Facebook post about hungry child gets school bus driver fired

[The Straight Story]

Let's role play.

You're a school bus driver at Haralson County Middle School in Georgia. A 6th-grader gets on your bus and complains he's hungry.

You ask him why he's hungry. The kid says he was 40 cents short on his lunch card, so he was denied food.

When this scenario played out for bus driver Johnny Cook, he took to his Facebook page to express his shock and offer to help any child who is short of lunch money.

However, as CBS Atlanta reports, the school wasn't too pleased with this expression of concern. Cook told CBS Atlanta:

Had it on my mind and had it on my heart and simply made the Facebook post that said that, 'Mr. Johnny I'm hungry,' and told the story exactly like it was. I posted my phone number and said 'the next time we have a kid at the register for 40 cent and we can't feed him, please call me. I'll scrape up the money.' About 200 people liked it, loved it, did all the things that Facebook does and it just caught fire

You might imagine that the school called him in for a chat, to help identify the child and analyze the problem.

Almost.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-57587850-71/facebook-post-about-hungry-child-gets-school-bus-driver-fired/

[proud2BlibKansan]

1. I'm calling BS on this one.

Schools are required to feed kids. When they don't have money, schools are required to give them a sandwich. Used to be peanut butter, now it's cheese, because of the peanut allergy problems.

This is a USDA requirement. They fund the meal programs.

[KittyWampus]

3. Many DU'ers have debunked this over years > families who sign up for lunch cards and the $ runs out

on the card are warned repeatedly well before it gets to the point they refuse the kid lunch.

No one is ever refused lunch on short notice.

These stories happen because some kids' parents just don't bother to do what is necessary even after multiple attempts by schools to get the parents to do what is required.

[proud2BlibKansan]

8. Yes, there's that too.

There are also teachers in every school who keep food on hand for kids who don't eat lunch or breakfast, for whatever reason. Many of us feed a handful of kids all the time.

[The Straight Story]

4. From the FB posting

" this past weekend I had teenagers tell me that if they owed money they would get their tray taken and it would get thrown away right there in front of them. Not to mention if you had late lunch you might get a sandwich our whatever is left. Now how is it right for that food to get thrown away snd a child go hungry? Backing you! God bless you."

More details here:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10200267483994470&set=a.3981342016672.2144970.1374337383&type=1

Also, let's say you are right, the kid and his family are liars - why fire the bus driver?

[proud2BlibKansan]

7. I agree the driver shouldn't have been fired.

I signed a petition demanding he get his job back.

The reason they throw the food away is health dept regs. Once the tray is touched, it can't be offered to anyone else. And the set up in most cafeterias is the kids get their trays and THEN pay or check in. So by the time the cafeteria workers see that the student owes money, they've already been given the food. My friends who work in restaurants tell me the same rule applies there. Once a customer touches a plate, no one else can be offered that food.

I think it's a stupid practice all together but the local health dept, the school district and the feds are all involved, creating a mix of ridiculous and sometimes conflicting regulations.

But the kid HAD TO HAVE been offered food. That's the law. And yes, the school district, the health dept and the feds inspect the cafeterias frequently - that's been the case in every public school where I have worked. I'm sorry this bus driver didn't know that one phone call to the right agency would have solved this problem and he wouldn't have lost his job.

[KansDem]

5. Agree with you, proud2BlibKansas, however...

There was this story posted by UnrepentantLiberal from April...

Worker suspended after Mass. students are denied lunch because they were behind in pay

Source: AP

ATTLEBORO, Massachusetts —School officials say as many as 25 students at a Massachusetts school were denied lunch this week because they either could not pay or their pre-paid accounts did not contain enough money.

Outraged parents say some students at Coelho Middle School in Attleboro cried when they were told by a worker they could not eat on Tuesday.

Superintendent Pia Durkin tells The Sun Chronicle that a worker for the contractor that provides lunch service at city schools has been suspended. She has also scheduled a meeting with officials at the company, Whitson's.

Meanwhile, workers have been told not to deny any child a meal.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014444191

Let's hope these are isolated events...

[proud2BlibKansan]

9. Ah the joys of privatization.

"the contractor that provides lunch service"

[justiceischeap]

12. The story may well be BS but...

your argument that the schools are required to give a free lunch doesn't mean all schools do that or that this school did that in this case.

[proud2BlibKansan]

14. Let's look at this logically.

If the school DID refuse to feed this child, they can lose their federal funding. And no school can afford to offer a meals program without federal dollars. Plus, people would lose their jobs.

On the other hand, what are the consequences for the kid who claims he was not fed? I'll bet my paycheck on that kid being fed daily from now on, even if he does owe money.

I'm not going to claim this never happens. But I don't believe it's a widespread or frequent occurrence. And it sure makes a great story.

[ForgoTheConsequence]

2. Isn't it illegal to deny kids lunch?

I know at my school if you didn't have money you were given a sack lunch. Maybe the school is upset that they've been outed for breaking the law?

[southernyankeebelle]

6. No kid should be hungry.

[LeftofObama]

10. I know I'm going to catch hell for this, but here goes...

No child should EVER be denied food EVER! I don't care if his/her parents never paid a cent from K-12. No child goes hungry EVER!

[loli phabay]

11. though i agree with you, why should i pay for my kids and someone else who can pay does not

I am all for free dinners for kids that have families that cant pay but not for families that wont pay. On a couple of occasions my eldest has had to have the pb and j as he never told me he was running out even though he was told and he bought extras with out telling. So that was my fault, but the school still gave him a sandwich.

[proud2BlibKansan]

15. We need to fund our schools so EVERY kid is fed EVERY DAY

But if they stopped buying crappy processed food, they could probably afford to feed all the kids without an increase in funding.

[NiteOwll]

13. Not surprising at all

My daughter came home crying one day because they wouldn't let her have milk for lunch at school. She purchased hot lunch on a Wednesday, then bought milk on Thursday with her cold lunch, which depleted her account. She was then denied the 30 cent milk on Friday. Apparently, she had gotten a note on Tuesday that her account was low but it was mixed in with her papers and I never got it.

When I went to school to find out what happened, they gave me all kinds of excuses why it shouldn't have happened. Yet, it did...and in only a few days. They told me it wasn't their policy, but apparently someone in the lunch room thought otherwise. That was the first and only time her account had ever reached zero.

[CrispyQ]

16. How many martini lunches did the taxpayers buy for the fraudulent banksters in 2008?

There should be a hot breakfast & hot lunch program in all schools & they should be free.

Fuck our fucked up priorities.