Meals for School Children
The cafeteria staff at Hilton Elementary School, as part of the Newport News Public Schools Child Nutrition Services, provides, without charge, bagged breakfast, lunch, snack, and dinner meals for any Newport News public school student five days a week from their post under the tent in front of the school on River Road. Meal delivery times are currently from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. weekdays, rain or shine. Weekend meals are provided in advance on Fridays. Julia, the Hilton School cafeteria manager, said, “It is a joy to see so many of our students and to be able to help them.” She said the most difficult part of her job is to estimate the number of meals needed each day. “At the beginning, I thought 15-20 meals a day would be enough. That number soon grew to almost 75. Now that the cold weather has set in, the daily number is down to 40 to 50.”
The meals are prepared by the staff in the kitchen at the school and delivered curbside to anyone who asks for one. “We want everyone to feel comfortable coming to us, and we don’t ask questions,” Julia noted.
