Bulk is back

Classes are delayed until after Labor Day.

Food service will resume this week.

Jay School Corporation announced Tuesday that it would resume its food distribution for local children beginning Friday.

Bulk food — five breakfasts and five lunches — will be available for pickup from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Friday at Bloomfield, East Jay, Redkey and Westlawn elementary schools. That pattern will continue through the remainder of August, as allowed by a federal waiver.

For those who can’t make it to those locations during the day, there will be an after-hours pick-up session from 5 to 6 p.m. on Fridays at Jay County High School.

Those who have questions can contact [email protected] or (260) 726-9306.

“I think there are families who need it, where it makes a difference for them,” said Jay Schools superintendent Jeremy Gulley. “Our economy took a hit. I’m sure that’s affected families that were out of work for a while … We’re taking one more bit of stress out of the lives of people who were affected by the closure of the economy …

“It’s been, I think, a positive thing for our families. People have been very supportive.”

Jay School Board voted last week to delay the start of the school year from the original date of Aug. 12 in part to allow staff to adjust to an anticipated increase in demand for the online-only option following Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb’s executive order requiring masks where social distancing is not possible. The new start date for classes is Sept. 9.

Jay School Corporation began food service distributions five days after students left school March 13, which ended up being the final day classes were in session in-person for the 2019-20 school year. Initially, lunches could be picked up daily at local schools. The corporation later switched to a bulk feeding program, with a week’s worth of meals being delivered to “country kids” while in-town students could pick them up at designated schools.

Food distribution was shut down as of July 20 to allow the corporation’s food service staff time to prepare for the new school year. Between March 18 and July 20, Jay Schools distributed 425,000 meals to local children.

Gulley said the decision to go with the pick-up sites only for the food distribution this month was made to allow bus drivers time off before school resumes. He noted that Chartwells, which manages the school corporation’s food service, can rotate staff in from other sites to allow local food service workers time off as needed.