Lady’s Island Elementary School fourth-grader Ciaran Cordial, left, takes a huge bit of cheese pizza while sitting with his friend Jeffrey Hampton during the cafeteria’s weekly pizza day on Feb. 22, 2006. | Photos by Megan Lovett

For the Love of Pizza

At Lady’s Island Elementary, Wednesdays are always good

By JONATHAN CRIBBS
Feb. 24, 2006

BEAUFORT, S.C. — It’s pizza day — otherwise known as Wednesday — at Lady’s Island Elementary School.

Ten-year-old Jordan Boxley, a fifth-grader, is fresh off her lunch period. She just finished gobbling down her customary Wednesday slice, and she ate it the way she always has: piece by piece, separating each ingredient, including the cheese, which she saves for last.

“I’m a real good tomato eater, so when I know it’s tomato sauce (on pizza), I lick it all off, and I eat the bread by itself, too,” she said.

In a recent informal school survey of 145 Lady’s Island Elementary students on various aspects of their schooling, it was clear that students loved a bunch of things such as treats, nice teachers, prizes, bake sales and more treats — clear staples of an American elementary education.

But the students united like a group of unionized steelworkers in support of cafeteria pizza — the kind that’s served in perfect rectangles like sheets of fiberboard and frozen, boxed and shipped to schools like office equipment or toilet paper.

The question on the survey was, “What’s one thing you would do to improve school lunch?”

The results came in, looking something like this:

“Have better pizza.”

“Better pizza.”

“Pizza.”

“Pizza every day.”

“The pizza is good.”

“I like pizza because it is good.”

And the occasional, “I think they should start cooking shrimp and shark.”

Regardless, students say, there’s no ignoring the alarming lack of pizza at Lady’s Island Elementary.

“The sauce is good. The cheese is just so cheesy and melty,” said 11-year-old Alexis La Force, a fifth-grader.

Jade Asbury, a fellow fifth-grader, said she doesn’t even like pizza, but Lady’s Island Elementary pizza? Well, that’s a different story. There’s some sort of indescribable, otherworldly magic that apparently makes its way into those greasy slices of sustenance, she said.

“It’s unusual, but it’s good,” Jade said. “There’s something special about their pizza that doesn’t taste like other pizza.”

Fifth-grade teacher Debbie Smith was just happy students were clearing their plates. Most kids at the school usually bring their lunches from home, but on Wednesdays, the majority of the school buys pizza, she said. It costs $1.25 and typically comes with a small serving of green beans, an apple and milk.

She figured the cafeteria probably sells more than 300 slices on every pizza day.

“I think pizza’s fine,” she said. “That’s the one day they eat the junk that they’re used to rather than the stuff the school and the government tries to get them to eat.”

Principal Terry Bennett said the school surveys students periodically throughout the year, often asking open-ended questions and gauging what sorts of things students like.

“Well, I think when it comes to school lunches, it’s a never-ending problem of figuring out what (students) want,” he said. “As far as pizza goes, I think I’d enjoy it every day for a while. I think I did that in college. But I’d probably get burned out on it, too.”

Some students such as A.J. Cech, a 10-year-old fifth-grader, already seemed burnt out on weekly school district pizza. A.J.’s mom is a yoga instructor, and A.J., a skateboarder, is lobbying for more tofu selections on the lunch menu.

“I think they need to stop freezing everything,” he said. “The only thing that’s really made fresh here is the spaghetti and the salad. I know because I asked the lunch lady.”

But before that happens, he’ll probably have to quiet the chorus of students like Anna Crenshaw, an 8-year-old third-grader and self-proclaimed “candy freak”. Anna’s pushing not only for more pizza, but anything that’s generally bad for her health.

“I don’t think it’s gonna happen, but that’s what I want,” she said.

“But it’s not good for you,” a girl next to her added.

Anna removed a pink, heart-shaped lollipop from her mouth, leaned forward, almost pressing her nose against the girl’s face and shouted:

“That’s why I like it!”

(This article was published in the Beaufort Gazette in Beaufort, S.C.)

Third-grader Anna Crenshaw relishes the final bites of her slice of pizza.