The Successes and Challenges of Running a School Food Pantry 

You don’t have to be a school employee to witness students coming to school hungry. And you don’t have to be a school employee to help them.
Take Sara Huseman of Milford, OH, for example. When her kids were young, she served on their grade-school’s Parent Teacher Organization (PTO). She and other parent volunteers regularly raised funds to supply students in need with food, personal-care items and school supplies.

As Huseman’s children aged, she learned that the district’s junior high PTO wasn’t quite as active as the PTOs in the district’s six elementary schools. She also learned that the district’s high school had no PTO at all. Huseman realized that Milford’s junior-high and high-school students were experiencing food insecurity, so she began researching the topic online.

She learned that the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) defines food insecurity as “the lack of access, at times, to enough food for an active, healthy life,” and deems it a “critical public-health issue” typically driven by poverty, unemployment and income shocks.

“I learned there’s a correlation between kids with food insecurity and drug use, becoming sexualized at a young age, having to take care of their younger siblings — all sorts of things,” Huseman recalls. (See: “Consequences of Food Insecurity.”) “I came across a program in California, where a school kept rolling carts on-hand and filled them with free food for students.”

Feed Our Flock’s Humble Beginnings

She thought Milford could implement a similar program, so she set up a meeting with then-Superintendent Nancy House. “Nancy was pretty open to me trying this. There’d be no money out of [the district’s] pocket, so she said to ‘Go for it!’”

Huseman then purchased three rolling carts and placed one cart at the junior high, one at the high school and one at the Milford Academy. (The Academy is a small, non-traditional, learning venue for MHS students who need extra academic and personal support.)

Because Huseman didn’t want students who took food from the carts to feel “othered,” she put each cart in a nurse’s office or in an administrative office. And she stocked each one with “food that looked like their peers’ food” — e.g., snacks and breakfast foods. Because Milford’s mascot is the Eagle, Huseman dubbed the food-cart program “Feed Our Flock” (FOF).

Huseman envisioned expanding FOF far behind those initial three rolling carts, however. As such, in early 2020, she and her husband leased a building around the corner from Milford’s JHS and HS campus that could serve as FOF headquarters.

“We planned to remodel the building. In the back section of the building, we wanted to have food bags for kids to take home on the weekends. In the middle room, we wanted to have a free store where high-school and college kids could come shop for toothpaste, deodorant and other personal-care items. And in the front room, we wanted to have space for kids to get mentoring, to meet with military and job recruiters, and to take online classes,” Huseman explains.

“But four or five days after we signed the lease, we got a call from the school saying they were shutting down [because of COVID-19]. We quickly pawned off the food we had on-hand to kids because we thought [the closure] was only going to last two weeks.”

Obviously, the closure lasted a lot longer than that. Furthermore, the pandemic meant many more students in the community needed assistance. FOF responded by distributing weekly and biweekly food bags and restaurant gift cards to families.

The School Pantry’s Current, Multi-Faceted Approach

Fast-forward to today, and FOF’s approach is multi-faceted.

Food rolling carts / cabinets

FOF still distributes snacks and breakfast foods to students and the junior and senior high. Microwavable mac-and-cheese cups have proven especially popular. “Kids grab them all the time,” Huseman says.

Weekly and biweekly food bags

Huseman shops at Sam’s Club for food to put in weekly and biweekly bags. Volunteers — including parents, church groups, sports teams, scouts and classes of Milford special-needs students — sort the food and place it into the bags. Some weekly food bags are also paid for and assembled entirely by college students looking to receive volunteer-hour credits. On designated days, the food bags are distributed to families in two ways:

• First, elementary teachers will place food bags in students’ backpacks. “Any family at a [Milford] elementary school can sign up for food bags through a Google spreadsheet form the school has created,” Huseman explains. “But my [concern] is that we have families without computer access.” As such, Huseman asks schools to offer paper sign-up forms as well. And she asks the schools to offer the form in Spanish.
• Second, parents can stop by FOF headquarters on designated days. “We don’t turn people away and don’t require paperwork. But we can also check if we need to,” Huseman says.

School-holiday-break food bags

Because kids who rely upon food from schools’ rolling carts and cabinets don’t have access to that nutrition during school breaks, FOF creates and offers holiday-break food bags. Many community food banks offer Thanksgiving dinner, for example. But FOF offers food bags for Monday-Wednesday and Friday of Thanksgiving week. For example, Huseman says they offered bagels in the past.

