14 DAY TRIAL // 25 students at a middle school in Massachusetts have been turned away at the school cafeteria over not having enough money on their lunch cards to pay for their meals.
According to Daily Mail, the incident took place at Coelho Middle School in Attleboro on Tuesday, April 2. Some even saw how the contents of their trays were tossed once reaching the registry, parents say.
11-year-old Victoria Greaves, an honor student, describes the cashier turning her away and throwing out the contents of her tray, leaving her hungry for the day.
As many other institutions do, Coelho Middle School uses a prepaid card system for the collection of lunch fees from their students.
Superintendent Pia Durkin notes that refusing to serve them is against school policy, in a written statement for The Sun Chronicle.
Durkin explains that they are bound by school district policy on the matter, which implies that the students are to get lunch even if their balance is overdue, unless district officials say otherwise.
However, they do alert aforementioned authorities when a student tries to use the card more than five times in a row while not having sufficient funds on their debit cards. Even so, the children are allowed to take away a cheese sandwich for lunch.
“The district communicates with the parents and, in the meantime, our staff has been instructed to provide an alternate lunch, such as a cheese sandwich entrée and the other components of a complete meal, including fruit, vegetable and milk,” Durkin says.
She details that the supervisor in charge of the cafeteria at the time has been suspended for mishandling the incident.
“When we learned of this incident Tuesday afternoon, we redirected our staff to provide a full meal (with no restrictions) to all children, regardless of outstanding meal balances, until the district has approved a formal policy, which will be clearly communicated to the school community,” Durkin adds.