Most students sleep in on Saturday mornings. Senior Wilson Robohm doesn’t. Starting at 8 am every Saturday, he joins a small group of Haldane students who volunteer at the Philipstown Food Pantry. During the week, on campus, a similar commitment to helping others spurs the Haldane Cafeteria staff to ensure that all students are fed, regardless of their ability to pay.
Out of the 29 million students who eat school lunch daily, 20 million eat using free or reduced-price school lunch programs, according to schoolnutrition.org. Out of 335 million Americans, 47 million, including 14 million children, experience food insecurity annually, according to feedingamerica.org.
Philipstown is not an exception. The Philipstown Food Pantry helps an average of 65 local families meet their food needs each week, according to their webpage. The Pantry is barely a 5-minute walk from Haldane at the First Presbyterian Church at 10 Academy Street. Despite the Pantry’s closeness to the school, Haldane senior Wilson Robohm is one of only a few students who volunteer at the Pantry every Saturday along with his siblings, freshmen Charlie and Max Robohm and seniors Christopher Cornell, Domenica Awananch, and Crystal Timmons and others. Wilson Robohm said he volunteers because he thinks it’s the best way to spend his Saturday mornings. “I mainly just had a lack of awareness,” he said. “So I was told that the Food Pantry happens right next to my house. I felt it was silly to sleep in on Saturday instead of helping out because they really use me down there, and they really like it and appreciate the help.”
Robohm stated he thought his assistance was helpful to the adult volunteers who plan and run all the myriad operations of the Pantry. “The more help they have, the better,” he said.
“Especially if I can take the workload off of the people already doing [the bulk of the work] because they have so much more on their hands than I do.” Maria Helbock, the Coordinator of the Food Pantry, is one such person. “Maria, the owner, she’s amazing,” noted Robohm. “She does a ton of different stuff. So even if I can just help a little bit, it makes her and me feel better about being able to take on some of the workload.”
Robohm felt the most important part of his work was the element of “giving back” to the community. He said, “Fortunately enough… I’m in a situation that doesn’t require me to go to the Food Pantry, but I’m very grateful for that, and I find it very considerate that if you can, you should.” Speaking of what he found most rewarding, Robohm continued, “[It is] the feeling I have when I help, but not even about me. It’s more so the feeling that other people give me and the thank yous and you can see, I can’t think of a better word than “true-ness” or like that real true feeling of thank you. ”
Students aren’t the only ones combating hunger locally. Haldane cafeteria staff also play an important role in helping local families meet their food needs. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, of the 786 students enrolled in the Haldane Central School District for the 2023-24 school year, 109 students, including 42 students in the high school, qualify for free or reduced lunch.
Getting enough food is vital to anyone’s well-being, but students are especially vulnerable to malnutrition. According to Feeding America, a nationwide non-profit determined to end hunger, children who lack sufficient nutrition may be at risk of academic underperformance, health conditions like anemia and asthma, and poor emotional and mental development. At Haldane, the cafeteria staff works tirelessly to provide every student with nutritious meals that can help prevent these side effects.
Serving between 350 and 400 students each day, our Haldane staff has a lot on their plate. Nancy Norton, who has worked eleven years as the Cafeteria Director at Haldane, is responsible for creating menus and overseeing the day-to-day of the cafeteria. The Haldane staff must follow specific nutritional requirements for different age groups per New York State guidelines. Norton says each grade level has grain and protein limits but none on fruit and vegetables. “You have to take at least half a cup of a fruit or a vegetable, but if you were to say to me, ‘Hey Mrs. Norton, can I have three fruit cups?’, you can have five fruit cups, as long as you’re going to eat them,” she said.
With this liberal attitude towards providing nutritious food, it is no surprise that Haldane is generous towards students and families. Federally-funded school breakfast and lunch programs offered at Haldane accommodate in-need families with free and price-reduced meals for their children. In some cases, these may be the only meals the child will receive, which makes it even more essential that the school provides these families with understanding and their children with proper nutrition. Even when families are not making full payments, that does not stop Haldane staff from providing food. Norton stated, “When I notice it’s been a while since [a family] put money in, I reach out. Sometimes they pay [the school] a little bit here, a little bit there, just to get it paid off”.
When this is not an option, she advises the family to apply for aid initiatives like price-reduced meals. According to Norton, many families do not even realize they qualify for these programs until they apply, which indicates a lack of understanding about access to meal assistance. Though debt incurred before enrollment in assistance programs is not removed after enrollment, Norton says they prevent families from becoming further indebted. She commented, “If they can pay me a dollar a week, fifty cents a week, whatever they can do to pay it off… as long as they make an effort”.
The cafeteria staff feels deeply connected to the students they serve; they watch tiny, hyper kindergarteners grow into graduating seniors throughout their lunch line. Norton neatly summed up her empathetic attitude toward ensuring the students she serves are fed no matter what: “I never, ever take a meal from a child, whether they owe fifty cents or fifty dollars.” At the end of the day, Haldane strives to nourish its students with nutrient-rich meals and its families with support, compassion, and confidentiality.
Families may qualify for free or price-reduced meals if they meet certain income requirements. Students under the meal programs may also be eligible for free or reduced rates for dual enrollment courses and AP exams offered by Haldane, fee waivers for college applications, and free score reports.
For more information about the Free Lunch and Reduced-Price Lunch and Breakfast Program at Haldane, visit the High School office or contact Mrs. Catherine Platt, Haldane’s School Business Manager, at 265-9254 ext. 111. Further information about New York’s federal school meal assistance program administration can be found online at https://www. cn.nysed.gov/national-lunch-program.
Any student who is interested in helping out at the Philipstown Food Pantry should contact the Food Pantry Coordinator at [email protected]. More information can be found at: presbychurchcoldspring.org/food-pantry
