“No money, no lunch.”
Posted by Michelle Moquin on February 26th, 2014
Good morning!
This story infuriates me. With all of the children starving all over the world, including in our own country, this Utah school has the nerve to throw away children’s lunches because the parents were behind on on their payments; some didn’t even know they were indebted.
Here’s the write from Think Progress:
Utah School Threw Out Students’ Lunches Because They Were In Debt
A Utah school’s child nutrition manager threw out the lunches of about 40 elementary school students this week after the kids’ parents fell behind on payment.
Some parents at Uintah Elementary in Salt Lake City say they didn’t even realize they were indebted to the school. The school apparently made calls Monday and Tuesday telling some parents that there was a balance on their accounts, and the children of those who had missed the call were the ones whose lunches got thrown out.
According to the Salt Lake Tribune, the child nutrition manager’s original plan was to withhold lunches for kids whose parents hadn’t paid. But cafeteria workers were unable to distinguish who was on that list before serving. Once the food had been dished out, food safety codes say it can’t be given to another student and must be thrown away.
The children were given milk and fruit instead of a full lunch — the meal that the school says it gives any child who isn’t able to pay.
“So she took my lunch away and said, ‘Go get a milk,’ ” recalled one student, a fifth grader named Sophia. “I came back and asked, ‘What’s going on?’ Then she handed me an orange. She said, ‘You don’t have any money in your account so you can’t get lunch.’”
Parents were outraged by the move, calling it “traumatic and humiliating.”
Salt Lake City’s school district has apologized to parents and students for the incident. “We again apologize and commit to working with parents in rectifying this situation and to ensuring students are never treated in this manner again,” the district said in a Facebook note.
Still, the incident raises longstanding questions about child nutrition and low-income families. It is not the first time that students have had their lunch thrown out for insufficient funds. In November, a Texas middle school student’s lunch was thrown away because he was 30 cents short on payment.
But depriving children of food — and embarrassing them in front of their peers — isn’t the only option. In Boston, for example, public schools provide all students with cost-free breakfast and lunch no matter their financial situation.
A compelling set of evidence drives such decisions. Child hunger has lasting impacts on children’s mental health, as well as cognitive and social ability. And while more than one in five children lack stable access to food, only half of the students who are eligible for free breakfasts actually receive them.
*****
Readers: For a few dollars, and sometimes not even that much, these children had to suffer the embarrassment, not to mention being robbed of their lunch, leaving them hungry and confused. And what is going through the minds of people who tell children that they can’t eat because there is no money in their account?! Wha’at?? Do they not realize the impact of their words? Do they even care?
It seems to me that so much is said and done on our planet with very little care to how it affects our fellow human beings, children included. People whose main goal is to keep people down, or take action to feel more important than others…or to make one feel powerless. Yes, in this case, these adults said things to these children, that made them feel humiliated and powerless.
What is it with the human psyche that feels the need to reach for negative feelings, to put down others, instead of reaching for positive ones to rise up, and empower? It comes from such a place of lack, as if there isn’t enough of whatever for everyone. That is the last thing children need to be thinking is that there isn’t enough money for them to eat. Those adult should be fired. They have no idea the impact of their words will have on their psyche about money as they grow up. How easy it would have been to just feed them their lunch and contact their parents later to rectify the situation. No harm done.
But now…they possibly fucked them up for a few dollars.
Thoughts? Blog me.
Before I sign off, on a positive celebratory note, it is someone’s birthday today!!
Happy Birthday Howie!! I HOPE you are having a wonderful day, and eating lots of Birthday cake!! Chime in and tell us.
Peace out.
Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.
Gratefully your blog host,
michelle
Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)
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February 26th, 2014 at 12:32 pm
There is a silver lining to this sad event:
http://m.today.com/moms/lunch-angel-pays-kids-overdue-accounts-elementary-school-2D12062213
Happy birthday Howie.
/SB
February 26th, 2014 at 4:34 pm
Redic(ulous) & ludicrous & downright STUPID way to handle the original situation. Nice that the angel paid but they were making them go without when they had the food there already…oh, don’t get me started…
Happy birthday, Howie!!
Luv, ZL
February 26th, 2014 at 10:42 pm
What bullshit, unbelievable. And we wonder why there is so much crime. Schools are teaching kids that stealing will fill their stomachs, because adults are stealing their lunches.
February 27th, 2014 at 8:52 am
Thank You Michelle, Social Butterfly and Zen Lill for remembering and wishing me a Happy Birthday — I d0 appreciate it. I did have a good day.
As far as those poor kids in Utah gettingt their lunches taken away and not given food to eat . . . I believe that the adults invoived should not be working with children. They should ALL be fired. Shame on Them!
Our Children already have a heavy load to carry on their shoulders, living in this decade; they do not need to be singled out and punished for their Parent’s financial state.
HOWIE
February 28th, 2014 at 6:05 am
I couldn’t get in to wish you Happy Birthday Howie. So here it is. You have been a sources of excitement for my whole family. I hope you had a very nice day.
February 28th, 2014 at 7:27 am
I’m hoping to get in to wish my favorite guy HAPPY BIRTHDAY. Someone needs a severe ass whipping for messing up this blog’s comment section.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:21 am
Whether the kids ate the food or the school threw it out, that money would have been spent either way (or, in their heads “wasted,”)? So, they pretty much just did this to make an example of the kids who’s parents were in debt…
Being the victim of an adult’s abuse of power as a child is a trauma that is not easily forgiven or forgotten. It will be exciting if poetic justice comes to the GOP when these kids reach voting age.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:21 am
Maybe the parents learned a lesson here and won’t let their kid’s account go unpaid in the future.
