School Program ‘Rescues’ Leftovers So Kids Don’t Go Hungry Over the Weekends

For families who struggle financially, a guaranteed school lunch is often their saving grace. While a well-balanced meal enhances brain power and overall health, sadly many children go hungry during the weekends. To help students in need, a school district in Indiana is reducing the waste of food by providing students with meals to take home over the weekends.

Northern Indiana’s Elkhart Country Community School system teamed up with a non-profit group called Cultivate to implement a hugely beneficial and cost-effective pilot program at Woodland Elementary. The meals consist of “rescued” food that cafeteria workers prepared but never actually served. Rather than trash the food, it’s consumed by students in need. Plus, there isn’t an extra expense involved.

Currently, there are 20 students enrolled in the pilot. Every Friday, the students are sent off for the weekend with a backpack filled with eight individual frozen meals throughout the school year. 

“Over-preparing is just part of what happens,” said Cultivate spokesperson Jim Conklin. “We take well-prepared food, combine it with other food and make individual frozen meals out if it.”