- Students and/or their parents/guardians are allowed to pre-pay for breakfast or lunch.
- Students are allowed to charge regular breakfast and lunch meals.
- Students are not permitted to charge à la carte items (snacks, ice cream, second meals, drinks).
Account Balances, Refunds, & Transfers
- The district will work with students and their families to ensure that each child’s nutritional needs are met each day. No student who requests a meal will be denied.
- Students will not be served alternative meals or be asked to follow any differentiated processes as a result of outstanding meal balances.
- On a weekly basis, the Food Service office will send email notifications to the primary parent/guardian of students who have outstanding negative balances.
- The district shall offer repayment plans and may take other actions that do not result in harm or shame to the child, until unpaid charges are paid.
- The district will make every attempt to determine if the student is directly certified by New York State to be eligible for free meals. If a student cannot be directly certified, the district will encourage the parent or guardian to fill out a free/reduced meal application.
- All negative balances must be paid prior to the end of each school year. If a negative balance remains at the end of the school year, the district may transfer funds from sibling accounts to cover the balance due.
- If there are remaining funds on a student account at the end of the school year, those funds will be carried over to the next school year.
- When students leave the district or graduate, the district will attempt to contact the parent/guardian and return funds for amounts greater than $5.00. Residual balances remaining after one full school year from the time the student transferred out of the district will be applied for the benefit of economically disadvantaged families.
- Parents/guardians may request the funds be transferred between students at any time during the school year in writing, by email, or by phone request.
For more information, please review the Meal Charge Policy.
Prohibition Against Meal Shaming
In the case of a student who cannot pay for a meal or who has accrued meal debt, the following actions are expressly prohibited:
- Announcing or publicizing the names of children with unpaid meal charges
- Sending clearly marked notices home with children who have an outstanding balance
- Using hand stamps, wristbands, stickers, or other physical markers to identify children with outstanding meal charges
- Requiring children with unpaid meal charges to do chores or other work
- Throwing a child’s meal in the trash
- Taking any action directed at the student to collect unpaid meal charges
- Discussing any outstanding meal debt in the presence of other students
- Serving alternate meals (i.e., cheese sandwich)
- Using a debt collector