Utah Lunch by Addison Jordan

Summary: Multiple children at an elementary school in Utah had their lunch trays taken from them before they could take a bite this week. At Uintah Elementary School lunches were taken because some students had negative balances in the accounts used to pay for lunches. Instead of the full lunch, they only received fruit and milk.

             "We don't ever let kids go without any food entirely," said Salt Lake City School District spokesman Jason Olsen. Erica Lukes, a concerned mother, said she was “blindsided” when her fifth grade daughter came home and told her what a school district official had said to her: "You don't have any money in your account, so you can't get lunch."  This brought some of the children to tears.

            The administration claimed that notifications were sent out to the parents earlier in the week, but some parents say they never received them.  "Even if they did try to send the word out, you still don't do that to a child," said Lukes. "You don't take a lunch out of their hands."

            “This situation could have and should have been handled in a different manner.  They admitted that a mistake was made. The Salt Lake City School District posted on their Facebook page “We apologize". 

Analysis: Its sad to hear that the school officials took the lunch away from the innocent children who had nothing to do with the lack of funds in their accounts. They definitely should have handled this situation in a different way. They should have taken it up with parents instead of taking lunch from the children.  Maybe now they will put notifications in place before accounts get to low, not waiting until they are empty.  Hopefully, they learned from this mistake and will never allow it to happen again.

Link: http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/30/us/utah-school-lunches-snatched/index.html?hpt=us_c2