#school lunch programs

Karson Foods offers Healthy School Lunch meals to private and parochial schools. Meals are served to students hot at lunchtime Monday through Friday. Our food service and catering are comparable to all standard federal school lunch programs.

Nutrition, menu planning and wellness are three of our most important priorities in our food service program. We make sure each meal is nutritionally balanced with all the ingredients needed to create a healthy yet satisfying meal.

Karson Foods can send a representative to discuss all your special school lunch menu needs. With our lunch program, you will have the option of selecting from several pre-existing menus or we can create a custom menu that is unique to what you are looking for.

The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough to those who have little.  Franklin D. Roosevelt

It has been my good fortune to have been able to support myself (barely at times) doing the work that I love, being a naturopathic doctor, for most of my adult life. I remember a sign in my tax preparers office that read: “The joys of owning your own business, not unlike the joys of natural childbirth, have been greatly exaggerated.” Or something like that. There are certainly those in my profession that have been financially successful along with the intrinsic rewards of helping people, but I was not one of them.

And then I got cancer. And not dying became my full-time job. On the side I also worked as a home health aide and I made little money but also had little in the way of responsibility. I also relied on programs like Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), also known as food stamps to survive.

I am doing well now. I have relocated from Alaska (my home of 30 years) to Washington state where I grew up, so that I could be closer to family. I was fortunate in that I had family to take me in while I figured out my next moves. Some are not so lucky.

I started volunteering at the Sky Valley Food Bank in my new community as a way to build my social network. I was blessed with the instant camaraderie of many fellow and sister volunteers, and paid staff, who were joined in a single purpose: support the mission of eliminating hunger. Every week we provided food for an average of 261 families, enough for 10 meals per person. This amounts to more than 75,000 pounds of food distributed every month—almost one million pounds per year.

And Then Came COVID-19

According to data from the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), some 13.7 million households (10.5% of all households), experienced food insecurity at some point in 2019. That is 35 million Americans who were either unable to acquire enough food to meet their needs, or uncertain of where their next meal might come from.

In one study that came out in June 2020, researchers asked: “In the last seven days, which of these statements best describes the food eaten in your household?”

 Enough of the food we wanted to eat

 Enough, but not always the kind of food we wanted to eat

 Sometimes not enough to eat

 Often not enough to eat.

According to these researchers, since 2019, food insecurity has doubled overall and tripled in households with children.*

The Ripple Effects of Hunger

Not having access to healthy food has ripple effects of chronic ill health, disability, stress, and worsening poverty. These problems did not start with COVID-19, but the pandemic has made even more glaring the differences in the quality of life between “those who have much [and] those who have little.” This kind of safety net, that supplies sustenance to those in need, makes good economic sense. Adults who have a disability, in particular a disability and are not in the workforce, also experience more than twice the rate of food insecurity as adults who do not have a disability.

At our local food bank, we were unable to have our customers shop in-doors like we had in the past safely. We were shut down but found a way to deliver boxes of food to the porches of 125 families in the area. We also drastically cut down on the number of volunteers that could be in our warehouse per day which translates to fewer people doing more physically demanding work. The good news is that people from the community, from gardeners, to private businesses, to social service organizations, and individuals found ways to help Sky Valley Food Bank carry out the mission.**

School Closures and Vulnerable Students

With schools being shut down, students were no longer able to receive meals at their schools at a reduced price or free as they had in the past. This was not just a local problem, across the country nutrition directors reported that they were serving fewer meals than when school was in session. Last spring, the School Nutrition Association surveyed 2000 districts that reported 80% were serving fewer meals. Of those, the majority said the number of meals had dropped by 50% or more.

Most areas relied on the food pick up model that they usually did in the summer months where families could drop by their local school each day, often between 11-1, and pick up a bag lunch and maybe breakfast. But as parents started returning to work, the pickup model did not always work if parents were not always able to take children to the drop off site at the right time.

In Fulton County Georgia and Tucson Arizona, nutrition programs started packing food including frozen hamburgers and pizza, enough for a week’s worth of meals, and sending them out on school buses to be distributed at bus stops where the lowest income families typically resided.***

Food Deserts

In the best of times getting adequate nutrition is especially challenging for people who live in a “food desert.” The definition of a food desert can change depending on where you live. In urban areas, you need to live more than a mile away from a grocery store. For rural areas, you live more then 10 miles away. According to Feeding America, rural areas make up 63% of counties in the US and 87% of counties with high rates of food insecurity. In 2015, 19 million people lived in a food desert and 2.1 million households both lived in a food desert and lacked access to a vehicle according to the USDA.

The Shifting Model of Getting Food to the Food Insecure

In the summertime at Sky Valley Food Bank, we were able to greet our long-time customers, and many new ones, that were able to shop in our outdoor market. I loved being able to chat with our customers and find out how they were getting along. From my own experience, I can say that accepting help for something as necessary as feeding myself was a blow to my ego. Thank goodness I got over that. Being able to help my fellow and sister humans, regardless of why they were our customers is something I treasure.

Like many school districts around the country, our schools were not able to open in September. We partnered with our public schools to set up food pantries in five of our schools. We also had the return of rainy weather and the outdoor market was not an option. We began having a drive through service where our staff would build boxes of food for distribution in people’s cars. We were now serving 325 families and had special “Holiday” boxes in November and December, along with the usual boxes of meat, dairy, dry goods, canned goods, grains, produce, and food for their four-legged household members. Getting two boxes is better than one box, especially during the holidays.

In December we also had a toy drive that garnered an incredible assortment of toys from community members. It is remarkable how much our community does to provide for people having a tough time—food, toys, money—all gratefully accepted. The parents were able to pick out toys for their kids. 

We are looking forward to having our customers back in our service area to carefully select the foods they want for themselves and their loved ones. We are looking forward to giving them the kind of respectful service we always have and continue to provide. COVID or no COVID.

LONE WOLF

I am a lone wolf.

I have lost my pack.

My sire was the first to go. The alfa.

His job to protect the pack, especially from each other, fell to no one.

I grew up with the bitch who was two years my elder.

Always the more adventurous one. She was gone

Before her pups were fully grown.

And they are lost to me.

 The she-wolf who bore me tried desperately to keep the pack together.

“Come home. Why don’t you move back home?”

She grew old, frail, a little crazy

A kind of crazy that was always there but kept in check by the alpha.

 The older bitch is gone too.

When did the word bitch become derogatory?

I reclaim that title. It suits me.

It suits those of us who live in a world where self sufficiency is prized above all

And sentimentality is a luxury.

 Another sire gone. Was it really eight years ago?

He left to be with Jesus.

I think he’s food for flora and fauna.

Who’s to say?

 My brother looks up from the hard work of dying

All traces of silliness and the infectious laughter that is his calling card are gone

And the world is just a bit more lonely.

 The rest of the pack is dispersed.

Do they prowl in search of the familiar?

Of course they do. (howl)

I cannot believe we even need to ask this question, but I guess we do. Without vital school nutrition programs, there will be an even greater dumbing down of America  than there already is. Fight for your children’s lunch programs. Fight for WIC. Fight for our schools. There is too much at stake.  Read here: How does nutrition affect children’s school performance? –…