Weekly, What recent changes are going on at your work / local businesses?

Large US public school district employee here. Our district has just completed the application window for the district offered magnet programs for the 26/27 school year, and the number of students applying for high school magnet options has dramatically increased. This is unusual because the district typically loses a large number of students to private high schools. This year, there are a lot more students trying to get back into the system, rather than planning to exit it. Also, noticing a substantial increase in the number of students now eating both offerings of the universal free breakfast and lunch. At the beginning of this school year, about 70% of the students ate free breakfast, and about 85% ate free lunch. Now seeing around 80% eating breakfast and 90+% eating lunch daily. Fresh fruit and vegetable offerings have disappeared. Now it’s all from a can or dried crasins. The quality of the free snacks provided for after school activities (to universal free breakfast and lunch schools) has dropped dramatically. It used to be a large bag of chips, or a pack of pop tarts, or fruit like apple slices with string cheese and a small bag of pretzels - an option like that, along with a Capri Sun. Now the snacks are much smaller. Yesterday’s was a pack of big graham cracker goldfish (2 crackers), a pack of crasins, and a small box of apple juice. The day before it was a small bag of animal crackers, a pack of crasins, and a small box of apple juice. Kids are also much more enthusiastic about ensuring they get a snack during the afternoon activities. Some kids are always like that, but there’s been an increase of the number of them displaying it recently. Our service learning club (student led and driven) has begun the process of creating a “snack and food pantry” to be made available to students in the school. The club conducted an anonymous “needs assessment” to determine what students felt would be most needed to support the student population. Food was the top item. Food insecurity has always been an issue in my geographic area, and growing kids are always hungry, but we seem to be seeing a sharp uptick, especially in the last month to month and a half, in the number of students receiving a large amount of their nutrition at school, funded by the School Nutrition Program. I’ve put out feelers to several School Nutrition workers at different schools in my district, and they have said they are seeing much of the same in their schools, as well.