Switzerland summer meal delivery program a success
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WOODSFIELD -- Switzerland of Ohio Local School District officials have called the school's newly implemented summer meal delivery service a success after it provided hundreds of students with at-home meals and will continue to do so throughout next month.
The board of education approved a contract between the district and Innovation Food Service last month which delivers breakfast and lunches seven days a week through July and August to registered students.
The service is free to any student in the school district.
Suzanne Holland, food service manager for SOLSD, gave an update on the program during Thursday's meeting. She said the program has been a success.
"During the first week we had 340 students sign up for it; this week we have 450 (students) signed up," she said.
Although the service has received a great deal of positive feedback, organizers have encountered some issues with the meals' packaging.
Holland said the biggest complaint about the service is the Fed-Ex packaging being damaged during the delivery process, which leads to the food inside being damaged. She said she reached out to the vendor, who is working to correct the problem.
"They have committed to personally transport the 450 meals to the Cambridge Fex-Ex station to be delivered. I'm really impressed. We went right out and talked to them … they said they were going to fix the problem and they have," she said.
Other than the issue with packaging, it has been a "wonderful" service that will provide hundreds of students with delivered meals during the summer months.
She said a box is delivered each week to the student's home that contains seven breakfasts and seven lunches for the week.
The cost per box is $44.50; however, the district is reimbursed the cost by the state.
In other news, students in the Switzerland FFA held a presentation during the meeting to announce the group's accomplishments over this past year.
Alexa Marley, Megan Hoover, Kyra English and Jozie Zwick each took turns speaking to board members about the accomplishments.
Zwick said their mission this year was to grow both academically and individually in agriculture and create a positive impact. The FFA has 84 registered members and includes students from every school in the district.
Hoover said the Switzerland group has participated in 12 community service projects including trail cleaning, making blankets for the care center and helping with community events which resulted in 778 hours of service. Zwick added that 64 of the 84 members participated in at least one FFA event over the year.
All four girls were wearing "official dress," which includes an FFA jacket with the chapter name at the bottom.
"Earning your jackets is an important accomplishment for each FFA member. Our chapter strives to have students each year meet the requirements to earn their jackets," Marley said.
Marley added that 22 members earned their FFA jackets this year, meaning they each participated in a minimum of 15 hours of community service, one fundraiser and attended at least two FFA events.
The team's biggest accomplishment this year was participating in the Career Development Team, English said.
"These teams work outside of school on additional material in their competition area. Competitions took place virtually this year, but we overcame the pandemic and worked together to learn the material needed to compete," she said.