At the end of last school year, the Golden Tornado Scholastic Foundation sent qualifying elementary school children home with a final backpack full of food supplies and information about resources they would have available to them while they were off from school.

Kim Thomas, coordinator for the Kids' Weekend Backpack Program, said the foundation served about 300 children in the Butler Area School District last year, and that number is expected to increase.

With fifth-grade students in the district set to stay in their elementary schools instead of moving on to a separate middle school, Thomas said the foundation is preparing for their needs.

“All of the fifth graders will also be eligible for the program,” Thomas said. “We're still trying to coordinate what we want to do this summer.”

For the past school year, all Butler schools qualified for a federal free and reduced meal program, which provided all students with lunch at no cost.

District superintendent Brian White said the program has come to an end, except for Broad Street Elementary, Emily Brittain Elementary, McQuistion Elementary and Center Avenue Community School, which are Community Eligibility Provision schools. So the elementary schools still qualify to give all students free meals.

White said at Monday’s meeting of the school board that a poverty study initially had the district qualify for free and reduced meals, but a late review of the study put an end to the possibility.

“We got notice from the Community Eligibility Provision saying all our schools reached enough poverty at 62-something percent,” White said. “They recalculated it to around 40%, which is where we have historically been.”

While the schools themselves are not automatically part of the free and reduced lunch program, any family can apply for the weekend backpack program. Every Friday, the foundation discreetly places a plastic bag of child-friendly, single-serving snacks and easily prepared meals into the backpacks of registered children.

Thomas said the scholastic foundation works with food banks and donors to get food each week to supply to the students.

“We have the same exact menu went out every week; we tried to keep everything identical,” she said. “We work with the Pittsburgh Food Bank and Saint Vincent De Paul in Butler ... The past couple years we have done a big stuff the bus.”

The fifth grade’s shift back to elementary schools is accelerating a goal the weekend backpack program coordinators are working towards, which is to be able to distribute food to everyone in the district who is in need. Thomas said the group has support from multiple volunteers and school administrators, so an expansion could happen in the coming years.

“Our goal is to make our way through the grades,” Thomas said. “We do understand the need for food doesn't just stop at fifth grade.”

To donate food or money to the Kids Weekend Backpack Program, email Thomas at kimberly_thomas@butler.k12.pa.us.