Parents and staff urge actions on school food waste and student smartphone use during public comment

During the public-comment portion of the meeting, Sofia Menazzi, a Kenosha County resident and former KUSD kitchen staff member, urged the board to adopt USDA- and DPI-approved share-table strategies to reduce daily food waste and better serve food-insecure students. "It is appalling and outright sickening the amount of waste on a daily basis that we see," Menazzi said, and she asked the district to review USDA guidance and a Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction toolkit on share and no-thank-you tables.

Menazzi said she was instructed at her school to remove bins she had placed to collect shelf-stable breakfast items after a supervisor told her the practice was not allowed, and she said the Kenosha Health Department staff she contacted could not confirm any letter prohibiting the practice. She asked that food-service staff review the USDA recommendations and offered to provide the district with the toolkit she referenced.

Sam Rusnick, who identified himself as a teacher at Reuther, urged the board to consider policies to limit student smartphone access during school hours, citing Jonathan Haidt—s The Anxious Generation as a data-driven argument that increased smartphone use is associated with declines in youth mental health and social behavior. Rusnick suggested school-level strategies such as collecting phones at the start of the day or encouraging voluntary parent contracts to keep phones at home for a given grade cohort.

Board policy prevents members from replying to public comments on items not on the agenda; the board acknowledged the comments and invited follow-up through appropriate administrative channels.