At Manna, the need is rising, and donations are slowing. Escambia schools are here to help
At Pensacola’s Manna Food Pantries headquarters, the need for nutritious food is getting higher and donations are slowing.
However, Escambia County Public Schools’ is hoping to make a big dent with this year's holiday canned food drive running now through Dec. 6 that will support their community long after the holidays.
Kerri Smayda, associate executive director for Manna, said that while their partnership with the school district has been in place for many years, this year’s holiday food drive is especially significant since food insecurity is rising in Escambia and Santa Rosa counties with “no indication that things will slow.”
“The pandemic hit, inflation followed, and we continue to see the repercussions of those two things. Families are struggling right now. They're having a hard time with affordable housing, with their utility bills, with their grocery bills, and all the other things that life throws at you,” Smayda said. “We absolutely are seeing need increase, and for similar reasons, we are seeing donations decrease. That has been a trend over the past year or so.”
To put the need in perspective, Manna distributed 662,866 pounds of food just last year, feeding 67,427 people across Escambia and Santa Rosa Counties. Sixty percent of the recipients were children.
It only made sense for the school district to help, due to what ECPS Community Involvement Coordinator Wanda Kotick refers to as the district’s “captive audience” of people who are willing to step in and make a difference.
“They (Manna,) they do the heavy lift. We just do our part because we have a captive audience. We have a lot of folks. We have 37,000-plus kids and families and 5,000-plus employees, so we have a lot of helping hands that can participate in a project like this,” Kotick said.
While Manna serves the community of Santa Rosa and Escambia counties as a whole, Smayda said the district is aware that many of the recipients are families from ECPS.
“Every school in the district serves students who have food needs or food insecurity, some more than others, but sometimes it is surprising where those needs occur,” Kotick said. “You may not know that someone is struggling to buy groceries or struggling to pull a meal together for Thanksgiving or Christmas, and so that's another thing that we hope that our efforts help. Because if we can pull a nice meal together for someone, it's heartwarming to be able to do that.”
This year, the school district is hoping to beat last year’s record of 16,885 pounds of food and about $1,200 in financial donations, equating to about 20,172 healthy meals. This year, Smayda’s focus is on collecting canned tomatoes and mixed vegetables and canned fruits in 100% juice. However, all nonperishable foods will be accepted.
According to Smayda, the food generated during the holiday season, where food donations typically surge, sustains them in the first quarter of the new year once donations have slowed.
“We hit January and giving slows dramatically because it is no longer the ‘giving season.’ Everybody's kind of tapped out after gift giving, all of that. So, by the time we get to January, those donations drop dramatically," Smayda said. "We really rely on what comes in (during the holidays) for several months to come.”
Departments spread all throughout Escambia County Public Schools have made it their mission to motivate families to help restock Manna’s pantries. Individual schools, principals and teachers have been creating their own incentives, whether it be a class pizza party or “popsicles with the principal.”
Kotick has even managed to get the adults in on the fun with door decorating competitions, where department heads have gathered teams to design their doors with creative messaging such as “lend a hand, do what you can” with homemade handprints or “treats are sweet, but donations are divine” tacked onto a life-size gingerbread house.
At OJ Semmes elementary school, the food drive's mission has deeply resonated with some students, according to principal Susan Sanders.
“So many of our children have had a need at one time or another,” Sanders said. “They do see the need because it has been personal for them. … When they have been the recipient, it’s a good a feeling to be able to give back. I think it's more meaningful to them because of that."
Sanders said part of the school’s success with participation in the drive has been talking about it and talking about it often – whether it be during their morning news show or written in messages in the classrooms.
“It is acknowledged every day,” Sanders said.
The drive has also helped raised awareness that there are resources available to help.
“It is something that folks don't like to talk about, when they're in need of assistance, whether it's food or any other service,” Smayda said. “So, it can be your neighbor that needs that support, because any one thing can really affect a family's financial stability. So, when they're in that situation, looking to access services that our community provides to them, then hopefully they find resources like Manna to help lift them up.”
Sanders said that because the majority of the students at OJ Semmes are economically disadvantaged, seeing the way students have filled box after box of donated goods over the years has been particularly heartwarming. Last year, the pre-K class alone brought in about 200 canned goods.
“It’s just super heartwarming here to know our kids and our families want to give as much as they do, knowing what their situations are like at home,” Sanders said.
Smayda praised the school district’s approach in opening up the conversation around food insecurity.
“We love when people have fun with such a serious issue because it is sometimes a topic that is uncomfortable to talk about. But when you can bring lightness to it, then it makes it a little bit easier to talk about, to understand, to kind of wrap your arms around it, and then make a change related to it,” Smayda said. “I know they have different classroom competitions … I know they had door decorating contests and different things. We love to see all of that, because it just engages more folks in the fight against hunger, which is really what we're shooting for.”
Once the drive concludes, the Escambia County Public Schools warehouse crew will spend the week from Dec. 9-13 picking up the food from each school before it is weighed and sorted at Manna.
David “Dave” Gardner, ECPS' director of warehouse operations, said that weighing the food is one of the exciting parts of the process when the impact is really put in perspective of how many families their efforts are helping.
“Unity. That's probably the first word that comes to my mind is unity. Everyone understands the mission, they understand the goal, and everybody lifts at the same time,” Gardner said. “I had a football coach that used to preach that ‘the burden isn't so heavy when everyone lifts together,’ and that really goes into the community itself. If everybody in the community lifts together, the burden isn't so bad on a single person.”
Once Gardner’s team drops the food off at Manna, they then compile the miscellaneous cans together to assemble nutritious meals for recipients in need to take home for free.
Smayda said the food can truly be life-changing for some of its recipients. One grandmother comes to mind for Smayda, who unexpectedly had to take her grandchildren into her home. While having the children live with her was a simple "yes," she still feared being able to afford groceries. Because of the help received by Manna, she knew she would be able to feed them nourishing meals.
“You never know how the food is going to reach somebody, but when it does, it makes all the difference in their lives,” Smayda said.
Those looking to help Escambia County Public Schools beat last year’s fundraising goal can bring donations to Gardner at the district’s central warehouse at 51 E. Texar Drive or directly to Manna Food Bank at 3030 N. E St. If delivering directly to Manna, simply let them know you are donating in support of Escambia County Public Schools.
For more information on the holiday food drive, contact Wanda Kotick at wkotick@ecsdfl.us.