This school cafeteria lady made a big difference to the children's lives, with a simple positive message

Working at an elementary school can be as rewarding as you make it. Stacey Truman, Kingston Elementary School’s cafeteria manager has been with the school for over ten years and counting. The Virginia Beach school has great reason to be proud of their employee, as she is a huge proponent of positive reinforcement and bringing light to children. Stacey has found a wonderful way to get messages to her students every single school day. Her creative thinking and positive messaging are a rare spin on a cafeteria lady and she knows that. Her hard work to bring love and confidence to the children of her school not only got noticed within the school’s halls and administration but have since gone viral and noticed by people around the globe. There is more to lunchtime than food at this school, as Stacey made sure of. The kids that attend the school are in very delicate years in their development and Stacey knew that if she could just reach them with positive messages, she could make a difference for them.

Background

The reason Stacey went to the lengths that she did to bring about positivity in her school was due to her own hard time during the very same age range. When Stacey was nine years old her parents announced that they were getting a divorce.

Her painful memories of that time brought her to the decision to spread happiness and messages of good cheer to the boys and girls that walk into her lunchroom every day.

Stacey’s past

The divorce of Stacey’s parents threw her life into disarray. As a result of the divorce, Stacey and her two sisters and mother moved in with her grandmother. There were both financial and emotional hardships that they had to go through and Stacey did not want that kind of hardships for her family when she had one.

She wanted to give her two daughters a better life than her own. Stacey is married to Zachery and has two girls, Mackenzie and Kayleigh, who are nine and ten respectively. They are at the very age that she was when her parents divorced.

Cafeteria gig

Stacey started her journey at the elementary school over ten years ago. The student count is on average around 500 children, with approximately 19 children per teacher. The school prides itself on its academic achievements in their students and the high teaching standard that it holds its teacher too.

Stacey’s ride to work is a serious one, as she lives in a different state technically. Stacey lives in North Carolina, and the school is in Virginia – the border stands between them. Stacey gets up ay 4:45 AM every workday to make sure she arrives at the school on time.

Tasks

Stacey has a nearly one-hour drive to the school from her home every day. She has to be on the premises before everyone else as she is the one who unlocks the doors and turns on all of the lights throughout campus. As soon as Stacey gets into work she looks at her emails and starts her day preparing breakfast and lunch for the school’s students and faculty.

She has two helpers for this great task, yet she has also managed to give herself another important job that she does just for her students and sees as one of the most important bits.

Extra work

Stacey was so committed to her family that her cafeteria work was not her only job. She worked at a restaurant in the evenings in order to bring in more money so that her daughters can have everything that she did not when she was young.

Stacey’s job at the restaurant went on for approximately two years while her girls were very young, she has since stopped but has taken that time to make an even bigger difference in the lives of the students at the school she is so dedicated to. Her heart is bigger than ever imagined.

Balance

It was a huge balancing act for Stacey to work two jobs for her family. She said that she had to sacrifice time with her two girls when she was working those two jobs, seeing them on the weekends only and sneaking into their room at night to kiss them every now and then.

She knew it was hard for her girls and for her and so she decided she needed to change something up.

Notes

Stacey’s idea started with her daughters/ Because she did not have much time with them when they were awake due to her workload, she decided to put sweet notes into their lunch boxes so that when they went to the lunch room they would see a sweet note.

However, the note that Stacey left for her girls was not on a piece of paper, it was far more creative and sweet. Stacey really did have an eye for the creative.

Fruity

Instead of writing her notes on a piece of paper, Stacey used a sharpie to write on a piece of fruit every day. Her fruit of choice was bananas as the peel would go into the trash in any event.

She started a tradition with her little girls that was something very special for them and would be something even more special for Stacey, although she had no idea the impact it would have just yet.

Daddy duty

Seeing as Stacey needed to get to work very early and had a long commute every day, it was her husband Zachery who was responsible for taking their two little girls to school every day.

He would be the one to give them their lunch boxes with the notes contained inside. Stacey wrote a note every day for each girl, their bananas were their favorite elements of their lunch. It is hard to believe that this all started with her two little girls.

Inspiration

After a while of preparing these notes for her girls, Stacey realized that she could expand her note sending by many many more. She figured out that her students at the school were just as deserving of nice notes as her little girls.

In October of 2018, Stacey started writing notes for her other students, which was quite a big undertaking considering there were so many of them. Stacey’s heart was expanding even more for her students.

