Posted on 02/13/2010 4:14:42 PM PST by reaganaut1
TAKOMA PARK, Md. – As back-to-back snowstorms shuttered schools for the week across the mid-Atlantic states, parents fretted about lost learning time, administrators scheduled makeup days and teachers posted assignments online. But Marla Caplon worried about a more fundamental problem: How would students eat?
The two snowstorms that pummeled the region, leaving more than 3 feet of snow in some areas, deprived tens of thousands of children from Virginia to Pennsylvania of the free or reduced-price school lunch that may be their only nutritious meal of the day. The nonprofits that try to meet the need when school is not in session also closed their doors for much of the week, leaving many families looking at bare cupboards. And many parents working hourly jobs were unable to earn any money during the week, as the snow forced businesses to close.
Caplon is a food services supervisor for Montgomery County Public Schools, where about 43,000 children are eligible for free or reduced-price lunches. Some also get breakfast, dinner and bags of staple foods to take home for the weekend. The snow days meant children would get none of that until Tuesday, because schools are closed Monday for Presidents Day.
"We've been bothered by this all week," Caplon said.
So Caplon arranged for Manna Food Center, a local food bank whose board she chairs, to bring boxes of food Friday to two still-closed elementary schools. Officials used the school district's automated phone system to notify parents of the distribution.
At Rolling Terrace Elementary School, a stream of people walked up to a Manna truck in the school's bus bay Friday. They filled plastic shopping bags with cans of soup, vegetables and beans, ground beef and Rice Krispy Treats.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Exactly
and if things are as dire as presentd then take the kids away , put them in group homes and stop WIC food stamps and welfare payments to the parents.
The money saved from not sending the parents bennies could provide a good atmosphere for the kids with all the food th4ey need.
Good LORD, we give them breakfast lunch dinner snacks AND basic food stuffs.
who are these people?
Methinks it goes something like this. If you are a government that buys a lot of cheese, you are going to spend a lot of money storing it. That is unless you are ingenious enough to create food programs where you can unload it.
Shush, that’s why they want year-round school, dontchaknow?
Oh for Pete’s sake. Even animals know how to feed themselves. Unbelievable.
“You get what you pay for.”
And they get what you pay for as well...
Hell I was a poor kid. We had a garden and I worked in it.
The lunch rooms stay open in Mid Tenn during the summer. At least I know they do in Rutherford County. 18 or under is the only requirement.
If someone is so “poor” or stupid they can’t feed their kids twice a day the kid should be in foster care.
Complete bollocks.
In this Friday Jan. 12, 2010 photo, Mercedes Rodas, left, chooses cans of food that were being provided to people whose children are usually in the school lunch program at Rolling Terrace Elementary School in Takoma Park, Md., in the aftermath of back-to-back blizzards. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Words fail me.
I didn’t know that.
What do they do in the summer when school is out? What do they do over Christmas vacation? Do they mean that these kids literally have nothing to eat if school isn’t in session?
That is completely politically incorrect to say. But you have a good point. If a parent is so ill equiped to be a parent that they can’t/won’t feed their kids properly, why are they parents in the first place? Would their kids be better off in foster care than with neglectful parents?
I’m thinking these parents are just smart enough to understand that playing stupid is a good idea.
Reminds me of a “farmer” who lived across the road from me. He was too stupid to take care of his few animals so he relied on the charity of some of the other local farmers who couldn’t stand to see his animals suffer. I knew the man and stupid is the last thing he was.
I’ve heard for months a commercial on the radio that supposedly 60% of kids are “in danger of going hungry over the weekend” so the group sends food home.
Frankly I think that’s a lie, and this story is as well.
Many of the kids eating free lunch live in middle-class homes with new cars in the garage.
Either that or tell the kids to put down the XBOX or the Playstation, get off your ass and get out here and eat dinner, now!
Donner pass intermediate school district.
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