#school lunch debt

[macmanx]

No child should go hungry, no Human should go hungry, and school lunch debt is a crime against humanity.

[sataniccapitalist]

[snarkymeetingnotes]

Co-signed. As a lunchlady, it's the worst part of the job (other than the burns).

[snarkymeetingnotes]

I hate school lunch debt.

I hate the school lunch costs anything at all.

I hate that school districts can contract school lunch out to for-profit dining companies.

I'm a lunch lady at a high school in the United States and here's something that happened today: lunch was French toast sticks, hash browns, and a sausage patty. One kid asked for an extra sausage patty. We had plenty: it was the last lunch period and we had way more than we needed, several kids in that and other lunches declined the sausage. So I gave him one.

My boss, the kitchen manager, comes over a few minutes later and tells me, "Stop giving the kids extra food. The one you just gave extra sausage to doesn't have any money on his account."

We can't deny them a lunch (which is only the elements that make up a "complete lunch", no extras) but anything extra, be it an extra helping or if the cashier thinks they took more than a serving even of fruit or veggies, if they take an ice cream or a beverage other than milk or juice, has to be paid for in cash or the balance of a kid's electronic lunch account.

I wouldn't want my manager's job, and if I had it I probably wouldn't keep it long because I would be looking but other way when kids steal food, I'd be telling cashiers to neglect to charge if the kid has an extra helping of something. Maybe in the before times they did, but right about the time of Obamacare legislating that employers couldn't just offer completely bullshit health benefits, the district decided to save money on employee benefits by contracting out. I know this is the reason because when they did a study about whether they should close some of our under-enrolled elementary schools, the report stated flat-out that that was the reason. Oh and as a kicker, we've been deeper in the hole with the lunch program than we ever were when it was all done in-district, surprise surprise.

So because we're beholden to a profit-seeking corporation, when a kid asks for an extra half-scoop of pasta or another sausage patty because we're still feeding them the serving sizes they got in middle school, instead of saying sure, kiddo, here you go, I'm supposed to warn them that they'll get charged extra and I can only give them this less than a dollar worth of food cost item (that we might have to throw out otherwise, if we don't sell the leftovers another day) if they have money on their account.

What I'm actually doing to do is tell them they better keep it quiet and don't go through my boss's line.

It should all be free. Even the extras. The cookies, the chips, the sugar free fruity fizzy drinks. If you don't want those to be free, don't have them available. But this is the fucking future of the country and we're supposed to be in the top ten richest countries in the world and CHILDREN have fucking DEBT because they need to EAT.

So vote tomorrow, and vote blue or I'll probably get replaced by a vending machine or they'll bring McDonald's into the schools and charge your kids $15 for what we now charge them $3.50 for. And remember: if you see someone stealing food, no you didn't.

[axolotlofficial]

Anyway, children and teens comparing school to prison are observant, not "childish".

[momiji-kitsune]

[IMAGE ID: A screenshot of a twitter post by Senator John Fetterman (@/SenFettermanPA) with text that reads:

"'School lunch debt' is a term so absurd that it shouldn't even exist.

"That's why I'm proud to introduce a bill to CANCEL the nation's student meal debt and stop humiliating kid and penalizing hunger."

The text is followed by a link to a news article by FOX43 titled "Sen. John Letterman, others, introduce bill to cancel all school lunch debt". The article includes a picture of Senator Fetterman wearing a black suit and blue tie with an aggressive expression. He is coming up the stairs in a white-walled building.

The twitter post was made at 9:00 AM on the 26 September 2023. It received 21.6 thousand views /.End ID]

He is exactly right, children should not be humiliated by school lunch debt.

[reasonsforhope]

"Surrounded by school children, teachers, advocates and public officials, Gov. Tim Walz signed a bill into law Friday to provide breakfasts and lunches at no charge to students at participating schools. It makes Minnesota the fourth state in the country to do so. 

During the signing ceremony, Walz told Minnesota parents this will ease some of the stress on them. 

“If you’re looking for good news, this was certainly the place to be,” said Walz.  “I’m honored and I do think this is one piece of that puzzle in reducing both childhood poverty and hunger insecurity.�� 

Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan was also at the ceremony. She said this was the most important thing she’d ever worked on. 

The legislation is similar to a program that was introduced during the pandemic to provide meals for all students, but was discontinued at the end of last year.

