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| Jeanne Reilly, left, the Director of School Nutrition for RSU 14, and David Boger, Windham Middle School kitchen manager, gathered in June to give out food to families as part of the district's backpack program distribution. With RSU 14 students back in school Wednesday, Reilly said serving safe and delicious meals is one of the district's top priorities this fall. PHOTO BY ED PIERCE |
By
Elizabeth Richards
When school reopens for area students on
Sept. 9, the RSU 14 school nutrition department will be feeding students in a
whole new way. As they adapt to the changes, meals will look different than in
the past.
Under the hybrid learning model, only 50
percent of students will be on campus to receive school meals, said Jeanne Reilly,
RSU 14 Director of School Nutrition. “This will, without a
doubt, affect participation, which will also significantly impact our budget.”
The district will be offering meals to families on days when children are learning at home, whether they are participating in the hybrid model or have chosen full remote learning, Reilly said.
Families
can order breakfast and lunch by 9 p.m. the night before and will pick up at
various locations throughout Windham and Raymond.
Elementary
students will be served meals in the classroom, while the middle schools and
high school will use the cafeteria following social distancing protocols.
Reilly
said that in order to allow the team to adjust to the new service method, the
start-up menu consists of almost 100 percent cold food such as sandwiches,
yogurt parfaits and other things that are easy for students to eat in the
classroom, while also easy for the nutrition program to maintain proper
temperature and food safety protocols.
“After
the first several weeks of school, we will gradually start to add in hot foods
that can be transported safely and easily,” Reilly said.
Choices
at the middle and high schools will also be more limited, with no salad bar and
self-service limited to packaged foods.
The
biggest challenge right now, Reilly said, is providing meals that are appealing
and delicious for students while also easy to deliver both in school and via
their Mobile Meals van.
“Our
goal is to continue to provide high quality meals safely and efficiently to all
students and to maintain our reputation as a program that delivers nutritious,
delicious, kid approved, convenient and affordable meals in the same way we
always have, even though things might look a little different then they have in
the past,” she said.
The
theme for this year is flexibility, Reilly said.
“We are
preparing our team to be flexible and able to adapt to the changing situations,”
she said. “Our team are experts at food safety and
efficiency. Serving safe and delicious meals to the students in RSU14 is
our priority.”
With so
many things to manage while setting up breakfast, lunch and mobile meals, the RSU
14 backpack program won’t begin right away.
“We
certainly plan to continue to provide food on the weekends via
our backpack program,” Reilly said. “We just need to get everything else
organized first.”
The district also is exploring different scenarios for student lunches
to maintain social distancing guidelines at lunchtime, ranging from eating in
the classroom to finding larger spaces in the schools for lunchrooms to
accommodate social distancing mandates. For some schools, RSU 14 has purchased
additional picnic tables for students to eat lunch outdoors.
About 3,200 students attend RSU 14 schools in Windham and Raymond. <
