LOCAL

Grand Ledge schools revisit lunch policy after mom says staff took food from student

Rachel Greco
Lansing State Journal

GRAND LEDGE - Grand Ledge school officials will revisit the district's lunch policy after the mother of an eighth grader said an employee at Hayes Middle School removed food from her daughter's lunch tray this week, told her she didn't have enough money to pay for it and sent her to the office.

Heather Batson said her 13-year-old daughter had a balance of $2.70 Tuesday when she took her lunch selections — a piece of pizza, cookie and bottle of water — up to a lunch room cashier. Batson said the cashier took each item off her daughter's tray and sent her to the school office.

"She just said, 'You don't have enough money to pay for this,'" Batson said.

At the office, Batson's daughter called her mother. She told Batson school staff made her sign a slip that read "Student Government Lunch."

Heather Batson said lunch staff at Grand Ledge's Hayes Middle School took her 13-year-old daughter's lunch away from her, told her she didn't have enough money to pay for it and sent to the school's office at lunch Tuesday, Nov. 19, where she was given this slip.

Batson said her daughter took the slip back to the school's lunch room, collected a lunch and took the slip to the cashier.

Her daughter told her the employee replied, "Oh, we're funding this now." 

Batson said her daughter left the lunch room embarrassed without eating anything.

Grand Ledge Public Schools Spokesperson John Ellsworth said the school district doesn't deny students lunch, but the incident has prompted staff to revisit its lunch policy and to make temporary changes that will prevent staff from removing food items from any student's tray. 

A 'humiliating' experience

Batson said she wasn't aware their daughter's lunch account was low on Tuesday. Three of her children attend school in Grand Ledge, and this is the first time she's ever had an issue with the district's lunch policy, she said.

The public exchange with a cashier in a crowded cafeteria humiliated her daughter, Batson said

"She left the cafeteria in tears and was made fun of the rest of the day," she said. 

The next day Batson's daughter took a sack lunch to school, too anxious to go back to the hot lunch line, and Batson reached out to school administrators.

There are better ways to address students who don't have enough money in their lunch account, she told them.

"Kids cannot be held accountable for what their parents have or don't have," Batson said. 

By Wednesday afternoon, she'd been reassured that school employees wouldn't deny food items to students.

Parents are notified automatically, via email, text or phone call, when their child's lunch account reaches a negative balance, Ellsworth said.

He said staff were "not as sensitive," as they should have been when communicating with Batson's daughter.

The slip office staff made her sign was "an artifact from an old effort by student council to help students that could not afford lunches," Ellsworth said in an email. 

Students with a deficit in their lunch account have been allowed a standard lunch, Ellsworth said, but not additional items.

It has been standard practice to apply an additional charge for "ala carte" items that aren't part of the school's $2.75 standard hot lunch, he said

Now school officials are revisiting that practice, he said.

For now a temporary policy has been put in place dictating that no food item will be removed from a student's lunch tray, Ellsworth said. Staff will simply add the cost of the lunch items to the child's lunch account charges.

Making policy changes

Approximately 28% of Grand Ledge students receive free or reduced-price lunches, Ellsworth said, and, district wide, families owe a total of nearly $6,000 in lunch debt.

"We want kids to be fed, and that's our first priority, but we have to work out the financial side of things," Ellsworth said.

Batson said she understands the school district's policy but disagrees with how staff communicated with her daughter.

She is happy with how they're addressing her concerns now, she said. 

"These kids should all be treated the same," Batson said. "No one should know whether or not these kids can afford their lunch."

Ellsworth said school officials will begin to address making permanent lunch policy changes in the next few weeks.

"This incident has prompted us to reflect on what our policies should be going forward," he said.

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Contact Rachel Greco at rgreco@lsj.com. Follow her on Twitter @GrecoatLSJ.

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