Riverview High staffer reflects on years with the district

For many people who, at some point or another, have eaten their lunches at a local school cafeteria, Melissa Phillips is a familiar face. 

“Little kids come up to you. ‘There’s my lunch lady.’ That’s the fun part, when they see you outside (school) and they realize you’re a real person,” Phillips said.

However, not all of the vast number of students in kindergarten through 12th grade that she has served know about her efforts behind the food counter, across her more than 26 years with the district. 

When Phillips first joined the district in January 1998, she was working in a kitchen and custodial role with part-time hours, discouraged and not sure whether to continue. 

Today, as the food and nutrition services manager at Riverview High School, she has the responsibility of running the show and shaping the menu. 

“I feel very proud. Everybody keeps telling me I should be,” she said.

A life in the school district 

After Phillips graduated from the district, she never left.

Having completed Cyesis, a teen parenting program based out of Riverview High School, she was looking for a way to stay in close proximity to her children, Jonathan and Madeline McNish, who were entering, respectively, pre-K and voluntary pre-K at Ashton Elementary School. 

The resulting career spanned not only years but schools as well. 

Initially working four-hour shifts that alternated between the kitchen and custodial work, she grew in the role over 12 to 15 years. 

At first, there was little pay, but due to advice from family members including her parents, Raymond and Marsha McNish, she chose to press forward.

Today, she said it’s the best decision she ever made.

"It was a little discouraging in the beginning, but I stuck it through, and that's what I tell people: stick through it, get through it, you've got to get through this first year, and you'll be good. And you'll get a lot of opportunities; there's a lot of opportunities to move around."

She's now responsible for managing the team at Riverview High School, producing more than 1,500 meals per day — and making sure students eat their vegetables too. 

During lunchtime, when not serving food, she can be found on the line talking to students, making sure they’re enjoying a well-rounded selection of foods, or any items they need for a reimbursable meal.

“I can make cheeseburgers and pizza every day, and these kids would eat cheeseburgers and pizza every day, but we have a salad bar too,” she said.

Photo by Ian Swaby

Her other responsibilities include producing, transporting and distributing food to Suncoast Polytechnical High School, Triad Alternative School and the Cyesis program, as well as overseeing one of the largest production kitchens in the summer meals program.

“I don't want to go nowhere,” she said. “This is where I’m going to retire from and they've taken well care of me. (Sara Dan), my director, is very encouraging, and she's very loving and sweet."

The entry-level wages weren't the only obstacle Phillips encountered along the way in her career.

She also struggled with Attention Deficit Disorder, as well as dyslexia, the latter of which hindered her when it came to an important part of the job: scaling up recipes. 

She would take recipes home in the evenings to make the calculations, although today, computers have rendered it unnecessary for her to do so. 

Although her internship for the role of food and nutrition services manager took her two years as opposed to the usual one year, she ultimately landed the role. 

What's the key to succeeding each day?

“You have to really like working with food, people and kids. Kids are your customers,” she said.

Serving high school students today, she finds they are eager to be treated like adults, seeking respect and offering it in return. 

“I was raised 'Yes, ma'am, no, ma'am,' she said. I even greet them now, ‘Yes, sir.’ Even the kids.”

At the same time, she invites them to call her Miss Melissa.

“I don’t care for the last name,” she said.

Of course, the job hasn't been without its challenges.

Hurricane Ian saw the school serving as a shelter for about 3,000 people. Staff had to deliver meals to the 2,000 people on the other side of the school courtyard, working out a route through locker rooms to avoid going outside. 

At the time COVID-19 came about, she had been undergoing radiation for cervical cancer and was confined to the production kitchen, not able to go into the community. 

She said Dan supported her during the loss of Marsha McNish in April. She now is helping to take care of Raymond McNish.

In addition to two surgeries for the cancer, she's had two rotator cuff surgeries on her left arm, but that's just part of the job, she said, with the heavy lifting involved. 

Above everything, however, she still finds echoes of the reason she first chose to join the district years ago. Her grandchildren, through her stepdaughter Emily Phillips, are now entering kindergarten, and she still picks them up from school after her shifts.

“I couldn't see myself doing anything else after being here for this long,” she said. “People ask me what I want to do, if I'm going to keep going. I'm going to keep going."