choices. In the past, they had six or seven choices.
Wittrock explained one of the biggest challenges they face is making sure they use all of the commodity dollars, which is money given from the government to be used on certain products that students like better.
“When school was closed last spring, the money got moved and now has to be used this year to make sure that the program dollars are being used and are needed,” Wittrock said. “When we came back (this school year), we had a 10-15 percent participation drop. A lot of families are choosing not to eat with us because of the fear of how their food is being handled.” Wittrock continued, “This makes it even harder to use the commodity dollars.”
Wittrock explained that there are so many things to think about when using the funds now with fewer choices, along with having a four-week menu cycle instead of a six-week cycle and wanting to make sure that they pick foods for everyone. “We don’t want to pick people out based on what they can or cannot eat,” said Wittrock.
At Tri-Valley, Blow said another challenge is the four-day school week. They are required to work so many hours which means they have to work on Fridays, Blow explained. “We had to figure out Fridays as we have to be here. We are doing extra sanitizing and online training webinars.”
Blow and Wittrock both discussed the hurdle of individually packaging food, especially pertaining to the salad bar. Blow said prepping at Tri-Valley takes more time now because they used to be able to put the washed items in one container, such as lettuce, for the students to take themselves. Now, Blow explained, they have to put each serving into a plastic bag or cup; this includes every topping option for a salad such as tomatoes, onions, etc.
When the changes were discussed, Blow tried to look at items through her vender that were prepackaged. Blow said, “The problem with this is that you already set up with your vender last year for this school year. So, to try to change now would be tough.” Blow continued, “You are still responsible for the amount of food and money you said you were going to buy from them.”
Wittrock said at West Central, kids were grabbing everything but their own entrée. “Now we are wrapping and packaging everything for the salad bars, fruits and vegetables.” Wittrock continued, “We don’t put them all on the line at once, that way they aren’t being touched over and over. We put about five individually packaged items out at once and as needed, restock.”
Most manufacturing companies are not prepared to individually wrap things, Wittrock explained. “We are too small for manufacturing companies to be willing to assist so that means we have to do it all ourselves.”
Both Tri-Valley and West Central school districts were recently approved to offer a free breakfast and lunch to students in grades K-12 each day. This program is in place until December 31, 2020, or until federal funding runs out.
At Tri-Valley, Blow states, “If it’s free, we are going to be preparing even more because more students will eat but that’s operationally what we are set to do. Generally, we are ready for that.”
Wittrock at West Central said now that they are approved for the free meals, she is hoping to do something different to help out with the cost of the snack; maybe move it to a second option breakfast.
Last spring when schools shut down, food services at both school districts were still able to assist families. Wittrock said they were able to provide lunches when kids were sent home and all summer long until the day school started. “This past summer, we fed 0-18 year-olds. We did have community members that donated to help pay for the meals for kids that were not enrolled as they knew I had a hard time turning those kids away without a meal,” Wittrock said.
Tri-Valley had the challenge of their school location when it came to providing meals for the students last spring, according to Blow. “We are in the middle of nowhere so having students come to the school to get meals wasn’t realistic,” she said. “We asked who wanted meals and got the list on Friday. We would make the food on Monday and would deliver five days’ worth of meals in one box to the families. We had about 65 families participate.”
If schools would go to e-learning now, Blow is uncertain of how all the details will work. “We will be required to have a plan in place and the government will let us know our requirements,” Blow said.
Wittrock said, “If they go back to virtual learning right now, meals would still be free until funding runs out. If funds run out, enrolled students would be able to get a meal based on their eligibility; kids that are eligible for free, reduced meals would still be charged that way.”