Kelly R. Price, the director of food services for Donegal School District, has a saying she likes to tell people. "I always say, 'Everyone thinks we thaw frozen pizza,'" she stated. "The cafeteria is so much more than thawing frozen pizza."

On a typical day at Donegal, students may enjoy homemade beef stroganoff or chicken and pasta with pesto. Over the course of a school year, the department serves 364,000 meals, providing breakfast and lunch as well as a friendly smile to thousands of students. And despite the almost daily challenges presented by the pandemic, Price and her staff have not missed a beat.

"When the district shut down in March of 2020, we only lost one day of serving meals," Price recalled. "We closed on Friday, March 13, and on the following Monday, we met as a department and we planned, prepped, and got all the food together for people to come and pick up meals. From March 17 to early June, we provided 77,000 meals."

Their work just got a little easier thanks to a $5,000 grant from Kellogg Company and No Kid Hungry. The department was awarded the grant in late 2020 and is using the funds to continue its focus on feeding students.

In a normal year, about 40% of Donegal students qualify for free or reduced-cost breakfast and lunch. This year, the USDA has provided a waiver for all students to receive free meals during the pandemic. Currently, the district is serving close to 65% of its students through the program, Price said.

Donegal students have been meeting in person throughout this school year, and Price and her staff found ways to work with social distancing and other pandemic guidelines. New equipment was needed as the department shifted from a traditional "lunch line" business model to an in-classroom delivery system from carts. Additionally, any students who have chosen to participate in virtual learning are eligible to pick up five days' worth of prepackaged breakfast and lunch items once a week. The grant money has helped the department purchase insulated bags, heating and cooling equipment, and packaging to make meal prepping and transportation easier.

"Breakfast service has been the hardest," Price said. "Less than 10% of our students were participating in breakfast, because kids couldn't come to the serving lines like they could before. With the addition of the carts and bags, we are able to bring breakfast to them and, in turn, increase our meal distribution by 60%."

Diana Hovey, senior vice president of corporate partnerships for Share Our Strength, the organization behind the No Kid Hungry campaign, said providing food to students is more important than ever. "America's kids need us," she stated. "Traditionally, many kids have relied on the meals they get at school each day."

Selecting Donegal to receive the grant was an easy choice, said Jen Roth, general manager K-12 of Kellogg's Away From Home division, adding, "We recognize the tremendous efforts of the food service team at Donegal School District who are working tirelessly to help get more meals to more children."