Ice cream products removed from schools

Students at four Grady County schools are out of ice cream options for at least this week after the nationwide Blue Bell recall.
Each principal said a Blue Bell representative was at her school before 8 a.m. Monday to retrieve any of their products still in the cafeteria’s ice cream freezers. Blue Bell voluntarily recalled all of its ice creams, sherbets, and frozen yogurts and snacks last week while Grady County schools were closed for Spring Break. The frozen items had the potential of being contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Whigham School was the first in Grady County to have items removed. “Blue Bell representatives contacted me on April 1 with a recall list of a few items,” says Principal Sherry Moncrief, “we were actually selling one of the items on the list,  Sour Pop Green Apple Bars. Two representatives of Blue Bell met me at school at 7 o’clock the next morning to immediately remove the recalled items.” Blue Bell picked up all of their products Monday.
At Shiver School, Principal Patsy Clark says, “The regular delivery man came first thing Monday morning and picked up the remaining ice cream. We did not have much left.”
Dr. Gloria Fuller at Northside Elementary School says after her school’s ice cream was removed “they reimbursed us for what we had in the ice cream box.”
Schools in Grady County sell ice cream often as a way of raising money for PTO or school projects.
“We currently use ice cream money to fund STEM activities, positive behavior rewards and incentives and special projects,” says Janet Walden, principal of Southside Elementary School where ice cream is sold only on Fridays.
According to principals Shelia Cain at Eastside Elementary School, Tilda Brimm at Washington Middle School and interim principal Dr. Kermit Gilliard at Cairo High School, Mayfield ice cream is sold at those three schools.
According to the Georgia Department of Education, health inspectors with the Georgia Department of Public Health are in contact with school nutrition and food managers around the state, and are performing physical checks during scheduled food service inspections at schools, to ensure all of the recalled Blue Bell products are no longer served.