Fairfield, Mt. Pleasant to share food service director

FAIRFIELD – Fairfield and Mt. Pleasant school districts will share a food service director this upcoming school year.

Stephanie Hawkins has been Fairfield’s food service director since 2016, and now she will be taking on the same job in Mt. Pleasant. Hawkins will split her time equally between the two districts, working 2.5 days per week in Fairfield and 2.5 days in Mt. Pleasant.

Mt. Pleasant has not had a food service director on staff for seven years. Mt. Pleasant School Superintendent John Henriksen said the district has relied on a POC (Point of Contact) in its kitchen to direct options, plus a food service consultant to plan the menu and ensure the district was following state and federal regulations. When the district’s food service consultant retired this past year, the district sought a food service director who could oversee kitchen operations and plan menus.

“Our program has been outstanding, and our POCs have done an outstanding job, too,” Henriksen said. “We know Stephanie is excited to feed more kids, and we’re excited to bring her on with her experience and everything she’s done in Fairfield.”

Hawkins said she’s excited for her new role, and the chance to feed twice as many kids. In fact, the idea to share a food service director between Fairfield and Mt. Pleasant was hers. She pitched it to the school boards of both districts, and they voted to approve Hawkins as shared food service director at meetings in July.

Fairfield enrolls just under 1,600 students, while Mt. Pleasant enrolls about 2,000. Though the two districts are similar in size, their food services have been run a bit differently. Fairfield’s meals are cooked at multiple buildings throughout the district, whereas Mt. Pleasant cooks all its meals at the high school and sends them to the other buildings (except for students at Salem Elementary, which has its own kitchen). Mt. Pleasant also has more buildings to serve than Fairfield, since it has four elementary schools to Fairfield’s two. Hawkins said that Fairfield tends to have a higher percentage of its students eat school lunches, though that’s not true at the high school level because Fairfield offers open campus while Mt. Pleasant does not.

Hawkins said one of the changes she hopes to implement this coming school year is to offer Mt. Pleasant students more options, similar to the work she’s done expanding options in Fairfield.

“The cooks are going to help me know what travels well,” Hawkins said. “As we develop our menus and expand our offerings, I definitely want them to be part of those decisions. I’d like to see multiple entrees in all buildings, though we’ll have to wait a year for the elementary schools.”

In Fairfield, elementary school students have two options for entrée, while middle school students have three options and high school students have a whopping six options. Hawkins said she probably won’t be able to offer quite that many options in Mt. Pleasant, or at least not immediately, but she wants to work toward that goal. Currently, Mt. Pleasant has the same menu for all grades with one entrée available and several side dishes.

“Mt. Pleasant has great things on their menu, but only one choice,” Hawkins said. “If popcorn chicken is on the menu, what if I don’t like popcorn chicken? Is there something else we can offer? Instead of losing that student, we might get them to stay if we offer a second choice.”

Mt. Pleasant schools will open their doors on Wednesday, Aug. 23, while Fairfield schools will ring the first bell on Monday, Aug. 28.

  Buy Photo

Call Andy Hallman at 641-575-0135 or email him at andy.hallman@southeastiowaunion.com