If you ask a student their favorite time of day, you can almost certainly bet on the answer being lunch. Rushing out of class to make it first in the long line is an experience various Weddington High students have been through.
When they finally get in line (which has recently started stretching across the A-Hall staircase), students may spark conversations with friends or fight over who gets the last ranch container.
Between October 12 and 16, Union County Public Schools decorated cafeterias for Circus Week—a themed approach for this year’s National School Lunch Week. Cafeteria workers hung up bright banners, set up decorative pieces on top of the food stalls, and put posters all over the cafeteria walls.
As high schoolers, we may see these attempts at spirit and passively ignore them; however, they speak volumes about the effort employed by our staff. Compared to their elementary-school counterparts, high-schoolers are often much more jaded and not nearly as focused on the details of their surroundings.
In my four years of buying lunch, I’ve grown accustomed to the many quirks of our cafeteria, whether it’s the constantly changing holiday themes, the unspoken riots over the ranch, or why there’s only two lanes available as opposed to three.
The Hershey chocolate cookie and the grilled garlic toastie in particular have garnered my attention over the past four years. Standing in line and checking out the food are moments I’ve used to talk to the lunch ladies about the items they are selling. When do these go back in stock? I love these items so much!
The Hershey chocolate cookie (HCC) is a bulk-ordered masterpiece. It’s gooey, chocolatey, soft, and melts in your mouth—which is exactly why it was back-ordered in the latter half of the 2025-2026 school year. Because of how much I loved them, I recall attempting to figure out a script for what I should ask the ladies at the front when checking out. Occupied with peers skipping the lines and dropping food on the floor, the ladies had bigger priorities; however, they replied to my question with genuine care. This is a pattern I’ve noticed. Last year, I asked multiple ladies about the HCCs, and they all responded along the same lines: “I’m glad to hear you like them! Unfortunately, we ran out of them, and couldn’t order them in time to last the rest of the year.”
This year, I had the pleasure of reviewing a new item, and one in particular caught my eye when I was raving about how much I needed something flavorful and filling. It was a grilled cheese sandwich—but the bread was the garlic bread served every once in a while. I really appreciated the creativity in this item. Whether it comes from the Weddington cafeteria staff or an official
County-wide addition, there will always be a little personality in UCPS food from whomever prepares it. When students are stressed out over a million other things, having something new to be positively surprised by is genuinely special; it’s something that deserves more recognition. It’s always a societal expectation to be polite to waiters and retail workers, so why not start that practice at school? After all, we’re learning so many other things to prepare ourselves for the future.
With fun themes and spontaneous light interactions, the cafeteria is more than the place you get your food. Next time you’re there, ask the lunch lady about her day!
