Summer Feeding Program serves almost 200,000 meals to local children

Wayne County Schools’ Summer Feeding Program has been a tremendously valuable service to the children of Wayne County during the on-going pandemic, having distributed almost 200,000 meals.

The school program has been in full force since March 16, supported by a professional school staff, which has included a particularly dedicated ‘family’ of food service employees that have definitely gone the extra-mile. At the end of June, they had served over 152,000 meals to the students in Wayne County. They anticipate adding over 40,000 more meals to that total for July.

“We are thankful for this program and the amazing job the staff has done implementing it. We do not want any of the children in this county to go hungry,” said Wayne County Schools Superintendent Wayne Roberts.

The local program is headed by Kathryn Tucker, who took quick action at the beginning of the pandemic, shifting gears from feeding students at school in the cafeterias to a completely different program that featured a school pick up service, plus a mobile fleet of buses delivering meals throughout the county.

“We want to thank everyone who made the program successful. We definitely could not have done it without the staff who chose to stay and put themselves at risk to make sure the students were fed breakfast and lunch each day,” said Wayne County Food Service Director Kathryn Tucker.

Tucker added, “We could not have done it without the bus drivers who help to deliver meals to the homes and to our mobile sites. We could not have done it without the front office staff at each school answering questions and signing people up for meals. We could not have done it without our numerous donations of bags, boxes, and give-a-ways that came in to be given out with the meals. We graciously thank each of you for all you did to ensure the students in our county were fed daily.”

“Although, this has been a stressful time on our world, knowing how everyone can come together to do something amazing, brings joy to this wonderful area,” noted Tucker.

Tucker hopes through this series of events, the community was aware that summer meals have always been free to all students 18-years-old.and younger, so all children are welcome to take advantage of this service. The federally funded Summer Feeding program has been provided to local children for many years and Tucker’s team looks forward to providing it again next summer.

With a school start date set for August 24, the food service team must start transitioning to meals looking a little different. The last day to provide Summer Meals will be Wednesday, July 29, 2020. The routes will run as usual that week and the last day for drive through pick up will be July 29.

Coming up, they have several school options for parents to choose from for students and each one provides a different type of meal service. With the options that are available, they will need the time before school starts to set their systems up to ensure each Wayne County student has access to meals.

They will have an Infographic available soon with the meal options available based on the options families choose for the new back to school schedule.

Summer Feeding Service sends food to sites across the county-

Co-workers pack food out to bus for transport