DECATUR — Many local students rely on eating breakfast and lunch at school to fulfill their nutritional needs, but what do children in need eat on weekends and school holidays?
Samaritan Community Center Snackpacks for Kids Program in Rogers provides northwest Arkansas children, including Decatur students, with plastic bags filled with eight to 10 healthy snacks to take home over the weekend.
Because the need is greater than the supply, the Decatur fifth grade gifted and talented students have stepped in and started a food drive to supplement the snackpacks provided to their school as a community service project, according to gifted and talented teacher Tim Smithey.
Decatur elementary students receive 65 snackpacks from the Samaritan Community Center, and the gifted and talented student’s food drive has supplemented the program enough to serve an additional 15 students, according to elementary school counselor Ginger Witty.
A total of 82 percent of Decatur students district wide, and 86 percent of elementary students, qualify for free and reduced lunches.
According to the Samaritan Community Center website, www.samcc.org, more than 39,406 students in Benton, Carroll, Madison and Washington Counties qualify for the Federal Free and Reduced Lunch program, and their organization is only able to serve about 5,000 children, or 8 percent of those in need. In addition to donations, they purchase 50,000 snacks at a monthly cost of $16,000, the website states.
Last Tuesday, 13 Decatur fifth grade gifted and talented students were adding more substantial items, such as ramen noodles, macaroni and cheese and Vienna sausages to the snackpacks to last students over spring break.
Calorie intake is a problem for some kids over the weekend and it can be especially hard for families to make food stretch towards the end of the month, Smithey said. If a family has school-aged children, they will have to provide each child with 10 extra meals next week, Witty said.
“It’s trying to make sure that kids get the things they need to eat because hungry kids can’t learn,” Smitheysaid.
“It’s fun to participate in it because you know you’re helping someone or their family have food,” said fifth grade student Erin DeClure, explaining that she has learned from Smithey that many families don’t get food stamps until the end of themonth and have trouble making their food stretch over the last weeks.
Tajae White, another fifth grade student, said he has been helping with the food drive for about three months. He said his gifted and talented class has been collecting food from family and friends and bringing it to school.
“It’s good to help others,” he said.
Even though 80 Decatur students are currently provided with snackpacks, the school has a total of 300 students who rely on free and reduced lunches, according to Witty. She said that students frequently approach her and ask to be added to the program.
“I’m certainly thankful they do have the program and that we can supplement it,” Witty said.
Community members are welcomed to help the Decatur gifted and talented students with their food drive. Non-perishable, lightweight items such as animal crackers, fruit and granola bars, juice boxes, individual pudding cups, cheese crackers, apple sauce, pretzels, fruit snacks, beef jerky, cereal, ramen noodles, Viennasausages and macaroni and cheese are needed. The Samaritan Community Center Program asks that no items with peanut butter or glass packaging be donated.
Items can be dropped off at Tim Smithey’s office at the Decatur Northside Elementary School.
News, Pages 11 on 03/21/2012