A Day in the Life: Eva Gertz, School Nutrition Member

What does a day in the life of a FoodCorps school nutrition member look like? Follow along as FoodCorps AmeriCorps member Eva Gertz (MA ‘23, ’24) takes you through a typical day.

A Day in the Life: Eva Gertz, School Nutrition Member

7:00 a.m. After my morning hour-long battle through Massachusetts traffic, I arrive in Lowell at 7:00! This morning, I’m helping to give out breakfast on the food truck at Lowell High School. I do many things, from helping to cup yogurt “coolers” on the truck, reminding students to grab a fruit, chatting with them to see how they like the breakfasts that we serve, and taking photos and videos for promotional content I will create later. 

8:30 a.m. It is a Wednesday, which means my site partner and I have FFVP, or the Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program! With this program, we hand out fresh fruits or veggies to the students of McAuliffe Elementary School twice a week on Wednesdays and Fridays. This week we served students local Massachusetts carrots, and local Bosc pears! Depending on the fruit or vegetable, we process them (meaning we cut/wash them), bag them up in individual serving sizes, and then dole them out to bigger bags that go to each classroom. We hand out the produce around 10:00 a.m., so as long as we start prepping anywhere from 7:30 to 8:00 a.m., we are in good shape! 

10:00 a.m. We wheel the FFVP cart around to each classroom and drop off their bag. Students get so excited to see us coming in with their fruit or veggie! If there is no lesson going on, I ask them to raise their hands if they tried the previous sample, and then keep their hands up if they liked it. There have been many times where I was surprised to see how many students tried and liked a vegetable that I had not expected to be popular! This happened this year with cauliflower.

10:15 a.m. We get back from handing out the bags, and we go back into the kitchen to clean up. We break down empty cardboard boxes and bring them out to recycling, wash any countertops we used, and wash any cooking utensils we used as well. 

11:00 a.m. Now, it’s lunchtime! During lunches, we gather meal feedback from students in the cafeteria. Today for lunch the students have Wally’s Boomin’ Nachos, Wally’s Bean Nachos, Bosco Sticks, Pizza Platters, and a Chicken Caesar Wrap! There are 23 different schools in the district, so finding a school to go to is never hard!

During lunch engagement, I ask students if they love, like, or leave (don’t like) the meal they are eating, and will hand out stickers to them! I also take photos and videos of the lunches for social media, and help out the cafeteria staff with anything they may need in between lunch periods. At the elementary school I was at today, students loved Wally’s Boomin’ Nachos! These nachos are extra special because the recipe was created by Wally, the head cook at one of our K-8 schools.

1:00 p.m. Lunches are over, and I have gathered written feedback from students about the meals they ate. I say goodbye to the cafeteria staff and head back to the Nutrition Department office for our weekly meeting that we call a huddle, and to do any work I have on my laptop. 

1:30 p.m. At the office, I input the feedback into our spreadsheet. Many students loved their meals and said that they want it more often! After this, I work on making graphics and promotional content. 

2:30 p.m. Huddle time! We discuss all the goings-on in the district this week, and the few weeks we have coming up as well. Huddle is a great time to get a plan for what I will be doing next week, and to figure out what social media graphics we want for the next week. It is also when we talk about the feedback that I collected during lunch and breakfast with all the nutrition managers. 

3:00 p.m. Our huddle is over and it is time to head out! My day is wrapped up and I am ready for tomorrow!

Want to learn more about joining FoodCorps as a school nutrition member? Learn more about applying to FoodCorps.