Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank helps stock pantry at Brashear High School
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PITTSBURGH (KDKA) — The Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank works with 30 local schools' food pantries. Brashear High School in the Pittsburgh Public Schools district is one of them.
Back in February of this year, Brashear teachers Chrissy Wolski and Megan Perfetti saw a need and decided to do something about it. Within weeks, the Brashear food pantry was up and running.
"We turn no one away," said Wolski.
"We just want to make sure that everybody's fed," Perfetti added.
"I think they really understand the need because they're physical education teachers. They know that their students need proper nutrition in order to develop and thrive," said Valerie Morgan, who is a child nutrition partnership specialist with the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank.
The food pantry at Brashear is packed with everything from canned and boxed goods to frozen and refrigerated food to even fresh produce and baked goods.
"Having food resources available in a school is really important because it's a comfortable safe environment for people to come and access those resources," Morgan said.
Current research shows one in six children in the Pittsburgh area is food insecure.
"So that just tells us that these initiatives inside schools are really necessary," said Morgan.
At Brashear, they've gone from 40 to 160 students in the program. That's out of the nearly 1,000 students enrolled there.
"We're a very diverse school. And so we have students from, they speak 40 different languages, so we have maybe 40 countries, maybe more than 40 different countries represented. And a lot of our students are coming over as refugees, and there is a large food insecure population in our school," said Perfetti.
Once a week, the students are allowed in the pantry to pick out enough food for not only them but their entire family.
"They get to roam through and take pretty much whatever they want. Our only rule is if you take a snack you need to take something healthy as well," said Wolski.
"And they're eating things that they normally would not eat due to the high cost of certain items in grocery stores," Perfetti added.
The school stocks the pantry with help from the food bank as well as donations from local grocery stores. They also have what they call a "food angel," who is the mother of a student at Brashear who heard about the food pantry and wanted to help.
Once the food comes in, student volunteers help the teachers get everything set up in the pantry.
"I think the idea of a food pantry is a big deal, especially because kids here don't really have all the support. And I think just supporting it and letting people know this is normal, and you can come here to get help," said Brashear senior Tamara Humphries.
Brashear freshman Vivien Raubaugh added, "Most food pantries, when I think of one in my head, I think of a lot of canned food and stuff. And that's not as healthy as fresh produce. So I think it's great that they have this, and we have the option to get something healthier and something good instead of canned food or processed things."
And as for the stigma that so often surrounds food insecurity, these students say that's not really a problem at Brashear.
"I've really never seen or heard anybody getting made fun of if they're less fortunate and need extra food at home. I've never heard it. A bunch of kids come here and they aren't ashamed of it," said Brashear senior Vincent Lenger.
Brashear sophomore Liliana Garcia said, "I'll see kids in classes at the end of the day walking home with big bags and people will say 'What's that?' And they'll say 'Oh it's just from the food pantry' and they'll say 'OK. That's cool.' That's it."
"I've seen people who get off my bus show their parents waiting for them their food, and they just seem so excited about all the different kinds of foods they picked out," added Brashear sophomore Austin Henning.
"It's just amazing. Like it just makes me feel fantastic that we can give them this experience," said Wolski.
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KDKA-TV's Managing Editor/Special Projects Executive Producer Corey Martin contributed to this story.
