Nationally Recognized School Lunch Heroes

The non-profit School Nutrition Association (SNA) is celebrating the efforts of school nutrition professionals all week leading up to School Lunch Hero Day on May 3.  During an online award ceremony today, SNA President Chris Derico, SNS, recognized all regional award winners and unveiled the national Director, Manager and Employee of the Year for 2024. All of these individuals show exemplary dedication and outstanding commitment to the school nutrition profession and the students they serve:

Employee of the Year:

• Mid-Atlantic: Shenna Morrison, Harford County Public Schools, MD (national winner)
• Midwest: Melissa Willhite, Tracy Area Public Schools, MN
• Mountain Plains: Sheena Boyd, Lee’s Summit R-7 Schools, MO
• Northeast: Sonia DelGreco, Meriden Public Schools, CT
• Southeast: Russell Barlow, Marshall County Schools, AL
• Southwest: Hollie Valenzuela, Roswell Independent School District, NM
• Western: Rosa Roque, Woodburn School District #103, OR

Manager of the Year:

• Northeast: Vivian Crespo, Meriden Public Schools, CT (national winner)
• Mid-Atlantic: Rommel Ongaco, Woodbridge School District, DE
• Midwest: Sandra Hirdler, Osseo Area Schools ISD 279, MN
• Mountain Plains: Kathleen Schneider, El Paso County School District 49, CO
• Southeast: Maggie Oswalt, Scott County Schools, KY
• Southwest: Luana Adams, Hobbs Municipal Schools, NM
• Western: Valerie Moore, Tigard-Tualatin School District, OR

Director of the Year:

• Western: Eric Span, Sweetwater Union High School District, CA (national winner)
• Mid-Atlantic: Sandra Stokes, SNS, Petersburg City Public Schools, VA
• Midwest: Stacey Bettis, Minerva, Brown & Tuscarawas Local School Districts, OH
• Mountain Plains: Beth Wallace, SNS, Jefferson County Public Schools, CO
• Northeast: Caitlin Lazarski, MS, RD, SNS, Pine Bush CSD, NY
• Southeast: Dawn Lewis, M.Ed.L, Coffee County School System, GA
• Southwest: Amy Woolsey, SNS, Ogden School District, UT

Read more about the efforts of the three national winners here and check back everyday this week for details on each of the regional winners in the Director, Manager and Employee categories.

Director of the Year  – Eric Span, Director of Nutrition Services, Sweetwater Union High School District, California

Eric Span is credited with revamping and updating menus in the school district to offer higher-quality ingredients and improve nutrition. Span instituted a scratch-cooked meal program by training all staff on knife skills, grill usage, recipes, culinary procedures and food safety standards. He successfully incorporated student, staff and parent input into the program. Parents are encouraged to visit cafeterias, observe meal prep, taste test new menu options and participate in annual back-to-school nights providing information on meals, benefit applications and nutrition regulations.

Span maintains productive relationships with students by supporting the creation of student advisory boards. Members present menu ideas to area supervisors and are tasked with recruiting peers for taste tests and pop-up educational events. The students are encouraged to provide positive and negative feedback on menu items or service-related issues. With direct marketing to students, the efforts he led increased meal counts 30 percent in the first year of implementation. 

Span also began a successful farm-to-school program by partnering with an engineering program at a district high school. The program began with 400 chickens, providing eggs for a variety of menu options, including protein boxes and Pho noodle bowls. Excess eggs were sold to teachers and community members to help finance the growth of the farm project, which included adding fruit trees on school campuses for students and staff to pick from. The efforts garnered positive media attention and awareness among local policymakers.

Community involvement is important to Span. He often supports local organizations focused on improving health outcomes for youth and helps bring activities into the school district to expand efforts to reach more families and students. He is also involved in local efforts to start community gardens and supports food banks by providing fruits and vegetables to these organizations.

