Patty Page
Director of Nutrition Services
Manteca Unified School District, CA

Patty has been using PCS products in Manteca since the fall of 2011 and is currently using RIGHTrak, FASTrak, NetPOS, Rocketscan F&R integration, and PayPAMS. She is now implementing PCS’ TrakNOW Nutrition and Inventory, which will be rolled out to all school cafeterias this year.

With Patty at the helm, Manteca USD  is one of only 24 districts in California to achieve honors in the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Healthier US School Challenge, with 30 schools in the district earning either silver or bronze awards. The program’s goals are to foster good health among schoolchildren through nutrition and physical exercise, activity and education.

Patty has taken the concept of “Farm to School” to a whole new level. Just outside her office window, the school district’s farm provides a place for students to cultivate and harvest fresh produce for sale to the nutrition program. Farm fresh specialties include everything from pumpkins to baby bok choy, herbs, potatoes, spinach and every kind of lettuce. On top of that, parents and staff can also buy freshly harvested vegetables, boxed weekly. This subscription services is called “Veggie Express”. 

Stats: A year-round operation for the 23,000-students, Nutrition Services prepared just shy of 5 million meals in the 12 months ending June 30, a little more than half of which were school lunches. The remaining meals included 1.7 million breakfasts, 210,000 snacks, 93,000 summer meals and, starting in January, just over 12,000 suppers.

PCS: So what’s new and what’s next?

Patty: We just recently hired a farm-to-school supervisor and are getting ready to plant produce in the next month. We will still have to subsidize our produce with purchased produce, but a lot of it will be coming from our school garden. We will hire “ag” students to help harvest it. What they harvest on Monday will be in the garden bar on Tuesday. You can’t get more “farm to fork” than that! The farm will provide spinach and lettuce, bok choy, different types of peppers, watermelons, and squash. We also have a greenhouse so we can start growing herbs for seasoning.

PCS: Talk to us about your famous “Garden Bars”!

Patty: We really work hard on providing healthy choices that the children enjoy. One of our big things is our garden bars. We don’t just offer the children things like apples, bananas, pears, and oranges. They get things like jicama sticks, blueberries, strawberries, white peaches, spinach and romaine. Next year we’ll start offering a kale salad with diced apples and pears. Plus we are going to do some different spinach salads and a faro salad.

PCS: How has PCS made a difference for you at Manteca?

Patty: Support is the biggest contributing factor, in particular their responsiveness and attention to detail. Whenever there is an issue, I can count on it being remedied effectively and efficiently, which is appreciated by our IT staff, as well.

We at PCS are proud of Patty, her staff, and her wonderfully creative programs. We appreciate having Manteca USD as a customer!

Check out the article from Who’s Cooking School Lunch? featuring Patty Page!

I’ve used PCS for over 25 years and have consistently found that whenever I needed assistance, the response from support was very quick and on target to resolve any issues. The company has made it their business to put their customers’ needs first, rather than just trying to sell their “latest and greatest” to make a buck. Everyone, from the company General Manager, David Yaniv, to the support techs (too numerous to name), make their best efforts to be available when we need them and are patient with us “non-techies!”

I honestly believe that the main reason for our district’s successes in surviving audits can be attributable to the unfailing quality of PCS products and the service provided by the people representing the company.This certainly adds to our ability to provide rapid service to our students through quick serving lines and virtually seamless data integration with our central office and systems.
Thanks for the opportunity to say, “Well done, folks!!”
Michelle Perkins, SNS – Okeechobee County School District, FL

Earlier this month, Clayton County Public Schools Superintendent, Luvenia Jackson honored several of the district’s school nutrition programs for their work in increasing participation in their respective school-level programs.

Nutrition Services Director, Audrey Hamilton awarded certificates of appreciation to several school nutrition managers. Hamilton said the nutrition managers were honored by the Georgia School Nutrition Association for having consistently high breakfast or lunch participation for at least three years straight and for increasing school meal program participation by at least 3 percent.

PCS’s Director of Marketing, CD Eichler, spoke with Audrey about her teams’ ability to achieve this boost in participation consistently over a three year period, and she shared with us how they accomplished this. Involving the students was was one key factor. They held taste tests, inviting vendors in to demonstrate new food items to be placed on the menu cycle based on acceptability to the students. Having the ability to be involved in the process and to make selections and choices for what they wanted to eat really created excitement and helped boost participation. Going CEP was another big factor.

“I’m elated,” said Audrey. “Our team works hard to get these results. This is not easy.”

Congratulations to Audrey and her team on this well deserved honor!

Sandy Lewis – Food Service Supervisor

Biddeford Schools, ME

A PCS customer since 2006, Sandy oversees the food service program in 3 districts. In addition to Biddeford, where she already has PCS, she oversaw the installation of RIGHTrak/FASTrak and NetPOS in Dayton School District this year. This presented a unique challenge because Dayton shares food service and business services with Biddeford but maintains its own database. Sandy handled the situation from start to finish with aplomb, helping to coordinate all those involved: IT, Support, and business services at the districts, the cafeteria managers, and of course, PCS!

          For POS hardware Sandy uses NEDs, Silentouch, Bolts, and has PayPAMS as her payments solution. When asked what feature or product she likes best about PCS, Sandy replied that the” Reports are awesome, very helpful and detailed.”

          Sandy says that even though Biddeford is her biggest district but she worries about it the least because “The system is up and running properly. I can go to other districts and take care of them knowing that the system at Biddeford works so well that I can rely on it to get me through the day and help perform all the functions necessary to efficiently run my school food service department. If there is a problem, I call support and they nip it right in the bud, something I haven’t experienced to the same degree with other companies.”

          Does she have a favorite support person? Well, if you know Sandy, then her answer will come as no surprise to you. “Everyone’s great!”

          We feel the same about you Sandy! In the words of our Regional Sales Director, Connie Sturman, “Sandy stands out for her upbeat and friendly personality. Any request or comment she makes is done respectfully and patiently. Sandy always has a good word and positive attitude and she is a pleasure to work with!”