Students at HPHS celebrate 'No One Eats Alone Day'

Students at Heritage Park High School (HPHS), located on Buckland Square Drive, celebrated National “No One Eats Alone Day” on Friday thanks to support provided by WellCare of Kentucky, an American health insurance company that provides mostly managed care services via Medicaid, Medicare Advantage and Medicare Prescription drug plans to individuals and families across the Commonwealth.

“No One Eats Alone Day”, a movement started by the Sandy Hook Promise, a national nonprofit organization founded by several families who lost loved ones during the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012, seeks to “end social isolation and help students get to know one another, so that every student feels like they belong,” according to a press release issued about the occasion.

WellCare has been supporting “No One Eats Alone Day” at schools across the state for seven years, including three years at HPHS. The insurance company stated that over 151 schools, including around 64,000 students, across the Commonwealth participated in the program.

Faculty and staff at HPHS had the lunchroom decorated with colorful balloons and tablecloths for the students, and WellCare provided a template of “conversation starters” that were placed upon the tables to help students generate conversations with their peers. Faculty and staff members were even invited to join the students for lunch and to engage in conversations, too.

Melissa Gregory, the school’s family resource coordinator, said that the conversation starters could be helpful since many of the students at Heritage Park have anxiety.

“These just give the kids some easy topics to promote thoughtful conversations during lunch,” she said.

HPHS principal Dr. Michelle Ruckdeschel praised the event, saying that it was fun for the students and gets them excited.

“We think it’s very important that we acknowledge that some people may not fit in or anything like that,” said HPHS principal Dr. Michelle Ruckdeschel. “So, this is a good event to bring awareness.”

Ruckdeschel said that the lunch helps to bring the students and staff at the school closer together, creating more of a “family” atmosphere.

“No one should be sitting at school all by themselves eating lunch, so it brings people together, and it’s more of an intentional thing to invite our staff to come down and interact with the students in a different way that’s not academics,” Rcukdeschel said.

In addition to the conversation starters, students were also encouraged to do an activity provided by WellCare, crafted to help the students highlight how they are both the same and different from their peers and teachers. A large poster was taped to the lunchroom wall, and everyone started at the first prompt, which asked whether they like to be called by their first name or a nickname. Those participating would use the marker to choose the best answer that relates to them, and then they would look at the next question, choose an answer and connect those answers together to form a line. At the end of the activity, the page would be filled with lines and patterns, which show how much the participants are alike or different.

“Sometimes it’s nice for the students to visually see how much they have in common with their peers,” said Melissa Gregory, the family resource coordinator at HPHS.

Ruckdeschel said that special events such as “No One Eats Alone” are important for students at the high school, especially since Heritage Park is a small school of only about 135 students.

“I think it’s good for our students to have some special events. Whenever you come into the lunchroom and see it decorated or you see balloons, it puts a smile on their face, and they get pretty excited. And it’s a good, uplifting thing, especially for February, in the middle of winter when sometimes people are down,” she said.

According to WellCare, “loneliness and social isolation have a direct correlation to an increased risk of depression and thoughts of self-harm or suicidal ideation” and “initiatives like No One Eats Alone Day help build connections, self-esteem and a culture of belonging at schools”.

Corey Ewing, WellCare’s plan president, said, “Social isolation has been identified as a precursor to bullying, self-harm, and community violence. WellCare is sponsoring the program because when students are given the appropriate tools, they will stand up for others as empathetic and caring activists, not passive bystanders.”

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