The Olmsted Falls City Schools Food Service Department looks forward to welcoming students back into our building cafeterias when school starts in Hybrid mode beginning Tuesday, September 8th.  There will be a number changes in how food service will look and operate this year.  Please take a few moments to review the information below and do not hesitate to reach out to us with any questions!

FREE Meals for ALL Extended through end of school year: The USDA has approved that ALL school meals will be provided FREE of charge no matter your economic status through June 30, 2021! This means Olmsted Falls Schools will continue to be able to provide FREE meals for ALL students through the end of our school year on June 8, 2020. Please do not hesitate to take advantage of this benefit! Whether in-person or through our curbside pick-up service (details below), we are happy to serve your students. Even though the meals are free of charge for students, our district receives government reimbursement from each meal served, which helps fund food service operations. Even with these free meals, we still encourage you to have money on your student’s EZPay account so they will have the ability to purchase an extra treat from our healthy a la carte options. (A la carte options such as chips, ice cream, etc., are not part of the free meal offering, but will still be available for purchase by students on their in-person attendance days.) This section was updated on 10/12/20 to reflect extension of USDA Free Meals for All Program through end of the school year.

Food Service Ordering Process for Days Your Student is NOT in the building: In order to properly plan and provide this curbside pickup service, orders for breakfast and lunch must be placed on this Daily Order Form by 11:59 pm the day before. To order for the upcoming school day when your child will NOT be in the school building, this form will be open and available from 3:00 pm - 11:59 pm the day before. For example, meals for Monday need to be submitted by 11:59 pm on Sunday night. 

When students are physically in the building for their in-person days, there is no need to use the daily order form. Please bookmark the form on your computer or mobile device so you have easy access to it!

Menu: Due to changes in the supply chain and more intensive government/public health safety guidelines, the breakfast and lunch menus have been simplified and are better suited for a grab-and-go style in order to keep meals individually wrapped and safe to eat. This year, the menus will be the same across all five school buildings. 

**9/25/20 Update** After considering staff and community feedback, we have made a few changes to our lunch menu that will go into effect beginning the week of October 5th.  One significant change includes having Dominos and Papa John’s pizza available for both the Gold and Blue group on their in-person learning days. To view the new menu, please click HERE.

**9/25/20 Update** Curbside Pickup/Delivery Service for School Days Your Student is NOT in the Building:

To make pickup less confusing for families, we have removed the High School as a curbside pickup location on Wednesday (Remote Learning Day). Beginning next week, the Wednesday curbside pick-up location for families will be the same as the assigned pick-up location for your at-home learning days (Falls-Lenox or Olmsted Falls Intermediate School). For example, if you are in the Gold Group at Home and you pick up from Falls-Lenox on Monday and Tuesday, you will now pick up from Falls-Lenox on Wednesday as well.

Below please find the revised curbside pickup schedule:

Please Note:  If you filled out the meal order form but are unable to pick up the meal that day, or if you are unsure if you filled out the order form for any given day, please contact Julie Bartell or myself by phone at (440) 427-6440 or via email (jbartell@ofcs.net or schin@ofcs.net) so we can plan accordingly and prevent food waste created by meals ordered but not picked up.  Thank you in advance for your assistance with this. 

**10/12/20 Update** CHANGES TO CURBSIDE SERVICE PICK-UP FOR INCLEMENT WEATHER DAYS

Thank you again for your continued support of our curbside service meal program! In anticipation of the change in weather, we will be making a slight change to our curbside service. On days with inclement weather (rain, snow, extreme cold, etc), the food will stay inside of the front vestibule at OFIS and Falls-Lenox. We ask that you pull up to the curb like usual, put your hazard lights on, and then have someone walk up and receive the food from our volunteers. This change will help protect our volunteers from illness and will also keep your meals warm! If there are days that you will not be coming to pick up your meal due to the bad weather, please call our food service department in advance so we can make the adjustment to our daily meal count and prevent food waste. 

Remember that curbside pick-up service is available to ALL OFCS STUDENTS on the days they are not attending school in-person.  If you haven’t given it a try yet, consider signing up for curbside lunch for your student(s) one day this week by accessing the Daily Order Form HERE. To read the recent local news story about our curbside service, please click HERE.

Volunteer to Help Deliver Lunches:  We understand that there are some in our community who are not able to pick up meals for their children due to lack of transportation. With that in mind, we are looking for volunteers who would be willing to pick up meals on behalf of these families and deliver to their homes. If you are interested in volunteering or are a family who wants to order meals but cannot pick it up themselves, please contact Julie Bartell at jbartell@ofcs.net or (440)427-6440, and we can coordinate a volunteer program for meal delivery.

Payment: Due to strict safety regulations and the national coin shortage, we will only accept electronic payments through the EZPay system this school year. EZPay is a simple, safe, and secure way to make payments to your student’s meal account. If we receive cash payments, we cannot guarantee exact change being returned due to the coin shortage. If you need help creating an EZPay account for your student(s), please contact Julie Bartell at jbartell@ofcs.net or (440) 427-6441.

Safety Measures: Keeping students and staff safe and healthy in all of our cafeterias is the top priority of the OFCS Food Service Department.  Six-foot social distancing will be enforced in all eating spaces and cafeteria lines. All food-service staff will wear personal protective equipment (PPE) at all times to ensure food safety. All foods will be individually wrapped unless handed to the student by a food service employee.

Free/Reduced Meal Application: Please follow this link to find out how to fill out your electronic or paper free/reduced application. If your family’s financial situation has been affected by the pandemic, you can check out the application to see if you qualify. Even though we expect meals for all students to be free through December 31, 2020, it is important that you still fill out this application to see if you can receive a school fee waiver and so that your student(s) will be signed up for free/reduced meals once the USDA free meal extension is over. If you need help with this application, please contact Julie Bartell at jbartell@ofcs.net or (440) 427-6441.

We hope that in this abnormal year, you will still consider receiving meals from OFCS Food Service for the following reasons:

• Countless studies show that proper nutrition is crucial for a child’s development and greatly improves their school performance. All meals served meet strict USDA nutrition guidelines to ensure adequate nutrition for each student.
• Our meals will help take some of the burden off of parents who may be juggling working from home and helping their students with remote learning.
• With rising grocery prices, it has become more costly to make meals at home. Now with meals expected to be free for all students, you can save a significant amount of money each week on food.
• By receiving meals through OFCS Food Service, you will be doing your part to support a local business. Even though the meals may be free for you, our department receives government reimbursement from each meal that funds everything that we do!

OFCS Food Service takes a lot of pride in serving our students healthy, delicious meals to fuel them during the school day and to support their growth. We are always so thankful for your support and we look forward to feeding your student(s), no matter what the school year looks like!  Again, I encourage you to reach out to me or Mrs. Bartell with any questions. 

Sam Chin MS, RDN, LD

Food Service Director

Olmsted Falls City Schools

(440) 427-6440

schin@ofcs.net

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