PANAMA CITY — Two local elementary schools have been approved for a program that provides food to students involved in after-school activities.
Waller Elementary and Lynn Haven Elementary will have snacks and meals available to all students who participate in school activities after the regular school day ends, said a district official.
Both schools will start the program in February. They join 11 other schools in Bay County already participating in the Afterschool Meals Program (AMP), said Chartwells director of operations Jonathan White. Chartwells is the vendor for the district food service program.
According to White, Bay District Schools currently average about 600 after-school meals a day, providing a hot meal for students.
“It’s something that the kids like,” White said.
Waller Elementary Principal Peggy Bunch said there are a few clubs that meet at the school in the afternoon: Girls On the Run, Guys On the Go and the Robotics Club, along with teachers that do after-school tutoring. AMP would see that these students on campus eat before they go home, Bunch said. She added most students who stay after school go home between 3 and 3:30 p.m.
The Florida Department of Health approached Waller about the school starting AMP, Bunch said.
“We were very pleased,” Bunch said of the outreach.
At Lynn Haven Elementary, Principal Debra Spradley said she was “thrilled” about having meals in their afternoon programs. She named the choir, Freedom Singers, as well as Lynn Haven’s Girls On the Run, as among those able to participate.
White said schools are eligible for AMP if they have a 50 percent or higher rate of free and reduced price lunches for students. It comes at no cost to the district and the meals are financed through the Health Department, according to White.
AMP is part of the USDA’s Child and Adult Care Food Program.