More work

These days, when Stacey walks into work every day, she sits down and hand writes on 60 or so bananas. Her messages are always positive and inspirational for the student to read and feel good about him or herself or the world around them.

It takes Stacey and her coworkers around 45 minutes to make these notes happen but they know that it is such a boost that it is way worth the effort.

Talking bananas

There are over 500 students at the school, but there are about 60 bananas and that is because not all of the students choose to grab the yellow fruit.

Those who do grab a banana for their lunch are happy to see the messages on them, calling them “talking bananas” and really enjoying the inspirational words on them, making them feel very special for the day. Little by little these small moments were becoming increasingly important to the kids.

Appreciation

While some students may not be too thrilled with the note they got on one day or another, they do appreciate Stacey for doing that for them and love getting to see them.

The kids wait every day to see what their bananas will say on that day and think that it is cool that the bananas are such an attraction. At the very least, more kids were eating more fruit as a result of this little initiative that Stacey took on.

Creative

Stacey’s thought process about what to write on her bananas was more to do with what she would have wanted to hear as a kid herself or what she thinks her own children would want and need to hear at this stage in their lives.

Stacey came up with most of the messages herself, while her coworkers were also the minds behind the messages on some of the others. It was slowly becoming a serious hit with the school.

Selection

One of the kids’ favorite things to do is get into the lunch line and choose a banana for themselves with a specific message that speaks to them personally.

There is always a wide variety of messages on each piece of fruit and each kid gets in line with a different attitude than the day before. Stacey was also happy that she is the reason kids are eating a little healthier thanks to the fruit in their lunch.

Messages

All this talk about the messages on the banana, you must be wondering what some of the messages were like. Stacey used her special sharpie to write longer quotes on the banana peel, such as quotes like “if you can dream it, you can achieve it”. Stacey also loved writing “not all those who wander are lost”.

All of the quotes she wrote resonated with her and she knew would be inspirational for the kids in the lunch line.

Quotes

Stacey had to reuse some of the messages for certain, especially with her writing them every day. Here are some of her personal favorites: “laughter heals hurt”, “be yourself”, “never give up”, “you get what you give”, and “shoot for the moon – if you miss, you’ll end up with the stars”.

While it may seem a little over the top for some, for the kids it meant a lot to get these messages every day.

Google

Sometimes inspiration dries up, Stacey admitted, and she will go to Google for some more inspiration and get those messages flowing. While Stacey thought about this for her girls at first, the students getting these messages were also inspired by their cafeteria manager.

It is wonderful how behavior teachers and shows others what is possible – seeing Stacy do so much for them made the kids appreciate her and others more. The kids took it upon themselves to do something.

The kids’ twist

Stacey started a trend. Kids were coming to school with their own version of the talking bananas and other such fruits that are now animated by their parents who took it upon themselves to do that for their kids.

The messages were now not only on bananas but on other fruits like oranges, as you can see in this photo. These oranges were dubbed the “emoji oranges” and were another Stacey creation for her students.

Principle

The Principal of the school was all aboard on the idea of the bananas and oranges at the lunch table. Principal Sharon Shewbridge stated that she loved that the kids were getting excited about the messages and therefore about the fruit and not only peeling it but eating it as a result of the interaction with it.

It is a nationwide struggle to have children eat a more balanced diet, and Stacey is doing her part to help with that.

Caring

In an interview for the Washington Post, Sharon Shewbridge stated that Stacey did this because she genuinely cares about the kids and wants them to not only be as well-rounded as they can be as people but to be nourished from the inside out.

As her superior, Sharon is pleased to have an employee like Stacey who takes the initiative and helps the kids without being directed to do so. It takes a special person to make this kind of change.

Social media

Sharon Shewbridge took to social media to put attention on her amazing employee. She posted about the fruit and the messages Stacey was putting on them for the kids. It did not take much time for the story to hit the viral waves.

There were two photos posted on Twitter that showed Stacey’s hard work and people noticed. Hundreds of likes were placed on the images and the fruit company, Dole, noticed that it was their fruit that was being used.

Banana delivery

Dole sent the school a generous amount of 540 bananas for each and every student at the school. This meant Stacey needed to think of many more messages, which she did together with schools PTA who was behind her in every way as they loved what she was doing.

Together they made all of the fruit filled with messages and every single kid got their very own message personalized for their very own selves.