06 June 2013 (18:20 UTC-07 Tango 05 June 2013)/27 Rajab 1434/16 Khordad 1391/28 Wu-Wu (4th month) 4711
“I think the county’s response is probably indicative of a larger mindset that is really frightening right now in the public school system. That we’ve stopped seeing kids as individuals…..Instead, they’re a number, or they’re a dollar sign!”-Katie Kaiser, outraged parent in Kentucky
“He sat at a table and watched his friends eat lunch. He was embarrassed and he was hungry. He came home starving.”-Elizabeth Ireland, outraged that her son was denied food at J.A. Leonard Middle School in Maine
Here’s what dip schtick school superintendent David Walker said: “[Middle School] Students are old enough to take responsibility for their lunches.”
Another parent responded angrily: “Take financial issues up with me, not my child!”-Kyla Harrison
“I’m proud that I was able to take a stand where others might not have been able to, and that I can maybe, in some little way, cause a change.”-Johnny Cook, school bus driver in Georgia, fired after he revealed that students are being denied food
Here’s what Johnny Cook wrote that got him fired: “A middle schooler got on my bus this evening and said mr johnny im hungry. I said why are you hungry buddy? Didn’t you eat lunch ? He said no sir I didn’t have any money on my account. I said they would let you charge it? No sir.
Huh! What! This child is already on reduced lunch and we can’t let him eat. Are you kidding me? I’m certain there was leftover food thrown away today. But kids were turned away because they didn’t have .40 on there account .
As a tax payer, I would much rather feed a child than throw it away. I would rather feed a child than to give food stamps to a crack head. My number is (…) the next time we can’t feed a kid for forty cent, please call me . We will scrape up the money.
This is what the world has come to.”
A private contracted food service company “…fired four employees after about two dozen students at a Massachusetts middle school were denied lunches…”-Associated Press
But wait, the New York based food service contractor didn’t fire the employees because they denied the students at Coelho Middle School food, but because masses of parents complained! In other words, the employees were following orders! Parent, John Greaves, is pissed off: “There are people in prison who are getting meals, my daughter, an honor student, is going hungry!?”
“Parent Katie Kaiser said her daughter who attends R.C. Hinsdale Elementary School was forced to dump out a full tray of food and given saltine crackers and cheese last week during state testing because of a $1.15 debt in her lunch account. Kaiser says she deposited money in her daughter’s online lunch account the night before, but the transaction wasn’t posted by lunch time the next day.”-WCPO channel 6, Kentucky
It was revealed by WCPO that at least 40 impoverished Kenton County, Kentucky, elementary school students were denied food during state testing in May 2013!
“Kenton County Assistant Superintendent Kim Banta says they are authorized to give away only certain foods that the federal government provides the school for free.”-WCPO
According to WCPO, teachers, principals, parents with money and even unnamed donors are now paying to make sure all students get fed. Gee, we already pay outrageous taxes for public schools and they can’t even provide one meal?
“Students at a Rhode Island middle school…..were forced to go back to class hungry after some of them were denied lunch and others were even ordered to throw away the lunches….24 students in all were turned away….The school’s principal said he is shocked, and has since launched an investigation into the [contracted] lunch provider.”-WHAS channel 11, Rhode Island
“Parents in New Jersey are outraged after learning their autistic son was forced to go hungry all day at school. That’s because the school denied the boy his lunch…..So the 5-year-old just sat there at Cliffwood Elementary in Matawan and watched others eat.”-WABC channel 7, New York
“I put my number in and they just said that I was short 20 cents and I couldn’t get a lunch.”-Kerstin Hughes, Lakewood Middle School student in Washington
In Virginia, a Montevideo Middle School student was denied lunch, and was told even the so called ‘free’ lunch would cost her money: “….they just took my lunch back and said, ‘Sorry, you can’t have lunch today, and if we give you bread and milk, we’re gonna have to charge you an extra fifty cents.’”-Casey Irvine
KOMU, channel 8 in Missouri, reported that at least 12 students were denied food at Moberly High School. “…they took his tray from him and dumped it out. My son said he wasn’t the only kid it was happening to. It was happening to other kids!”-Johnnie Carden, angry parent
In Michigan, a Roseville Middle School student was denied food, not because his parents owed money, but because the pre-paid account was too low and the lunch officials were not willing to extend credit: “He just said they denied him lunch. He said, ‘I need money,’ but that was too late in the day for me to get him any money. I was never notified by the school. He just said that they said he couldn’t have it.”-Fred Eckert, angry parent
In Pennsylvania, Millersburg Middle School students were denied food, because the pre-paid accounts were negative $5. School officials say it’s standard policy. Angry parents say they were not notified about the account shortage, or the policy.
In Tennessee, Mount Juliet Middle School lunch officials denied food to a 12 years old: “They took the tray away from him and said, ‘You can go find 30 cents if you want to eat your lunch’.”-Jennifer Jones, angry parent
And just what did Mount Juliet Middle School do with the lunch? They threw it in the trash! Give the kid the food or throw it in the trash, either way the dip schtick food service provider/school still loses the money!!!!
Even the Pope is pissed: “Throwing away food is like stealing from the table of those who are poor and hungry.”-Pope Francis
I’d like to correct the Pope; it isn’t “like stealing” from the poor, by denying food and throwing it away they have actually stolen the food from the poor!!!
In 2007 a school lunch lady, in Iowa, was fired for not only denying students food, but intentionally denigrating them in front of other students. Here’s what she said about low income students: “[students] didn’t deserve to eat because they didn’t have money.”-Nancy J. Harvey
But wait, there’s more! Don’t think this is all about money, in one case a four years old was denied his own lunch that he brought from home!!! In Raeford, North Carolina, the food police at West Hoke Elementary School took her home made lunch on the grounds it was not nutritional! Here’s what was in her lunch made with love by mom: A turkey and cheese sandwich, a banana, a container of apple juice, and potato chips.
But there’s insult to injury, the police stateist school told the mother of the child that they’re going to charge her for the crappy school made lunch that they forced her daughter to eat!!!
And in California, an Agoura High School student, with learning disabilities, who normally leaves campus for lunch was prevented from doing so because he scored low on the STAR (Standardized Testing And Reporting) test!!! In other words school officials were using denial of access to food as a punishment for doing bad on a test!
Here’s what the evil school officials said in response to complaints by the parents: “It’s a privilege, not a right.”
Eating is a privilege? I thought it was a necessity!