Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
What the hell happened? When I was a kid, all kids paid for a subsidized lunch (35 cents at the time). Now, it seems like parents runaround like chickens with their heads cut off if the schools don’t fed their kids for them. When did all of this happen?
I don't know when, but my sister worked at a school in central Washington where all the kids got free breakfast and lunch, whether their family needed it or not. This was at least 20 years ago. She explained that the stigma of being a lower-income family that qualified for "free lunch" was considered unacceptable, and the school's way of dealing with that was to give the entire school free food so no one was singled out.
And people have just become used to it, and object if it's taken away. There are certainly parents who struggle to provide nutritious food for their kids, but there are many many more who find it very convenient to get free stuff.
What the hell happened? When I was a kid, all kids paid for a subsidized lunch (35 cents at the time). Now, it seems like parents runaround like chickens with their heads cut off if the schools don’t fed their kids for them. When did all of this happen?
Actually there were free lunches back then, it just wasn't publicized and teachers weren't forced to give every student a form and coerce them into having their parents fill it out (we were told to give a homework grade for one returned completed. Actually we weren't "told" that, just that might be one way to get compliance). When I was in high school all the lawyer's kids got free lunch. So did the kids whose families had 12 or 14 kids.
You have to remember that in some school systems and some states that the per student funding formula gives you extra money for every kid on FARM as well as ESL, SPED, plus a couple other sub-categories, so it's to the school's benefit financially to have a high number of free lunches. That also is a benefit for testing targets since "poor" kids do less well so your scores can be expected to be low.
Also, and many don't want to accept this, there are parents out there who can't feed their kids. Not for money reasons but because they just don't know how or can't get themselves organized enough to do it.
What the hell happened? When I was a kid, all kids paid for a subsidized lunch (35 cents at the time). Now, it seems like parents runaround like chickens with their heads cut off if the schools don’t fed their kids for them. When did all of this happen?
The school district I grew up in had always been labeled a high poverty school district, even going back to the good times in the 50s, 60s and 70s when it was an industrial giant. With that being said families could receive free breakfast / lunch as long as they filled out the one page document. Obviously the higher income families did not, both my parents being teachers in the district did not take advantage as many others did not. My old hometown now almost forces every kid to take the free/reduced lunch option because the state forces it on them. Not sure if there are parents who demand it but I know when my dad retired from the district in 2010 after being their since 1971 he said some parents would flat out fight having to take the free food. So sort of a reversal I guess.
In California (and probably others), when a school reaches about 90% free or reduced-price lunches, they just feed everyone because the paperwork becomes more costly to exclude a few kids.
SNAP (food stamps) provide enough money to feed each covered person about 90 meals per month yet they don't make a deduction for the 40 meals each kid gets at school each month.
Schools also serve as meal stations for kids when the schools are closed.
What the hell happened? When I was a kid, all kids paid for a subsidized lunch (35 cents at the time). Now, it seems like parents runaround like chickens with their heads cut off if the schools don’t fed their kids for them. When did all of this happen?
School lunches were federally mandated in the 40s. Breakfast started as part of a federal program in the 60s.
I don't know when, but my sister worked at a school in central Washington where all the kids got free breakfast and lunch, whether their family needed it or not. This was at least 20 years ago. She explained that the stigma of being a lower-income family that qualified for "free lunch" was considered unacceptable, and the school's way of dealing with that was to give the entire school free food so no one was singled out.
And people have just become used to it, and object if it's taken away. There are certainly parents who struggle to provide nutritious food for their kids, but there are many many more who find it very convenient to get free stuff.
I went to school in the 80’s and you get free or reduced cost lunch depending on your family’s income. I would say 30% qualified for free lunch, 30% qualified for reduced cost, the rest was full cost.
You would get a color coded pass that you would show the cashier. There was no stigma. The kids never cared about that and trust me, kids cared about a lot of things but just not that.
It happened a long time ago. When I was in high school almost 30 years ago, a large portion of my class had free and reduced lunch. When I was substitute teaching/teaching almost 20 years ago, schools had moved to free breakfast for all kids (regardless of ability to pay) in my district because they realized that many kids were not getting breakfast at home.
These breakfast and lunches are especially important now since many of these workers have had their hours cut or have been laid off. While they will get the unemployment benefits, those are not immediate, and the kids need to eat NOW, not 3 weeks from now.
Way back when, there were some kids who got free or reduced priced lunch, but percentagewise, not many. I came from a small mill town. Most people didn't have much money, but they had pride. Their kids came to school clean and fed. Very few on free lunch.
Today, after decades of learned dependency, we have a much higher percentage of parents who don't feed their own kids. Who will in fact steal food from their kids to sell for drugs. That's the group of parents who go nuts when the free stuff is cut off; and who are represented by all sorts of social "help" groups who just keep enabling their dependency.
Add in the taxpayers who are not only paying for their own kid's meals, but paying the taxes for all the "free" stuff. They reach the point of "I'm paying for it, so I might as well get some back."
Don't know about everywhere, but around here, schools get money for butts in seats. And more money for every special program including free meals during school, and during school breaks too. Wonder why education costs so much per pupil? Well, it's not all going into teacher's salaries. It's going into the extras.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
