A homegrown program that helps feed students in Lehighton Area School District is expanding thanks to a recent grant from the local Giant Food Store.

Michelle Rex, store manager at the Lehighton Giant, visited the district Wednesday morning to present a check for $12,430.74, which will go toward the Backpack Buddies Program launched at LASD in 2019.

The idea behind the program is to provide weekend and summer meals to low income, food insecure children.

“We currently serve 70 children at the elementary center and the middle school, but this will allow us to expand to the high school,” said Rebecca Karpowicz, an administrative secretary in the district who has spearheaded the program. “We can also increase our meals per week from three to around five. This money will also help us provide a greater variety of meals and maybe some healthier options as well.”

Funding for the grant comes from an act many grocery store shoppers may take for granted.

“When a customer rounds up their bill at the register, that money goes back to the community,” Rex said. “It’s called our Feeding School Kids initiative.”

What better way to use that money, she added, then to make sure Lehighton students are getting the meals they need.

“We don’t want any child to go hungry,” Rex said. “We’re so proud to partner with the district and be a part of this.”

During the school year, students usually get the meals to take home for the weekend. In the summer, however, Karpowicz and Lehighton Assistant to the Superintendent Tim Tkach deliver the products to the students’ homes personally.

“On one delivery, a student got a container of apple juice as part of the package and you would have thought it was Christmas morning for them,” Tkach said. “It’s just wonderful when you see how much this program means to them.”

It’s a way, Karpowicz said, for the student to feel they are involved and a major part of the family dynamic.

“I think they get a sense that they’re chipping in for the family when they bring the meals home,” she said. “We try to keep it to things that, if the child needs to prepare the food themselves, they can do that. So it may just be something they can heat up or add water.”

District officials said they’re happy to be able to partner with a local grocery store.

When the Backpack Buddies program started two years ago, Lehighton was working with Second Harvest Food Bank.

“COVID-19 did a number on a lot of these places and Second Harvest had to cut back with what they were doing,” Karpowicz said, “but we’re just thrilled that Giant was there and we could work together for this grant.”