Dalene Bowden, School Cafeteria Worker, Fired After Giving Hungry Student Free Lunch

NBC News ^ | December 23, 2015 | Elizabeth Chuck

[IDontLikeToPayTaxes]

Now to sounds like a heartless Scrooge....

In food service operations, food accountability is a big deal, especially in the government. I've had the additional duty of "Dining Facility Officer" twice during my Army career. The Army treats mishandling food as seriously as mishandling classified information. People go to jail over this kind of thing.

This lady works in a government organization's food service operation. I'm sure the food accountability standards are just as high as in the Army.

There's no doubt this lady knew that giving away free food was a big "no no." That kid wasn't going to freaking starve to death.

[Fundamentally Fair]

A school cafeteria worker in Idaho says she was fired after giving a hungry middle school student a free lunch.

Not possible. There's no such thing.

So, there's more to the story.

[BfloGuy]

She exercised adult good judgement. I’m sure she sleeps well at night.

She should have put $1.70 in the till out of her own pocket, Even though it's a government program and the amount is minuscule, it's still theft.

[HotHunt]

With that snarky comment, you should switch jobs to a middle school cafeteria so you can continue to practice your Scrooge persona.

The article said the employee offered to pay the $1.70 but the supervisor suspended her instead and the district fired her. Are there no mature adults in schools who can use reasoned judgment anymore? They all seem to be ridged, robot-like fascists sometimes.

After overwhelming outrage from the community, the school offered her her job back to save face. The tables turned on them and their decision and they ended up looking like the ogres in this situation.

I stand by original comment. Merry Christmas to you too!

[cincinnati65]

I think you need to re-read the source of your namesake.

[Lizavetta]

Or was just trying to scam a lunch. We really don't know what the truth is here .. I know better than to trust these initial versions because different facts tend to come out later. And if the lady wanted to feed this girl, why didn't she BUY the lunch?

Don't get me wrong. Firing her was overkill on steroids. But the food isn't hers to give away.

[Fundamentally Fair]

It seems like items in italics aren't showing up. Test Italics

[Busko]

Only in America. Hungry Kids Matter!!!

[Cen-Tejas]

I appreciate your view but a hungry child is the penultimate abomination to me and I don’t care what mountain has to be moved to get the child something to eat.

YES!!!! ......the food was not the school employees to give but that is an ancillary issue!

Getting food to the little girl Trumps EVERYTHING!

Firing the woman was so many stupid adjectives I’m not going to waste my time!

[JayGalt]

I don’t think Galt had kids in mind.

[JayGalt]

Think about the children who lived in Galt’s Gulch, from Atlas Shrugged:
The recaptured sense of her [Dagny’s] own childhood kept coming back to her whenever she met the two sons of the young woman who owned the bakery shop. . . . They did not have the look she had seen in the children of the outer world—a look of fear, half- secretive, half-sneering, the look of a child’s defense against an adult, the look of a being in the process of discovering that he is hearing lies and of learning to feel hatred. The two boys had the open, joyous, friendly confidence of kittens who do not expect to get hurt, they had an innocently natural, non-boastful sense of their own value and as innocent a trust in any stranger’s ability to recognize it, they had the eager curiosity that would venture anywhere with the certainty that life held nothing unworthy of or closed to discovery, and they looked as if, should they encounter malevolence, they would reject it contemptuously, not as dangerous, but as stupid, they would not accept it in bruised resignation as the law of existence. p. 730 (Paperback 35th Anniversary edition)

A much more joyous embrace of life’s possibilities than the dour Calvinistic views some are espousing.

[mountn man]

I am sorry, as much money as I pay in taxes for the government to piss away, I am sure that $1.70 is not going to break the bank.

Thank God there are people out there who have a conscience and compassion for those in need.

I hope that you never find yourself in need. Scrooge would be proud of you.

Sorry for the rant however until you have walked in anothers shoes you do not know.

I have been on both sides of giving and need.

And while you feel that your taxes are quite sufficient and that $1.70 is fine for someone else to give away, I prefer that MY GENEROSITY
comes from MY POCKET. (beyond what I give in taxes)

So while your tapping yourselves on the back for your SUPPOSED generosity, and kicking me in my balls for supposed lack thereof, their are those of us who are generous WITH OUR OWN CASH.
And with more than $1.70

Liberals seem to assume that, if you don't believe in their particular political solutions, then you don't really care about the people that they claim to want to help.

Thomas Sowell

Don't know what you guys are doing here at this site.
DU is for pompous, self righteous liberals, who are quick to give away others money or expect government to do things so they don't have to and then feel good about what THEY did.

[JayGalt]

No body gave away money, just left over food that was going to thrown out.

[mountn man]

Liberals like you always TWIST the truth.

It wasn't food that was going to get thrown out. It was for sale.

IF it doesn't sell, THEN maybe it gets thrown own.

But it seems this woman has been warned in the past about giving stuff away. This wasn't a one off.

Secondly, there are cold lunches the school has, for just such occasions. Granted, maybe it's not a hot dog or hamburger, but a cheese sandwich and carrot sticks would have insured that the student wouldn't have gone hungry.

Thirdly, it seems that the school district has an $11 lunch program that the kids can buy food with. When the child gets to $11, the parents are notified. Seems the child had enough money in this account to pay for the hot lunch (so she really wasn't penniless).

So, the bottom line is that the child had enough money in the schools lunch account and EVEN IF they didn't, the school had cold lunch cheese sandwiches, for just such events, so that a student WOULD NEVER go hungry.

This woman, who had been warned in the past for giving away stuff, decided to take it upon herself to give away a hot lunch instead of a cold lunch. There was never any threat of the child going hungry that day.

As a kid, there were many times I was sent to school with a cheese sandwich. Didn't hurt me.

[JayGalt]

I prefer to keep the discourse civil. We may agree better on another issue. Liberal is a dirty word and doesn’t really fit the circumstances you are using it in. Merry Christmas to you and yours.

[Hot Tabasco]

For even when we were with you, we used to give you this order: if anyone is not willing to work, then he is not to eat, either."

Then let the child starve........Got it!

[William Tell]

JayGalt said: "No body gave away money, just left over food that was going to thrown out."

How many hungry students should the employee be authorized to feed for free? One? Ten? One hundred? How many each day?

Do you really believe that there should be no limit?

If not, then tell us how you will choose which hungry children to starve?

[Hot Tabasco]

Actually it was Socialist compassion, using someone else's money to buy the kid lunch.

Since everyone here is ragging on the lady for providing a free lunch to the child without paying for it out of her own pocket, then y'all obviously don't have a problem with the child not receiving any lunch............Got it!

[mountn man]

There was never any threat of the child or number of children starving.

The school had cold lunch cheese sandwiches for just such a need.

The woman took it upon herself to give away a hot lunch vs giving away a cold lunch.
Just an FYI.

I agree with you on your points.

[mountn man]

Since everyone here is ragging on the lady for providing a free lunch to the child without paying for it out of her own pocket, then y'all obviously don't have a problem with the child not receiving any lunch............Got it!

See post 59