CLEARFIELD – At Monday night’s regular meeting, the Clearfield school board approved eliminating a single paragraph in its elementary cafeteria policy, found in the student handbook, due to belief that it “singled out” students in the breakfast and lunch line.
The board had initiated its vote on the buildings, finance and activities committee report. When called upon for her vote, board member Gail Ralston asked if it was too late for discussion on an agenda item related to the student handbooks.
Board members then agreed to rescind the motion to approve the committee report in order for Ralston to engage them in discussion and to seek answers to questions on the district’s cafeteria policy in the student handbooks.
On page 21 of the junior-senior high school handbook, she said when a student’s account reaches a negative balance, students are to be notified and handed an envelope for payment remittance in the breakfast or lunch line.
“To me, it means singled out from the rest of the children,” Ralston said. She spoke of being told the district makes phone calls, sends letters home, etc., about students’ negative cafeteria balances and sometimes this is the “last resort.”
According to her, the district has a school-wide positive behavior program and anti-bullying policies. She felt there were other ways to handle what she described as being an “adult problem” than embarrassing a child.
“… We do have the ability to allow our children in the breakfast and lunch line to not be harassed by an unpaid bill that’s not even their responsibility,” Ralston said, adding this cafeteria policy appeared in both the junior-senior high and elementary student handbooks.
Jeff Kavelak, director of food services, explained it was procedure for the district to contact parents by phone and written notice when there is a negative balance. When children come through, especially at the junior-senior high, most are aware of their balance, ask about it, and if it’s low or negative, they are given an envelope as a “reminder more than anything.”
Board President Mary Anne Jackson said they wanted to do two things, which were to maintain a balanced budget and to allow every child to have a meal. “So how do we do that without embarrassing the child?” she asked.
Kavelak said student meal money collection wasn’t just a problem for Clearfield schools, but also for numerous school districts. It’s a problem, he said, that continues to be pushed back for the local level to deal with.
According to him, federal law says the district cannot refuse meals to students in kindergarten through grade three due to a negative balance. However, a charge will continue to accrue throughout the school year.
He said the district can begin to refuse meals for grades four and up if a reduced or full price student’s negative balance reaches a certain threshold.
He pointed out that the district policy doesn’t refuse a meal if the negative balances go unsettled but instead offers an alternative lunch of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, apple and milk. “Is it embarrassing for some? Yes,” he said. “Some just come in and automatically grab the alternative lunch.”
Kavelak said the district has been in the process of updating its policies, and he’s open to any suggestions and resolutions to the meal money collection problem. He noted this wasn’t an easy task for his cafeteria staff to deal with.
Putt asked if it was possible to just eliminate that part of the policy, and Kavelak thought so. He said envelopes are at each cafeteria station, can remain available for the students and they don’t necessarily have to continue with the practice of handing them out.
Jackson asked Kavelak if he has received payments from distributing envelopes, and he said quite often. However, he couldn’t say which are due to his staff sending them out or from being picked up by students in the meal line.
Junior-Senior High School Principal Tim Janocko said he didn’t like this part of the cafeteria policy, as well. He suggested that a student list and the envelopes be provided to the school office for its staff to discreetly distribute to students.
Jackson said she didn’t think board members wanted the child involved at all. “But at least it would be discreet,” Janocko said. “… It wouldn’t be in front of anyone.” Jackson asked if the district’s new computer system would permit the cafeteria staff to correspond with parents.
Superintendent Terry Struble said for that, the district would have to be able to export the balances and create a list to contact homes. Calls are already being made to the ones who are “most critical,” he explained, and Kavelak pointed out students’ cafeteria balances change daily as does those with negative balances.
Morgan asked if students who have negative balances are possibly ones who should be on the free and reduced lunch list but aren’t. Kavelak said that was the case for some who haven’t completed the necessary paperwork, and they can accrue a debt of close to $600 in a year.
