If a kid at C. W. Baker High School isn’t getting enough to eat, hopefully they’ll find their way to Dana Rubadou’s office sooner or later.
Rubadou, a teaching assistant in Baker’s Career Center, is the faculty advisor for the Key Club. As such, she also heads up the Bee Full, a student-run food pantry that provides a little extra sustenance to kids who need it.
“Yesterday morning, first period, an art teacher called me and said, ‘I have a student that expressed an interest,’” Rubadou said. “Then later in the day, I got a call from a science teacher saying, ‘Can you give a permission slip to so-and-so?’ So I know people have talked about it.”
The pantry was launched through a grant from the Halo Foundation, a partnership between Nickelodeon and Key Club International that rewards high school Key Clubs working on projects that will help their communities. Baker’s Key Club was one of 11 clubs nationwide to receive grant money, netting $1,125 for the Bee Full pantry so that kids at Baker living with food insecurity could have a little more to eat each month.
“The kids knew there was a need,” Rubadou said.
Rubadou herself was surprised by how great the need is.
“We have about 1500 kids in this building,” she said. “How many kids do you think get free or reduced lunch in this building? Because when I first started this, I told myself in my little head, 50, maybe 75. It’s 328. I feel like I’m barely touching the surface.”
With additional support from the Baldwinsville Teachers Association and the First Presbyterian Church of Baldwinsville, the pantry officially opened in February of 2018. With the help of a BOCES student who buys and inventories the food, Rubadou and the Key Club stock the pantry and pack up bags of food for students who have signed up for the program. In order to sign up, kids just have to have their parents sign a permission slip. They pick up a backpack from the pantry twice a month from September through June. Rubadou said she also organized one pickup each in July and August. When the pantry launched, a total of 25 students were signed up. Rubadou said she thinks they could now handle about 40. Students who are interested in the program can see their guidance counselor or the school nurse for a permission slip.
“[We recognize] it’s a delicate issue,” Rubadou said. “We’ve been very careful about keeping everything private.”
Rubadou said keeping the kids’ information confidential is important.
“Years ago, I had this boy, and… he was very slight and very pale,” she recalled. “He would always come to my room during lunch. I used to say to him, ‘Why do you not go down to the cafeteria?’ That’s back when you had to walk through the line and say, ‘My name’s Dana Roubadou. I’m free.’ He wouldn’t go because that was embarrassing.”
While the system for getting free and reduced lunch has changed — students now use their student IDs, which either charges a MySchoolBucks account connected to a parent’s credit card or registers that they receive free lunch — the stigma of poverty hasn’t.
“They have enough to deal with,” Rubadou said. “I just want them to get their meals.”
To that end, the pantry is looking for donations of the following items:
- Pancake mix
- Syrup
- Canned vegetables
- Canned fruit
- Applesauce
- Pasta
- Sauce
- Granola bars (avoid nuts)
- Fruit snacks
- Taco shells
- Taco sauce
- Macaroni and cheese
- Ramen noodles
- Rice
- Peanut butter
- Canned chicken
- Canned tuna
Rubadou said she’s also hoping to get donations or vouchers for fresh milk and dairy as well as produce. Short of that, she said she may put gift cards for grocery stores into the bags so parents can buy dairy goods and fresh fruits and vegetables.
While the pantry is still just getting off the ground, Rubadou said she does see it growing in the future. Space is already getting tight in the storage closet the pantry currently occupies.
“I would love for the kids to be able to come and pack [their own] bags, do their own shopping,” she said. She also wants to be able to provide more than food. “In the beginning of this, someone donated a bunch of toothbrushes, so over the break, we stuffed those in the bags. Once we put little hotel soaps and shampoos in everybody’s bag. It would be great to have those more regularly.”
Rubadou said it’s all possible with the generosity of the Baldwinsville community; she’s already seen it in action.
“It takes a village,” Rubadou said. “It’s this big collective effort. There’s something we can do.”
If you’d like to make a food donation, contact Rubadou by phone or email first rather than leaving boxes outside the school. Monetary donations can be mailed to the high school at 29 E. Oneida St., Baldwinsville, NY 13027. For more information about Bee Full, contact Rubadou at [email protected] or (315) 638-6149.
