Osseo Area Schools, Hennepin Healthcare Partner for Food Bags
A special partnership between Osseo Area Schools and Hennepin Healthcare is bringing food to people who need it.
District 279’s Community-Based Vocational Assessment and Training program helps students with disabilities grow skills they can use in the workforce. Kids take on a variety of community projects, including disassembling medals, feeding animals or on this day, preparing food bags.
Eileen Baker, the work experience coordinator for Park Center High School, said this experience is incredibly valuable.
“We want to ensure that they will have successful employment, and this is a part of it,” Baker said.
Baker said this work develops soft skills, or skills that relate to how you work with others. That can include taking direction from a number of different people, working on a team and problem-solving. In the CBVAT space, students are encouraged to work independently.
Abhi works alongside his classmates to seal and put stickers on each bag.
Earlier this week, five of those students were working at their soft skills by packing bags of ready-to-eat food, including a snack from each food group. When they finished packing each bag, the students handed it over to Abhi, who sealed up the bags with tape and a sticker.
The room buzzed with conversation and collaboration.
“These are the bags for kids that I helped with Tony and Nora,” Abhi said, showing his latest creation to the camera. “My favorite part is putting the stickers on the bags for kids.”
“It’s that win-win”
The partnership is meaningful, and even more-so knowing these bags are going to families experiencing food insecurity.
“This is our favorite kind of community partnership; it’s that win-win. There was that need, and we have a need to have a variety of work for our students to complete,” Baker explained.
The kits — complete with Abhi’s stickers — go to Hennepin Healthcare in downtown Minneapolis. There, the bags are stocked alongside other food bags on supply shelves.
Christea Montgomery, a medical assistant who works in pediatrics, said assistants typically ask families if they are having trouble getting meals. If they say yes, they offer the food bags as one small solution.
“I think that healthcare is holistic,” Montgomery said. “We are treating not only physical ailments, but also socioeconomic and emotional, and things like that.”
Montgomery said she typically requests 12 bags of each kind, including the ready-to-eat bags packed by Osseo students.
A few different bag options are available to patients in need at Hennepin Healthcare. The ready-to-eat bag in the middle is packed with every food group by Osseo Area Schools students.
“It’s been super impactful for our patients and our families,” Montgomery said. “The fact that we can address something as small as a meal in a day for someone.”
Back in the production lab, Baker says the impact of this program comes back around.
“It gives them a good feeling to know that they are doing something meaningful that helps others,” Baker said.
Baker said CBVAT is always looking for more hands-on projects to develop her students’ skills. If you have a project that you think the students could tackle, Baker asks that you contact her. Her email is BakerE@District279.org.