When asked, Kavelak said parents do have the option of paying for students’ meals through a MySchoolBucks program with a debit or credit card, and this has a fee attached to it. They can also view students’ school meal transactions and set up to receive e-mail alerts when the account reaches a certain balance.
He said parents are using the program, and the cafeteria is seeing more money come in through MySchoolBucks each year.
Ralston said she felt if the district could get parents to complete paperwork for free or reduced school meals it could help with making a dent. She also felt perhaps the district needed a “home visitor” of some sort, but Putt felt that would “create real problems.”
Ralston also inquired about the district contacting Magisterial District Judge Richard Ireland and exploring that as an avenue for collecting students’ unpaid cafeteria balances.
After listening to the discussion, Struble said in grades seven through twelve, students create their own deficits with the ala carte purchases they make. “You know, parents put an amount of dollars into the account, and kids buy not only lunch, but $2-$3 of whatever else,” he said.
“If we entrust them to be able to make decisions about what they’re buying, then giving them an envelope to say, ‘hey you’re low today’ and to re-fill your account, to me is a no-brainer.”
At the elementary level, he said they do not have an ala carte menu, and it’s truly about buying their meals. He said parents are being contacted by phone and letter and they may even send home the free and reduced lunch forms and say “hey, you may qualify for this.”
Struble said the district cannot make that determination unless parents complete the free or reduced lunch form. He continued, saying: “We don’t know the situations that the different families are operating through, but to some point to give an envelope, I don’t think it’s that traumatizing to any child … because it could be given to anybody’s child.”
Struble pointed out some parents won’t complete the paperwork for free and reduced meals due to pride or incompetency. He didn’t see a point of taking unpaid meal cases to the magistrate to try to get money out of people when it probably doesn’t even exist in the first place.
“We’re going to take the envelope away from the child because that’s embarrassing,” Struble said. “But then, their parents are going to show up in the police blotter because they didn’t pay their lunch fees. To me, that’s more embarrassing to the child than being handed an envelope.”
According to him, members of the district’s staff work hard to recoup the money to the extent they have to ask if it’s worth the money being spent in doing so. He said he didn’t know the right answer, but he’s never had a parent call and say their child was traumatized by being handed an envelope in the lunch line.
“In seven through twelve, if they have negative balances, chances are they are eating an extra cheeseburger,” Struble said. “They should learn a little financial well-being … if you eat it, you got to pay for it, and there’s a process for that.”
He said if they went with the suggestion from Janocko, students will still be asked by their classmates about why they were called down to the office. No matter how discreetly it’s done, he said it’s difficult to take the child completely out of it.
Struble said at least if an envelope is sent home with a child, it may at least have a chance of getting to the parents. When Ralston asked if it would be more effective to use technology, Struble said some parents block the school’s phone calls and do not accept registered mail. “They might pay attention to something out of their kid’s backpack though,” he said.
Elementary Assistant Principal Andrew Brickley said he isn’t aware of students being emotionally affected by a cafeteria balance envelope. But in eight years, he said he could count on one hand the number of elementary students who have appeared emotionally affected by the alternative lunch. He said for most part, students are just as happy with the bagged lunch as they are a hot dog or pizza.
Brickley said he’s never had anyone complain to him about it. If someone has gone to another administrator or board member, he said he wasn’t made aware of it. Ralston said she’s had several people approach her about this issue.
Morgan asked if negative balances can stay with a student through graduation, and Kavelak said they can but they try to address it well before that. In speaking with parents, Kavelak said some have indicated they pay other bills first because there isn’t any interest charged for the school meal debt.
Ralston said she had a problem with the district labeling the student as their “last resort.” Board member Phil Carr concurred with her so far as the elementary level, but he felt the junior-senior high students were “old enough to take some responsibility.”
Carr suggested that the district eliminate the part of the cafeteria policy involving handing out cafeteria balance envelopes at the elementary level when there’s a negative balance, which Ralston called a “step in the right direction.” The board subsequently voted and approved to do so.