Nah, I doubt it.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:22 am
Sorry little dude. You ain’t got no money, so rather than be charitable, were giving it to the rats because the rats are better than you. Oh by the way, where did your mom get those shoes? Walmart? HAHAHAHA!!!!
February 28th, 2014 at 8:22 am
Does this qualify as psychological torture?
What’s next, putting kids in jail because they farted?
Oh yeah.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:23 am
Yes, this is what we have become. I can hear the Limbaughs, Hannitys, Savages, and Lavines, cheering this school about giving children a good lesson in economics that will last them a lifetime, teaching kids to pay their bills.
No free lunch should be the first lesson learned in school.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:24 am
This a real example of what our society has become. That anyone who made this kind of decision considers it the right thing to do speaks volumes of what kind of culture we live in.
Humiliate the kids for their own mistakes they should of
done a better job with the finances of collection for the meals not take it out on innocent children.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:24 am
What a hero! I’m sure this ‘nutrition manger’ has a deep personal relationship with Jesus though.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:25 am
End school lunch. That time should go toward letting them out of school earlier, so they can eat when they get home.
It’s just a way to feed niggers and cheap jews.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:26 am
“…she took my lunch away and said, ‘Go get a milk,’…”
I think petty tyrants are on the rise. Making someone hurt more than you hurt inside makes it go away even if just for that moment.
There’s a lot of pain these days.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:27 am
As they say, There’s no such thing as a free lunch.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:27 am
99% of the time, my kids take their lunch. When they have had lunch at school, I gave them cash. My daughter’s school is telling me she is negative ten dollars.
They can’t tell me how that could be. They state they don’t really “stop” kids from getting lunch when they are over drafted. My kid swears she never spent more than I gave her.
That could be her just trying to CYA. Still if she is true, what the hell are they doing in that cafeteria? And the administration never really knows what goes on in the cafeteria.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:28 am
The government needs to be overthrown and the defenders of the current vile order of things all exterminated.
This situation will not improve through rational discussion or understanding or any of that feel good garbage. Conflict is necessary for progress and there’s no easy way out of this rotten situation in our culture, politics, and economy.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:29 am
What the school district has done is absolutely cruel and borderline criminal. However, I think the bigger problem is the contractors who produce what passes for “food” for school lunches, and do a poor job at producing it.
It would be far less expensive for schools to buy at bulk prices from local restaurants, but (probably because of “dietary guidelines” that are not at all followed anyway) this is not done, I’m guessing due to contractor lobbying.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:31 am
Israel wishes you a very Happy Birthday Howie. Couldn’t get in before, hope this does.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:34 am
Reba#19, …has school lunch become a privatized for profit business now?
I don’t really know. But, if so, there’s the problem.
There is no profit in dispensing humanity, kindness or generosity even to innocent children.
We will be seeing more cruelty now that “Privatize” has become a god-like commandment.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:34 am
I work in a middle school in Washington State and see this happen all the time. At the school I work in school employees created a food bank for kids.
Providing lunches (and breakfast, snacks and sometimes food for home) for any child without a lunch for whatever reason. It is shocking to watch a grown-up take a tray of “food” away from a child, throw it away, then give the student cereal, milk and a fruit.
So they spend more money and embarrass/shame children. The system is broken. It is really sad.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:36 am
Happy belated Birthday Howie.
Ironic the school shootings.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:36 am
I would like to know if this happened because the school board put this in place? Or was it the principal?
February 28th, 2014 at 8:37 am
This is right out immoral.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:37 am
Let me get this straight……they would rather throw out food than feed children who need it? What the $%# is wrong with Utah and its school system?
Degrading, lacking in compassion, poor critical thinking, hateful judgmentalism, wasteful…..I could go on, but whats the use.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:39 am
Sarah#22, You’re lucky you don’t live in a red state where people care so much about “the children.” The hipocrisy of the dominant culture here is truly disgusting.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:41 am
Samantha#26, They are Mormons, and the kids were probably heathren gentiles. It would be very abnormal for Mormons to do this to other Mormons, but non-Mormons are treated with disdain and are considered repulsive to the LDS.
I lived in a Mormon town, and it was a nightmare. My daughter came home from public school with a LDS tract that taught the kids that you deserve to die of hunger if you are not LDS.
February 28th, 2014 at 8:53 am
Igor #28, Actually, Mormons are quite vicious with their own, and will excommunicate someone if they don’t tithe their full 10%. (Not someone like Romney, though, even though it was likely the main reason he didn’t allow most of his tax returns to be made public).
February 28th, 2014 at 8:55 am
That just about made me wanna puke the sick feeling I felt when I realized the educators decision was to deprive children of nourishing meal and not because of the lack of payment but for the audacity to throw away good food instead of giving it to them anyway .
They lost the money anyway but it apparently made them feel better to humiliate children in front of their fellow students and traumatize them by not feeding them as a lesson ..
Theirs gotta be a sick moral to this somewhere…Time to call in Jamie the Chef to get things in order I say .. maybe the money wasted can be put to nutritious foods for all children …Not just those who can afford or have a forgetful parent …Just my outlook on it anyway …
February 28th, 2014 at 8:56 am
Norris#29, I heard from Mormons it was 10% in tithes, and 5% in offereings, before taxes, reviewed monthly by the Elder.
Of course, I should have pointed out, students in poor standing with the church, but non-Mormons are much easier to single out, and young Mormons are actually taught that this is what non-Mormons deserve.
In a sense, you are right, that this action would hit a Mormon child even harder, because they are being taught that they are not accepted by those of their own faith. The non-Mormons can always fall back on well deserved hatred.