USD 231 Nutrition Services celebrated a monumental milestone on Friday, March 5 when the team served the one-millionth meal to our community's children since March 2020.
"The extraordinary efforts of our department staff throughout this unprecedented time have been tireless and selfless," shared Amy Droegemeier, director of USD 231 Nutrition Services.
"Our team's passion and drive to provide quality, nutritious meals for our students has never been more evident than this past year. I have never been prouder of our employees' adaptability and creativity to ensure we meet our kids needs in a vast array of delivery methods while maintaining our commitment to excellence."
After providing thousands of free curbside meal kits during the spring and summer of 2020, meals continue to be served to elementary students in their classrooms, via curbside pickup for students in alternative learning models, and in the cafeterias for older students attending in-person classes.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), which oversees the school meals programs, provided nationwide waivers that allowed all children to receive nutritious meals for free as part of its pandemic response efforts with an extension of the Summer Food Service Program. These flexibilities allowed all school meal providers to ensure that children received nutritious meals while schools were not in session or students were learning in remote or hybrid learning models. This Federally-funded program also provides reimbursement based on meals served to schools that provide these services to students attending on-site during the 2020-2021 school year.
With the USDA's recently-announced extension of these flexibilities, the USD 231 Nutrition Services team is making preparations to offer free curbside meal kits again to all children ages 1-18 in the Gardner and Edgerton communities beginning June 1 and continuing through early August. Additional details will be available on the USD 231 website, USD 231 Nutrition Services Facebook page, and other communication methods.