Price School offers grab and go lunch
Kids living on the Yuma Proving Ground (YPG) installation rolled in on their bikes, skates and scooters with a smile on their face, ready to get their free pre-packaged school lunch from the lawn at James D. Price Elementary School.
“I love the interaction,” exclaimed Taryn Chase who drove up with her son to grab a lunch.
“It’s a nice extra thing showing that they care. In these trying times just this little bit of relief especially for parents who work from home it definitely makes a big impact.”
The free school lunches are part of a nutrition program provided by the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) grant. Select schools within Yuma School District 1 are providing grab and go lunches to children under the age of 18.
Price school located on the YPG installation almost missed out on the opportunity because of logistics explains Price School Principal Jarrod Norris, “We don’t have a cafeteria here. So Price doesn’t typically give out hot lunches but once a month.”
This is where Stacie Oliver, administrative secretary at Price and Melissa Henderson, Military Free Fall School Peer Network Coordinator stepped in. Oliver was in the process of emailing the nutrition program about Price’s monthly meal when Henderson walked into the office asking about the daily meals. The ladies had never met before. In the first week they handed out more than 400 lunches.
Henderson picks up the lunches at Desert Mesa Elementary School and transports them to YPG Monday-Friday and Oliver organizes the lunches and helps pass them out. “It’s a huge team effort,” says Henderson.
This is Henderson’s second time at YPG, her husband served at YPG once before and her children attended Price when they were stationed here before. Currently, her kids are older and no longer at Price, which actually makes her service even more remarkable. “As parent I understood the struggle of always having to pack a lunch.”
She also finds the experience rewarding, “We have happy kids and happy parents.We get smiling faces, everyone wants to talk. They are out in the community which is great because have all been so cooped up.”
Norris says, “It is one more thing we can do for the YPG community.”
The USDA grant provides meals until the school winter break in December. At YPG the service might not continue on a daily basis through December because of the logistics but for now it’s here Monday-Friday.