‘Angel fund’ to pay for lunches

Amanda Gold started paying for the meals of strangers’ children after an incident at her daughter Kylie’s elementary school in Cherokee County.

“She told me her best friend’s hot lunch had been taken from her and thrown away and she was given a sack lunch instead, because her account had no money in it,” Gold said of the incident at Indian Knoll Elementary School. “My daughter said it’s not just this child; there are a lot of kids who’ve had their hot lunches taken away.”

A Cherokee County School District spokeswoman confirmed it has a policy that if a student falls two lunch payments behind, at $2.35 per meal, the hot lunch can be replaced with a cheese sandwich and a choice of fruit or vegetable and milk or juice until the account is made current again.

“Occasionally there are families whose parents, despite getting a letter that they’ve run up a balance, keep running up the balance,” spokeswoman Barbara Jacoby said. “At a certain point, a child doesn’t have a choice of lunch.”

Gold, of Holly Springs, contends that giving a child something different over a money issue singles out the student for ridicule.

She learned her daughter’s school had $79 in lunch fees owed. “I asked if I could pay off the negative balances so children could get hot lunches again, and they said, sure. But I realized that was only a temporary solution.”

So, Gold and her husband Jonathan in May started a GoFundMe “angel fund” campaign to pay off all the school lunch arrearages in the Cherokee County public schools. As of June 7, 42 people had contributed $1,020 toward a goal of $5,000 — almost enough to pay off half the $2,200 in total unpaid lunch fees systemwide.

It’s one of several similar fundraisers across the country. Other campaigns call the practice of taking away a child’s hot lunch for nonpayment, and substituting a cold sack lunch, “lunch shaming” or “the Cheese Sandwich Stigma.”

In fairness to Cherokee schools, it should be noted the district already offers free or reducedprice (40 cent) hot lunches to children of financially stressed families that sign up for the USDA program. About 30 percent of the district’s 42,000 students are enrolled.

“Whenever we recognize there might be an issue with a family, we say please, if you haven’t already done so, fill out the paperwork,” Jacoby said. As for Amanda Gold’s campaign, “We appreciate she’s doing it, but it’s not something we’re doing with her. This is her independent project.”

“Kids go to school to learn. They shouldn’t have to be humiliated,” Gold said. “A child doesn’t have control over how much their parents make, and that shouldn’t be a concern for them.”

David Ibata is a journalist with more than 25 years’ experience covering the news in Atlanta and Chicago. Contact him at: davidbata2015@gmail.com