It will cost the state of Minnesota close to $400 million in the first two years and grow in price in the future. It covers the cost of meals, but not of second helpings or of separate a la carte items.

Many — but not all — students in Minnesota qualify for free and reduced meals. That program is based on household income, and if families are below a certain threshold their students can receive school meals for free or for a reduced price...

But even with these measures, there are still families who do not qualify for free and reduced meals but who struggle to pay for food. In many districts this year, that has meant mounting school lunch debts in the tens of thousands of dollars because there are families who don’t qualify for free lunch programs but aren’t able to pay.

This bill would cover all school lunches and breakfasts, even if families don’t meet current federal USDA household income guidelines.

Darcy Stueber is the director of Nutrition Services for Mankato Area Public Schools and she’s also the Public Policy Chair of the Minnesota School Nutrition Association. 

Stueber says her district is seeing just over $80,000 in school lunch debt at this point in the year, so there is a definite need families in her area have for this. She says many of those struggling to pay are single-income households that work hard, don’t make enough to pay for meal programs, but make too much to qualify for free meals. Stueber says providing meals is just another basic necessity for learning...

For students in Mankato, Stueber says this will make a big difference in a more relaxed, communal cafeteria. Kids won’t need to worry they’re racking up debts when they eat lunch, she says. And Stueber pointed out that kids aren’t really able to learn well when they’re hungry. 

Students will start receiving school meals at no charge starting at the beginning of the next academic year, which starts in September for most schools."

-Minnesota Public Radio News via 3/17/23

[whataburger-unofficial]

HAPPY BIRTHDAYYYYYYYY

♥ BQ

Happy my birthday to you too! Free food if you have the app and have used it in the last year!

[tittyinfinity]

Did you know that in a lot of places in America, they won't let you graduate until you have your lunch debt/school fees paid off?

[giraffeonstrike]

According to a school board meeting I went to this evening, there are a thousand students in this district with a negative lunch balance and instead of talking about what we could do as a community to help...what they could do as administrators, they argued about how much debt was enough to DENY FOOD TO CHILDREN.

Pardon me for saying this but I feel like I have to: what in the actual shit ass fuck is that?

[hazelhymns]

imagine explaining to a non American that i almost didn’t graduate high school bc my “lunch credit debt” didn’t get paid back

[midnightmadwoman]

Addendum: The Horrors may be sauteed but they are a dreadful dish

being alive is great because there are so many different vegetables you can sauté. but then there are also the horrors

[galacticneighbor]

I was in SCHOOL LUNCH DEBT when I was a kid bc my parents were told to prioritize paying tithing to our church over feeding their children. No WAY was there ever going to be money to send us to college.

[shaanks]

like. I know. I know we live in the epicenter of Western greed, the seat of neocolonialism and structural violence, I know we're a country being farmed and driven into dust and nothing for corporate greed and capitalist ideals, I know I know I know...and yet it still assaults my rational mind and senses every time I go outside or open an app or look at anything anywhere and get a banner ad for HURRY BLACK FRIDAY DEALS ARE HAPPENING NOW that, once scrolled past, was slapped over footage of pieces of Palestinian children or posts calmly documenting horror and atrocity in Ukraine.

somehow we live in the timeline where we're expected to care about...like. buying things. when all the things are made from slave labor. or new phones, made from cobalt and precious metals being pulled up from mines run by old money lunatics who are grinding their workers into blood and pulp. or the geopolitical posturing of our government, when their lies are being documented and livestreamed concurrently as they're being told, when the tax dollars of people who are chaining themselves together on freeways trying to stop our country from contributing to a genocide are being used for that genocide.

we're just people on a planet whipping around the sun, killing and torturing and destroying each other over money and borders we made up, over gods we made up, over nothing substantive. the government of the country I live in is funding three different genocides because it's making the countries they're killing seem like less reliable trading partners for natural gas and oil.

I know the academic why, I know the political and philosophical and historical answers about what is happening here.

but what. the fuck is happening here. how did this happen to us as a species. why do hellfire missiles and white phosphorus exist. what would possess one person to cut another person's head off for being born in a different country. how is anyone capable of watching footage of children burning with their own eyes, and still turning around and calling them dogs that deserved it.

who are we? who are we??