COPPERAS COVE, Texas — Copperas Cove ISD will have Blessings and Backpacks food pantries on all of their campuses.
There have already been pantries on other campuses thanks to students doing community service and the high school's DECA club, but thanks to the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund's $9.9 million grant money to the district, they can expand the program.
"Sometimes they don't have the essential nutrients that kids need now a days, so with these bags we provide for these students, they'll have all food groups and nutrients they need to get through the weekend," Danny Velarde, the high school's Community in Schools coordinator, said.
He says that his job is to help get students what they need to succeed and that Copperas Cove has students who worry about their next meal. With this new program, students will be given meals on Friday night and will be given materials for six meals over the weekend.
"We have kiddos that come in here that have no food, sometimes nowhere to sleep, and they come in here and we're able to help them with whatever they need."
Elise Fuselier is a 16-year-old junior at Copperas Cove High School and participates in the Five Hills Pageant. She helped start a new pantry at her elementary school, to Hettie Halstead Elementary.
“I felt the need that like lower income communities, they needed a lot more help, I felt like it was my mission to expand that and help get more food out to other people”
The pantries should be up and running at all schools by the end of the school year.