St. Paul, Immanuel Lutheran youth ministry raises money to combat Dixon schools' lunch debt

DIXON – For Dixon’s St. Paul and Immanuel Lutheran churches, February is all about “kids helping kids” as the children and youth ministries raise money to help eliminate student lunch debt at Dixon Public Schools, co-pastor Anthony Windau said.

The total lunch debt – stemming from unpaid student lunch fees – stood at about $9,625 in December, which is when Destiny McElhinney, a mom of a third grader at Jefferson Elementary, began fundraising to pay it off. She was quickly joined by Brett Nicklaus of the nonprofit organization Trinity Cares, and by Dec. 24, almost half of the debt was cleared.

[ Donations paying off Dixon school’s student lunch debt spark larger conversation about school fees ]

About that same time, Windau, along with his wife and co-pastor Riley Reed-Windau, saw the campaign on Facebook and immediately wanted to help, Windau said in an interview with Shaw Local.

“Feeding kids is exactly in line with the message of Jesus Christ and what we do,” he said.

Windau said the issue also was personally significant to him.

“Growing up, I was the kid that was denied food from having too much school lunch debt. So this struck a chord within me,” he said.

From there, the co-pastors brought the issue to the church councils. They decided to give all donations made to the children’s offering in February to the district’s lunch debt, Windau said.

The children’s offering is separate from the churches' regular giving. It’s done during worship services where kids will “walk up and down the aisles of the church with little buckets” and during Sunday school classes, Gerad Von Holten, praise band director for the St. Paul children, youth and family ministries, said in an interview with Shaw Local.

The youth ministry also came up with the idea to contribute to the lunch debt at its monthly youth committee meeting, Von Holten said.

“One of our young people actually had the idea that they wanted to contribute to something within the community, which is very adult of them to think of such a thing,” he said.

The youth ministry decided to hold a spaghetti bake dinner at St. Paul Church, 421 Peoria Ave. in Dixon, from 4 to 7 p.m. Feb. 21. Half the proceeds will go to the lunch debt and half to the youth church programming, Von Holten said.

“Kids helping kids. That’s a really awesome thing, and they recognize like everyone should eat, and who knows if they’re affected by this,” Windau said.

The dinner has the option of carryout and will include spaghetti, breadsticks, salads and desserts. Tickets are $10 for adults, $5 for kids ages 6 to 12 and free for kids ages 5 and younger. They can be bought online in advance or at the dinner.

“That’s awesome that they’re doing that, because they will do something, and then hopefully everyone keeps doing something,” Nicklaus said in an interview with Shaw Local.

Since December, donations to the student lunch debt have slowed, collecting a total of $148, he said.

“I was kind of disappointed,” he said. “It’s got to be a collaboration, where we all come together in the summer, you know, and keep doing fundraisers to set up a fund at the school.”

Nicklaus said his goal is to set up a lunch fund for the district to prevent the debt from accumulating again in the future.

For information, visit stpauldixon.org or call St. Paul Lutheran Church at 815-288-2757.