FIT works to deliver meals to Whitefish teachers

The Whitefish Schools Family Involvement Team has made it a tradition to provide appreciation meals to teachers in the fall, but this year with the COVID-19 pandemic it meant the group had to use a bit of ingenuity to make it happen.

Normally the meals accompany parent teacher conferences with FIT parents signing up to provide meals to teachers at every school like a potluck dinner every night of conferences. Even with the absence of the conferences, FIT still wanted to provide meals.

“We wanted to do something to boost morale, to let them know how much we appreciate them,” said Katherine Sivanish, one of the main organizers of the effort.

FIT is the parent group that supports the nonprofit mission of the Whitefish Education Foundation.

Last week FIT parents delivered about 230 meals that included squash soup and a salad, all packaged individually to meet safety standards, to educators at the schools.

Organizing the meals from sourcing ingredients to delivery took about a month.

Sivanish reached out to her network of friends and contacts, which resulted in the main ingredient of squash being donated by Wicked Good Farm and meal preparation coming from GreenGo’s Homemade Meals on the Run and parents.

While the main ingredient was donated by the Wicked Good Farm, the process of safely preparing and individually wrapping each meal did incur costs of close to $2,000, and the FIT team is asking that parents that are able donate $8.50 per meal to help offset costs.

An email seeking donations, along with a link for online donations, went out to all of the families in the district last week. Donations can also be made at www.whitefisheducationfoundation.org