Free Lunch is over
- Thread starter SamSpade
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Clem72
Well-Known Member
To clarify, the free lunch for everyone paid for with the federal pandemic funding is over. Still have the normal free lunch programs for those in need.
SamSpade
Well-Known Member
Is THAT what paid for it? I just assumed they had unused funds from all those Zoom days when kids were eating at home.
Okay, I was gonna say....
A blue state like MD isn't going to completely eliminate their free lunch program.
NorthBeachPerso
Honorary SMIB
A lot of school systems kept their meal programs going on a "pick up at the school" model. Others had bus drivers deliver them to the bus stops. Some did both.
The meals program gets a lot of grief from some of you, some justified, but the reality is that there are countless kids, even in the GS and contractor driven Nirvana that is Southern Maryland today, whose parents are unable to organize themselves well enough to pour a bowl of cereal for their kids let alone prepare a real meal for them.
That inability is not, by the way, limited to one or another demographic or income group.
SamSpade
Well-Known Member
??? There are many such programs across the country, where the two squares the kids get at school are sometimes the two meals a day they're certain to have. And I'd be willing to bet the poor in red southern states get them also.
awpitt
Main Streeter
The F.A.R.M. program is Federal and available in all 50 states, "blue" and "red".
My point was that especially a blue state wouldn't eliminate the free/reduced lunch program. It was actually a semi compliment, definitely not a knock on them (for a change). I have said numerous times that I'm all for feeding kids and will happily kick in for that; it's the greasing of bureaucratic palms with what's supposed to be food money that I object to.
Clem72
Well-Known Member
Really? I don't remember anyone complaining about free/subsidised lunch programs. I think we all understand that children need to eat and parents often drop the ball.
SamSpade
Well-Known Member
There's a part of me that just - I hate that what I pay for, for lunch, and what they GET for lunch, are so out of line. I pay almost as much for their food in a month at home, as I do feeding them at school. And that includes breakfast, dinner, weekends and everything else they eat. But WE give them FOOD, and school feeds them slop.
Yep, the gripe is the lack of accountability when spending the money we give them to feed kids, not to mention educate them.
kwillia
n/a
Kids aren’t allowed to bring lunches from home anymore?
LightRoasted
If I may ...
For your consideration ...
That is soooo like yesterday. No kid today would be caught bringing lunch to school. Plus, I don't think parents know how to make lunches anymore or how to make sandwiches.
NorthBeachPerso
Honorary SMIB
Look around.
SamSpade
Well-Known Member
Oh they CAN. Actually, my youngest probably WOULD want that, because she likes a lot of our leftovers. My son would eat both, and throw away half of each. What annoys me is, they sell snacks out of the same account, and the ONLY MEANS of stopping my son from ordering two lunches or buying lots of junk - is my pledge to whup his ass if he tries it.
Packed lunches come and go in popularity. Once "all the kids" are doing it, some rebel will do the opposite. Then "all the kids" will do that too. Play on repeat.
According to my co-worker's 7th grader, school lunches are out and packing a lunch is in. They were in a rush so she gave him a few bucks to buy lunch, and he griped and moaned about it.
Send him to school with a bologna and cheese, with mayo sandwich in a brown bag a few times.
My grade school lunches were either the above or PB&J.
Can’t blame them there. I can remember complaining about lunch when I was a kid and it was worlds better than the crap they serve these days.