Food nests

At each school in the district, at FOF headquarters and at the local police station, there is a “food nest.” (If you’re familiar with the “little free library” concept, think of those, but filled with food instead of books.) Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, anyone can drop off food donations or take food that they need. FOF also makes sure each location is stocked.

Sometimes, when she’s at FOF headquarters, Huseman sees and hears teens stopping by the nest to pick up breakfast on the way to school. Although they don’t know Huseman is on-site, she says, “It’s amazing to me how respectful and gentle people are with [the FOF’s nest]. One kid will say to the other, ‘Hey dude, just take one [food item]; leave some for other people.’ Or one kid will remind the other to close the nest’s door as they leave. None of our boxes has ever been vandalized. [Another district in the area] also has boxes, and theirs get vandalized all the time.”

Huseman recounts how once while she was at FOF headquarters, an older gentleman stopped by. He said he came in to thank me. He’d recently learned from his grandsons that his daughter had been struggling financially for the previous year. Consequently, the boys would stop by FOF’s food nest on their way to high school and get food for the day. Huseman explained to the grandfather FOF’s other offerings; now, he stops by FOF headquarters each week to snag a food bag for his daughter’s family.

Special holiday “feasts” at the MA

The week before big school lets out for big holidays (Thanksgiving and Christmas, for example), Huseman and her volunteers bring fresh fruit and casseroles to the students at the Academy. During their in-school feast, the volunteers often present the kids with gifts.

For example, this year for Thanksgiving, the Academy teachers asked FOF to provide all Academy kids with an outfit. All students received fuzzy socks, and could choose between sweats or leggings, and a sweatshirt or a hoodie. Many Academy students have limited wardrobes and little or no access to laundry facilities. As such, “They often come to school in filthy clothing,” Huseman says. “The feasts [and gifts] build community among the kids. And the kids are so sweet and so thankful.”

Personal-care assistance

FOF headquarters maintains a limited supply of personal-care items (e.g., toothbrushes, toothpaste, deodorant) available to students and families. In addition, the facility houses a single washer and dryer.

Grants

Teachers can apply for grants/gifts on behalf of their students. FOF then provides the teacher with the requested item so the teacher can present it to the student. That way, the student doesn’t even know FOF was involved in any way.

For example, several years ago, FOF helped a student who lived with his older brother, because their parents were both addicted to drugs. The boy didn’t have a reliable way to get to his school — especially in inclement weather — so he was frequently absent or tardy. His teacher asked that FOF provide the child a bike, a bike lock and a raincoat; FOF did just that and his attendance and performance improved.

For another student, FOF purchased comfortable, well-fitting shoes. The teen’s juvenile arthritis caused him excruciating foot pain that he regularly acted out in school and couldn’t focus. Once he received new shoes, his behavior and academics immediately improved.

FOF has helped other students by providing computers or other needed school supplies. And FOF has provided kids with nice clothing appropriate for job interviews, DECA competitions, school dances and graduation ceremonies.

Feed Our Flock’s Challenges

As is the case with most non-profits, finding funding and volunteers can be challenging. FOF receives its donations — monetary and otherwise — from individuals, area community gardens and local businesses. In addition, it hosts an annual Volley(ball) for a Cause fundraiser. Huseman uses funds to buy food in bulk from Sam’s Club.

When asked what other challenges FOF faces, Huseman says that in every community, “There’s the ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots.’ And the ‘haves’ don’t always believe that the ‘have-nots’ exist.” She said that some people mistakenly believe that if a student is performing well academically or playing a sport, they’re not hungry. “But I know there’s a need because I have so many kids tell me there’s a need,” Huseman emphasizes.

She also says that, if she had more funds — and if she could get the district to okay it — she would switch out the on-campus carts and cabinets for vending machines. Specifically, she would like to install vending machines tied to student ID numbers. That way, students who are not experiencing food insecurity could enter their ID number and have their student account charged. But students who are experiencing food insecurity could enter their ID number but not have their account charged. Of added benefit? The vending machine would automatically track what food needs to be refilled.

“People can do programs like ours,” Huseman emphasizes. “With school-district buy-in, you don’t have to have a crazy mom like me. A school food pantry teaches kids there are adults around you who want you to succeed. It teaches empathy. There are many layers of benefits to something like this.”