After the bell rang at Escondido High School last week, students lined up outside the cafeteria for snacks: milk, cereal, gelatin cups, shark-shaped fruit gummies and saltine crackers, along with apples, melons and canned peaches.
The students were helping themselves to the offerings of a food pantry by the nonprofit Feeding America. Kids Pantry provides free produce and non-perishables to any students who want them, on the first and third Thursdays of each month during the school year.
Sophomore Damon Woods, 15, said he’s visited the pantry several times so far. The cans and boxes he brings home stretch his family’s grocery budget a little further, he said.
“My parents don’t have to go out and buy as much stuff,” he said. “It makes it last a little longer what we get from the store. I already have a meal right here: cereal and milk.”
The program is one of the ways the high school is trying to make sure students get the nutrition they need to concentrate in class, said Kim Bodie, a school social worker. In addition to the school breakfast and lunch program, the district has offered free supper after school at Orange Glen High School for several years, and is expanding that to the Escondido High and Valley High campuses this year.
“If they’re fed, they can focus,” Bodie said. “Food makes such a difference. If you come into your first period fed, you can learn. If you’re starving, that’s what’s on your mind.”
With about two-thirds of students on its free and reduced lunch program, the high school is a good match for the food pantry, said Evelyn Zarzosa, director of nutrition for the district. said. Kids Pantry is open to all students, with no eligibility requirements. Students don’t need to show identification to pick up food, but they’re asked to write down how many family members they’re collecting for, so administrators know how much to bring the next week.
Sophomore Zack Wesem, 15, said he appreciates the opportunity to stock up. His dad works long hours, so Wesem picked up snacks that his dad can eat on the run.
“You can get it even if you have paid lunch, and it’s just nice to have extra food,” he said.
Although the pantry sometimes offers premium produce such as fresh avocados, many students skipped those items in favor of packaged food. It’s an issue that the food pantry administrators struggle with, much as parents labor to get kids to eat their fruits and veggies.
“A lot of times we’ll have five different types of produce — tomatoes, lettuce, avocados — and we’ll say, ‘take some produce’,” said Marla Martin, the site lead for nutrition for the high school. “And they’ll take one apple.”
That wasn’t the case with senior Khloe Brinegar, who left the pantry with a box piled with apples and melon, along with boxed goods. She said she would like to see a greater selection of produce.
“I think a lot of people take more sweets and snacks, but if they emphasized more kinds of veggies, they would take veggies,” said Brinegar, 17.
Administrators promote the program through flyers and notices on the cafeteria menu. Students were a little shy at first, officialssaid, but became more comfortable after coming to the pantry a few times. Word spread, and new students showed up.
“I found out from my friends,” said sophomore Tristan Dunn, 15, who started coming to the pantry last year. “I saw them with boxes of food, and I was like, ‘I want food!’”
Dunn and other students said they were happy with the selection, which includes donations from local grocery stores of food that may be surplus or nearing its expiration date
“All of this I’m going to eat, and we don’t have to buy groceries for a while,” Dunn said. “It’s got everything a guy needs.”
deborah.brennan@sduniontribune.com
