No.
MADISON, Wis. – A state lawmaker says his new proposal aims to cut down on what’s being called “lunch shaming.”
Rep. Gary Tauchen introduced a bipartisan bill that would require schools to provide a school lunch or breakfast to a student who requests a meal and would prohibit schools from taking certain actions against students who are unable to pay for meals.
“If you’re hungry, you’re just not in the mood to learn. You’re just wondering where your next meal is coming from,” said Tauchen, a Republican from Bonduel.
Lunch shaming is a practice making news around the country, where there have been instances of schools taking away lunch trays from students or providing them with less nutritious alternative meals if their meal accounts have negative balance.
1. This is not a state issue
2. It is the responsibility of parents or guardians to make sure their kids are fed. There are abundant government programs and charities to help them if they can’t afford it. All this will do is encourage more deadbeats because there won’t be any consequences for not paying.
3. Perhaps if a kid felt a little shame for eating on their neighbor’s dime, they might use that shame to better themselves so that they don’t have to accept handouts to feed their own kids. Shame is a powerful motivator for successful people.
Tauchen is the ultimate Rino. Hopefully his voters will figure that out and dump him in the next election.
As with every issue, there’s the edge case.
Would you prefer to let the kid go hungry because his parents failed?
Why not just sign the kids up for the existing assistance programs? Because there might be eligibility criteria actually intended to prevent the scammers from wasting funds already devoted to the truly needy? It’s not like we haven’t seen this scenario a million times before.
Merlin, we were talking about children who didn’t bring a lunch, not WEDC handouts to companies that didn’t really create jobs.
“Would you prefer to let the kid go hungry because his parents failed?”
That’s such a bogus comment.
Most districts would give the kid cold lunch.
But to qualify for free or reduced lunch and breakfast, you can be close to middle class to get the meals, so, the ones not getting the free meals are not exactly poor.
And the one’s who don’t qualify can bring food from home.
It’s not bogus. Imagine you’re in the lunch room and there’s a kid without a lunch. What would you do? What policy would you like to see in place?
WWJD? We don’t feed the hungry because they’re worthy. We feed them because they’re hungry.
Owen sez: “All this will do is encourage more deadbeats…”
Deadbeats are always deadbeats. No encouragement needed.
Where the so-called “controversy” began…
“Officials on Wednesday said that there are 1,653 families with outstanding lunch debts, putting Warwick schools $77,000 in the red.
“The problem is all the people, even after receiving certified letters, have not contacted us and have not made any arrangements,” Bachus said. “It’s like this doesn’t exist.”
Bachus noted 72 percent of the students who owe money are not part of the free or reduced lunch program.“
Warwick RI student population: 9142
jjf: Timothy 5:8 English Standard Version (ESV)
8 But if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.
Mar, just repeat that verse to them, and ignore the rest of the message of the New Testament, and I imagine you’ll be just fine.
School year is about 175 days. Who feeds these deprived children lunch the other 190 days?
Careful, Mark, you might be getting closer to understanding other people’s situations.
John Faust, I have quite the understanding of people’s situations. Long time ago, but 5 years as a County Social Worker, which entailed helping elderly & disabled people navigate through helping programs like Social Security, SSI, Veteran’s Benefits, Title 19 Medicaid, Food Stamps. After that I spent 20 years administering HUD rent assisted housing. A major task was determining eligibility based on income & making sure that people who might be eligible for things like SSI, Medicaid, Veteran’s Benefits, Food Stamps, etc. be encouraged to check their eligibility. Because our population was elderly and disabled, did not have to know too much about AFDC or W-2 programs. Part of my tasks also consisted of cofacilitating a local committee made up of representatives from the local Veteran’s Service Office, Social Security Administration, Aging Services, Mental Health Services, Social Services, Food Pantry, United Way, Homeless program, Volunteer Center, and various other local agencies that interacted with low income residents. Only entity never represented was the school district.
So, although it has been over 15 years since I left those jobs, I still have enough knowledge to know that there are programs to help – this legislation seems like a lot of overkill for what amounts to be a behavioral/responsibility issue. Parents & kids. Like parents who just don’t bother to apply for programs or send money with the kids. Like the kids who don’t convey to the parents that their prepaid balance is low or were given cash for lunch, and spent it on something else.
Families that are on Food Share or W-2 are automatically eligible for free lunch, as are foster children, Head Start participants, Homeless & Runaway students. A family of 2 with an incomeless than $30,451 are eligible for Free or Reduced lunches. The Reduced lunch cost is $.40 To help you in your calculations, John, the cost of the Free Lunch is $.00
>Careful, Mark, you might be getting closer to understanding other people’s situations.
Typical liberal. Cant live in a world where someone that is not as “enlightened” as they could possibly understand and empathize with downtrodden or unfortunate. Elitism because no one can understand suffering as well as a liberal.
jjf, I understand other people’s situations. I used to teach before education was ruined by liberals and RINOs like Obama and Bush 2. I’ve donated to pay for a kids lunch many times, but those kids had parents who could pay or at least send a sack lunch.
In my 20+ years of teaching I have never, ever seen a child go hungry in a lunch room. Unless, of course, they had to endure one of Michelle Obama inspired lunches.
So Mark, if you have that deep understanding of the troubles that some people face, the awful situations that kids are sometimes tossed into, then why would you wonder “who feeds them the other 180 days”, as if that was an answer to this issue?
Jason, I’m so elite I think you could still learn, as well as be more enlightened, or heavens to Betsy, even change your opinions.