For more than 15 years Maria Ponce has been the person who turns on the lights at Ridgetop Elementary. She has to be in the cafeteria kitchen by 6 a.m. to start preparing breakfast. By 7 a.m., Hermelinda Sánchez de Loza is there to get ready to feed the kids.
When Ponce started working at Ridgetop, Sánchez de Loza had already been there for four years. They have seen other kitchen staff come and go but have always remained a duo. They know each other’s steps in and out of the kitchen. They know each other’s family history and have comforted one another through rough times.
They also know the name of every kid who walks through the lunch line, which kids are siblings and which come from immigrant families.
”Some of them tell me their stories, and when some of them come crying and I ask ‘Why are you crying?’” Sánchez de Loza said in Spanish.
She said she loves seeing the kids every day.
“Just seeing their faces, every day that they come all happy asking ‘what’s for lunch?’” Sánchez de Loza said.
Ponce said Ridgetop feels like a big family. Students who have left the school come back to see them — some even after they graduate from college.
“We saw them grow. We saw them even since their moms were pregnant,” Ponce said in Spanish. “They don’t forget about us.”
But this summer, Ponche and Sánchez de Loza are saying goodbye to the kids, each other and to Ridgetop. The school is one of 10 in the Austin Independent School District that will not reopen next fall.
As the school year came to an end, Ponce and Sánchez de Loza got ready for their last lunch together. Next year they will be working at different schools.
Michael Minasi
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KUT News
Sánchez de Loza and Ponce have been working together for 15 years. While other kitchen staff have come and gone, they have remained a team.
The last lunch
On the last school day, Ponce and Sánchez de Loza filled the oven with hundreds of burger patties, chopped cucumbers and put strawberries in individual trays. With less than 45 minutes till lunch started, they hurried around the kitchen in a scene too hectic to be a coordinated dance, but with an awareness of each other’s next moves. Ponce continuously looked at the clock on the wall and yelled “Hermelinda!” when she needed help.
By 10:45 a.m., kindergarteners waited in a line at the door. As kids began walking through the cafeteria, Ponce helped them put strawberries on their trays and pick between a beef, chicken or veggie burger. Sánchez de Loza stood at the end of the line, checking if kids had money on their accounts, giving them cookies and drawing ketchup smiley faces on their burgers.
“Where are you going next year?” Sánchez de Loza asked almost every student in Spanish. While most students at Ridgetop are bilingual, she also made an effort to talk to some of them in English. “Last burger at Ridgetop,” she told a third grader.
“I can’t believe you had some of my favorite food for the last three days,” Marco Mills responded.
The last week of school the cafeteria staff got creative to make sure there was no food leftover once the year ended. It wasn’t always easy. When kids asked for cheese on their burgers, Ponce realized the sliced cheese was frozen. Even so, Mills said the best thing about the cafeteria, besides the food, is how nice the lunch ladies are.
“She is definitely nice and kind, and very, I would say, caring, compassionate. And if I drop my food she gives me a bit of the food for free,” Mills said about Sánchez de Loza.
He said food at Ridgetop is better than food at home.
“I have bring it from home once when I was in kindergarten and I did not really like it,” he said. “So I’ve been just having this for the past years.”
Michael Minasi
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KUT News
Ponce thought she would grow old at Ridgetop. Because of the school’s closure, she will move to a different AISD campus next school year.
Better than McDonalds and H-E-B sushi
Alexis Morales said her children are more open to trying new food because of the menu at the cafeteria. She said her son loves the cafeteria staff, knows their names and loves to bring them flowers.
“When he brings flowers for the teachers he’s always like ‘I want to bring flowers for the ladies at the cafeteria,’” she said. “[They’re] always there with a smile and always greeting him in the hallway, even not inside the cafeteria.”
On the last day of school, Morales offered to bring McDonalds or H-E-B sushi to her kids to celebrate the end of the year. Her daughter said she wanted to have whatever the cafeteria was serving.
Every AISD school cafeteria has to follow the district’s recipes. But, Ponce and Sánchez de Loza make sure the kids will enjoy the food, otherwise, they won’t eat. Parents said, even if all the schools follow the same recipe, families with kids at other schools say the food at Ridgetop is the best.
“There was a mom that used to come and ask ‘How do you cook the lentils? My boy wants the lentils just like you make them,’” Sánchez de Loza said. “There was a teacher that used to come and buy lentils to take home because she loved our lentils.”
Michael Minasi
/
KUT News
Ponce and Sánchez de Loza said they will miss their mornings having breakfast together and helping each other through rough times.
Saying goodbye to each other
As the last day of school went by, Ponce and Sánchez served 306 meals, more than they expected. They ran out of burgers, so they cooked the falafel from the the freezer. When that ran out, they made grilled cheese sandwiches with the remaining ingredients.
Once rush hour passed and all the kids were fed, Ponce and Sánchez de Loza cleaned the kitchen and sat down to eat their lunch, adding an ingredient only for them: the red salsa Sánchez de Loza made at home.
“It’s sad. Sad from seeing all the kids that are leaving and are saying ‘we are going to miss you,’” Sánchez de Loza said.
Sánchez de Loza thought about all the kids who are moving to new cities or countries over the summer, but also how hard it must be to go to another school. She said she’s also worried about starting over with another manager.
“It’s always been us. Her and I have been here, some have come and gone, and they bring someone else, and then someone else. But there’s nothing like this,” Ponce said about Sánchez de Loza. “I haven’t seen a manager that helps as much as she does, because some just stay in their office doing their paperwork and don’t do things in the kitchen.”
Sánchez said she thought she would retire from Ridgetop, but next year she will be at Andrews Elementary. While she was able to find a spot in the district, her working hours were cut, which means her pay will be reduced for her last two years before she retires.
Ponce will become a manager at Reilly Elementary, where many of the Ridgetop students have been reassigned. But she worries that she will have to get used to working with new staff. She won’t be able to yell “Hermelinda!” anymore. She said she’s leaving her right hand behind.
“How am I not going to miss her? But it’s not in my hands, what would I like more than to take her with me. But I can’t, I’m not the one that decides,” Ponce said. “She and I have made each other’s life easier.”