As an elementary school lunchroom staffer, her job was to work the register for the children when they paid for their meals.
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A lunch lady in Pennsylvania is speaking out after a new school policy required her to swap a student’s hot lunch with a cheese sandwich earlier this month. “So Our Children are being served cheese, being charged and denied the hot food that we then throw away”.
Koltiska said that just because it’s a state issue and other schools have adopted the policy, that doesn’t mean it is right. “It’s sinful and shameful is what it is”.
She was so upset by the new policy, she quit just a few weeks into the new school year.
“What you don’t know is they are being given one piece of cheese on bread”.
A cafeteria employee for a Pennsylvanian elementary school quit her job after she was forced to take a hot lunch away from a child whose parents had fallen behind the $25 limit for school lunches.
She said one incident upset her so much, she resigned.
In a post on Facebook, the school said that staff were given training on how to implement the policy and parents were informed before the start of the school year. He told Action News 4 WTAE that the policy has cut down on the number of parents who don’t keep current on their lunch accounts, and that the policy does not target those who qualify for financial assistance.
Superintendent Matthew Daniels told KDKA that this is about collecting money owed and parents are notified of lunch balances every week.
While the Canon-McMillan School District policy doesn’t affect students in the federal lunch program, which provides low-income students with free or low-priced meals, school lunches remain a policy flash point at the federal level.
“After overdrawing the cafeteria account by twenty-five dollars ($25.00), students in grade K-6 will be able to charge an alternate lunch which will consist of a sandwich, a fruit/vegetable serving and milk”. “I had the same sick feeling”, she said.
“I’m not saying the parents shouldn’t be held accountable, but I think there has to be a better way than involving the children”, she said.
Since resigning, Koltiska said that she has received messages of support from inmates in a nearby prison who want to donate their food to the schoolchildren and a nun who told Koltiska that she started a revolution “with a cheese sandwich”.
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The former cafeteria worker says the policy was enforced on the very first week of school. “They’re suits at a board meeting”, she said.
