Superintendent: Schools following procedure on lunch charge cut-off date

School lunch in Springfield has been a topic of conversation on social media this past week, with residents claiming students have had to go without lunch, or had food thrown out.

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2016-05-17 / Front Page Superintendent: Schools following procedure on lunch charge cut-off date By Tory Jones Bonenfant toryb@eagletimes.com SPRINGFIELD — School lunch in Springfield has been a topic of conversation on social media this past week, with residents claiming students have had to go without lunch, or had food thrown out. That is not precisely the case, according to School Superintendent Zach McLaughlin. McLaughlin said on Monday, May 16 that he has received only one phone call with a complaint from a parent in regard to the district’s food service program, and one email that was related to that phone call. He was aware of the discussion around lunch rooms in Springfield, but “on social media, it’s an echo chamber,” McLaughlin said. McLaughlin said that on Monday May 9, with only 20 days remaining in the school year, the school district stopped allowing students to charge meals, to allow time to bring accounts up to date. This did not affect students who receive free and reduced lunches he said. Those full-paid lunch students who had money with them were allowed to buy lunch, he said, contradictory to what some people — including some who said they were parents of Springfield students — wrote in posts on a Springfield, Vermont public Facebook page. McLaughlin said that the district did something similar last year, notifying students that charges would no longer be allowed, but that it “didn’t do as good a job in communicating this year.” Some buildings did a “better job than others” of communicating that the cut-off date for charging lunch was coming, he said. At one elementary school, it was mentioned in both a flyer and a newsletter. At another school, the principal had personal dialogues with parents who were in arrears. At the middle and high school, posters went up to announce that after May 9, students could no longer charge lunches. “Perhaps that was the mistake,” and the schools should have communicated with multiple forms of media, McLaughlin said. The talk amongst community members about the perceived lack of communication has led to considerations about “the way communications go out and how much people can charge,” McLaughlin said. McLaughlin said he followed up with all building principals and the head of cafe services for the Springfield area and cannot confirm any stories of students’ food being thrown out. However, at Riverside Middle School, two or three students had to place their full lunch trays on top of a cooler at the end of the lunch line on May 9 and were not allowed to take their lunches to their tables to eat because they could not charge their lunches, McLaughlin said. So while that raises the question of if Springfield wants the school district to start paying the cost of all lunches, the “basic approach” is that full-paid students must pay for lunch, he said. Once outside the school year, “if you haven’t recouped it, you’re not going to recoup it,” he said. “Ethically, it’s a legitimate, interesting question,” he said. Legally, however, the schools are not required to provide free lunch to full-pay students, he said. Since the charge cutoff date of May 9, the district has recouped more than $4,000 in lunch fees, and four new families have applied for help with free or reduced lunches, McLaughlin said. McLaughlin sent out a document outlining the district’s school lunch procedures, a brief outline of events that occurred on May 9, and the lunch fund balance to the school board and local media. Families of students who owed more than $35 had been sent notices in October, November, December, February and April. By the end of February, the school lunch program had a negative balance of more than $23,000, he said. Jessica West, a Springfield School District employee who works in food services, posted her thoughts about the matter in a public, online post on the Springfield, Vermont Facebook page. “I know first hand how this situation was handled because I work at the high school,” West wrote on Wednesday in the post, which she gave permission to share. West said that any student with a negative balance receives a monthly notice throughout the school year. West said later that she stood by her words, and that some lunchroom employees are helping to foot the bill for students who cannot pay for lunches. “This needs attention. From both sides. We all seem to agree on a few things,” West said in an email on Thursday, May 12. “Kids should not go hungry. It's up to the parents to handle negative lunch bills or fill out required paperwork to receive help,” she said. “There is a kink in the lunch system that needs to be repaired. Offer the kid a cheese sandwich or a pbj (peanut butter and jelly sandwich). Offer something from the government commodities that are sent to the schools. There simply must be a way to feed our kids.” “It is up to the student to give the notice to the parents because the school refuses to send them via mail. Two weeks ago, the food service director sent out notices to each student who had a negative balance … Those notices said very clearly that there will be no charging lunches as of Monday, May 9,” she said. West also said that she was aware that, as of Tuesday, May 10, teachers were “stepping up and covering the kids” at the middle school and that she has also done so at the high school when it was brought to her attention. West said later in the email that she was “so glad” that people are talking about the school lunch situation. “Hunger is a very sad reality for Vermont children. We need to fill in the gaps somehow,” she said. Dana Jacobson-Goodhue is the principal at Elm Hill School, which serves about 300 children in grades K-2. Jacobson-Goodhue said on Thursday, May 12 that the school is following procedure, but that no child is being made to skip a meal. “At Elm Hill, no child goes hungry,” she said. Jacobson-Goodhue said the procedures are in the student handbook that the school does not permit charging. “The payment issue is always between adults,” she said, adding that it is “always bad for children to pay the consequences” when the school has to enforce procedure. “But at Elm Hill, we are still permitting families to charge if they need to,” she said, and sometimes that charge is paid for out of the principal’s discretionary fund. Other parents often pitch in to help that fund, too, making it a revolving fund of sorts, she said, but parents cannot yet track balances through an online portal. “It’s hard [for parents] to keep track,” said Jacobson-Goodhue. If the balance is more than $30 “in the red,” the parents are informed, she said. But the lunch fees are between the central office and the cafeteria, so the school tries to keep parents up to date by sending home a notification with students, she said. The principal said she hopes to see a new school district portal for balances up and running soon. Some people automatically qualify for free or reduced lunches, part of a federal program, and every student is sent home with a letter at the beginning of the school year explaining the program. “But we can’t force people to fill out that paperwork. What’s hard for us is identifying those people out there,” he said. In the next school year, a new software program called “Meal Time” will be in place that will allow parents to access a portal to track and view lunch account balances. That option may also be open to upper-grade high school students who want to take on the responsibility of overseeing the balance, he said. The Eagle Times reached out to other school principals and the school board for any input on the allegations. School Board Chair Ed Caron, Springfield High School Principal Bob Thibault and Union Street School Interim Principal Bindy Hathorn referred all questions to the school district superintendent.