His leadership is further demonstrated by efforts to train site and area supervisors in financial management, staffing and procurement, and in soft skills such as interacting with site administrators and school board members. Span also created a culinary training program for 250 staff members, which included butchering, portioning and training on processing whole vegetables. The training has increased morale and employee retention. 

Span served as Public Policy and Legislative Committee Chair for the California School Nutrition Association (CalSNA) and a board member for the Chef Ann Foundation. He led efforts to restart a CalSNA chapter that had been dormant for two years and can be seen working with his staff to increase participation in the Association. Span was recently elected to the national SNA Board of Directors and will begin his term of service in July 2024.

Manager of the Year –  Vivian Crespo, Cafeteria Manager at Israel Putnam Elementary, Meriden Public Schools, Connecticut

Vivian Crespo is a valuable member of the school community, encouraging students to make nutritious choices with genuine kindness. School administrators tout Crespo as providing high-quality customer service, and she’s known for treating students and staff with the utmost respect. She knows all 400+ students by name and makes a point to reach out to those who may be having a difficult day.  She takes pride in cafeteria celebrations and holidays and continuously strives to make the cafeteria and kitchen warm and inviting places to be.

Crespo wants the dining experience to be fun to get students excited about eating school breakfast and lunch; her efforts helped to increase lunch participation. She encourages staff to get involved in special events by dressing up and decorating the cafeteria. Her bond with her students is evident when they shower her with cards and pictures in honor of School Lunch Hero Day each year.

Crespo played a vital role in the reinvention and expansion of the Summer Food Service Program. She worked diligently to find solutions to challenges and continues to move the program forward. She also recorded a bilingual Facebook live promotion with the superintendent to educate the community about the summer program and its kick-off event.

For the past five years, Crespo has shouldered additional responsibilities as a supervisor to both FoodCorps and AmeriCorps service members working in her kitchen, a mark of her strong mentoring and leadership skills. She actively coaches staff members from all walks of life and listens, advises and nurtures them professionally and personally. Crespo’s compassion and supportive qualities have fostered mutually beneficial relationships with various organizations, opening many new doors for her district. 

Crespo attends state and national SNA conferences and local chapter meetings and encourages others to do the same. She became Level 1 Certified last year and is currently pursuing Level 2 certification. 

Employee of the Year – Shenna Morrison, Production Center Assistant for North Harford High School, Harford County Public Schools, Maryland 

Shenna Morrison has demonstrated an unwavering dedication to her school, students and coworkers. She takes great pride and joy in all aspects of serving the students and consistently goes above and beyond for all stakeholders within her school. School administrators rely on her calm demeanor and focus when she is tasked with feeding students during less-than-ideal circumstances, such as losing power in the kitchen during Thanksgiving meal service. Teachers and staff are grateful for the time and attention she puts into special items made for them. 

Keeping nutrition and school meals interesting to the students is important to Morrison. She worked with her team to create unique weekly menu themes to increase student excitement, including Italian, and Asian delights, grill specialties, and an extremely popular deli line. They also developed a commercial and song to the tune of “Hey Jude” by The Beatles to increase breakfast sales. Morrison frequently invites students from Food and Consumer Science classes to witness the working school kitchen in real-time. Students value and enjoy learning about meal prep, cooking and teamwork.

Morrison finds the positive in any situation while guiding her team to excellence. This is illustrated by the amount of time she devotes to training team members with differing abilities and through her approachable personality.  

Morrison works hard to keep her skills up to date while expanding her expertise for the future. She frequently attends professional development events and encourages her team to do the same, organizing team trips to state conferences. While many school nutrition team members choose to take summers off, Morrison has been involved with the community’s summer meals program for the past 19 years. She helps prepare meals, pack the food in coolers and travels to varying locations to set up and serve lunch to awaiting children. 

School Lunch Hero Day is celebrated on May 3, 2024, to honor all of America’s dedicated school nutrition professionals. The accomplishments of all SNA award winners will also be highlighted in a special digital publication and promoted in SNA’s annual Hero Day social media campaign on Facebook.com/TrayTalk and TrayTalk.org.