Vancouver family advocates for longer elementary school lunches

When Vancouver mom Caressa Milgrove would pick up her 8-year-old son Mark from school, he’d dive into his lunch box to chow down on the food left behind from earlier in the day.

At first, Milgrove thought her son was goofing off and chatting with his friends during lunch at Walnut Grove Elementary School. And to be fair, there is some of that going on. He is in third grade after all. But when Milgrove began to press her son, he told her he simply didn’t have enough time to finish his meal.

“It just stresses me out because I don’t really have that much time to eat,” Mark said.

The experience prompted a string of activism for the Milgrove family. It started with school board meetings and an online petition garnering more than 2,000 signatures. Now, the issue is at the state Capitol, where lawmakers are considering a bill that would require elementary schools to pilot longer lunch periods.

Milgrove worked with state representatives and child nutrition experts to help craft the proposal, and said some of their input became the language of the bill. The bill passed nearly unanimously out of the House and is in the Senate Ways and Means Committee. It must move to a floor reading by April 9.

For the Milgrove family, the experience has been a lesson in advocacy and politics rarely experienced by kids so young. Both Mark and his brother, 6-year-old kindergartner Chance, have attended legislative sessions. Mark even spoke at a House Education Committee hearing, urging lawmakers to approve the bill — though, he didn’t quite know how to explain that.

“Mom, what’s it called again when you work to…?” Mark asked, trailing off.

“Oh, the hearing? The committee?” Milgrove responded.

“Yeah, I talked,” he said.

“Oh, you testified,” she said.

“I testified,” Mark said, beaming.

Rep. My-Linh Thai, D-Bellevue, is the lead sponsor on House Bill 1272. If approved, the bill would require six elementary schools to pilot a 20-minute seated lunch period. Those sites will then present findings and recommendations to the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction by July 1, 2021. The Washington State School Directors’ Association will also have to adopt a policy for local school districts to model.

A bipartisan coalition of legislators also signed onto the bill, including Vancouver Reps. Paul Harris, a Republican, and Democrats Monica Stonier and Sharon Wylie. The bill passed out of the House with 95 yeas to a single nay earlier this month; Republican Brad Klippert from Kennewick was the only no vote. It’s now in the Senate Ways and Means Committee awaiting a vote in that chamber.

Thai said the bill reflects the “heart and soul of so many parents and children” in Washington. She recalled hearing from low-income families whose children depend on school lunch, and from parents who repeatedly heard from their children, like Mark, that there just wasn’t enough time to eat.

“In general, we know that when our kids go to school hungry, they can’t focus,” Thai said.

Elementary school lunches can be a whirlwind time for students. At Chinook Elementary School this week, students filed in class by class to grab their lunch, sit down and eat. All told, students spent about 15 minutes eating before running out to afternoon recess, leaving their meals in varying states of completion. Principal Patrick Conners said students are welcome to spend a few more minutes eating if they haven’t finished, and indeed, a few stragglers do. But as Mark points out, that cuts into recess.

Milgrove is pursuing a bachelor’s degree in public affairs at Washington State University Vancouver. But in some ways, pursuing this bill has been a master’s class of its own, for her and her sons. Now, Mark is asking what the next bill they’re going to work on will be. According to Milgrove, if they can fix one thing, he’ll say, can’t they fix anything?

“He sees how it is possible to do something when you see something wrong,” she said. “It’s been inspiring to both of them.”