Free lunches at school

[rebeccajo 14]

If a student has weak language skills, if our schools can help him or her with that, how is that taking advantage? Schools and teachers do not exist merely to draw a salary, a fat state pension and to teach children who would learn just fine without them. They exist to teach those who need them the most.

You in the right thread, Gupt?

Lookit. He's got a heart after all.........

[Ban Hammer 13,624]

the costs involved in going after parents to pay for the lunches after the fact, and the additional bureaucracy needed to fund that would in all likelihood cost more for taxpayers than the initial cost of the free or subsidized lunch.

A school is a place for kids to learn and not a childcare center. Many people seem to forget that.

I also love how the people who pay the most tax always get the least out of government services.

WHATTT???

THOSE POOR PEOPLE WHO PAY THE MOST

NOT GETTING THE CRAPPY PEANUT BUTTER AND ALMOST JELLY SANDWICHES

THEY HAVE TO SETTLE FOR THEIR MEASLEY STEAK AND EGGS

THEY ARE DEFINITELY GETTING THE LEAST OUT OF THE GOV'T. SERVICES. NOW I SEE WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT. I AM STARTING TO FEEL BAD TOO

[rebeccajo 14]

If a student has weak language skills, if our schools can help him or her with that, how is that taking advantage? Schools and teachers do not exist merely to draw a salary, a fat state pension and to teach children who would learn just fine without them. They exist to teach those who need them the most.

To teach; not to be a parent or babysitter or unicef. A teacher's duties now go above an beyond simply teaching kids or those who need them most. Some kids are a wreck. From ADD to neglect etc. If your boss doubled your work load, with the same pay, would you simply take it and say oh well they are my new responsibilities.

The teachers aren't providing the free lunch. They aren't cooking it. They have their hands full already. What the heck does the free lunch program have to do with what a teacher does all day long?

Oh....other than the fact it fills a kids belly and possibly makes his brain ready to learn, which makes him less of a behavior problem.....which makes the teachers job easier.

Pay attention to what you are saying here. You're reaching.

Edited August 27, 2007 by rebeccajo

[Addie_Goodvibes 0]

Well, the next time the goverment asks you to choose where and how you want your tax dollars are spent, I am sure you can tick those boxes.

Wouldn't that be nice, instead the govt. fails to secure our border and allows Illegal Criminals to ivade our country and drain our social services w/out putting anything into the system the defraud every day.

Hopefully ICE will continue to crack down on enforcement and round up & Deport Fugitive Criminal Aliens.

It needs to happen with the same intensity as our troops pressence in Iraq, the real insurgency is here in USA on USA soil. The Invasion is happening in our own country.

[KarenCee 3]

Viewing the forest from the trees, in the overall US budget sense; any child in need of food is a good investment of my tax dollar.

Issues related to the parents? Not part of the equation, as the child had no choice in the matter.

This is what I've been trying to say and certain people just don't get it. Why make the child suffer because of the parents who abuse the system?

Because the child then grows up and stays in the same cycle of poverty and dependency.

....and you can prove this how....?

If a student has weak language skills, if our schools can help him or her with that, how is that taking advantage? Schools and teachers do not exist merely to draw a salary, a fat state pension and to teach children who would learn just fine without them. They exist to teach those who need them the most.

To teach; not to be a parent or babysitter or unicef. A teacher's duties now go above an beyond simply teaching kids or those who need them most. Some kids are a wreck. From ADD to neglect etc. If your boss doubled your work load, with the same pay, would you simply take it and say oh well they are my new responsibilities.

Yes, I'd do it. These children deserve an education. No, I might not like it, might be bone tired at the end of the day but these children deserve an education just as my daughter deserves an education. Yes, a lot of my kids are a wreck (I work in SPED) and there's stories that would make your blood run cold. I do what I do because I believe that these children deserve an education...one that might get them out of the life they're in and into one a helluva lot better.

"Teaching is the essential profession...one that makes all other professions possible." - David Haselkorn.

Yeah...I teach...and my kids are gonna get MY best.

[Clarky and Tarah 0]

All this talk about school lunch makes me hungry. Even if their food is very unhealthy and pretty gross overall, I did LOVE their mashed potatoes and chicken strips. Yum.

Ok, back to the topic.

[rebeccajo 14]

Public Charge and Means Tested Benefits:

http://www.fns.usda.gov/fsp/rules/Memo/PRW...eldguidance.pdf

http://www.fns.usda.gov/fsp/rules/Memo/PRW...ubliccharge.pdf

[Peikko 1,575]

Wouldn't that be nice, instead the govt. fails to secure our border and allows Illegal Criminals to ivade our country and drain our social services w/out putting anything into the system the defraud every day.

Hopefully ICE will continue to crack down on enforcement and round up & Deport Fugitive Criminal Aliens.

It needs to happen with the same intensity as our troops pressence in Iraq, the real insurgency is here in USA on USA soil. The Invasion is happening in our own country.

Sorry, I am just not going to get my knickers in a twist because of your perception of how terrible the illegal alien problem is. Your measures to solve, what is a problem, are just expensive and unworkable and I wouldn't be happy about tax being spent in this way. Your provocative use of inflammetory language doesn't have any effect on me either.

Meanwhile, back on topic...I totally support all kinds of welfare measures. That there are abuses is of course certain. That these abuses can be prevented in a way that is financially responsible is unlikely. One thing is certain, anyone who does avail themselves of welfare of any sort is not someone who is in a privelaged postion.

Edited August 27, 2007 by Purple_Hibiscus

[Trompe le Monde 1,107]

Public Charge and Means Tested Benefits:

http://www.fns.usda.gov/fsp/rules/Memo/PRW...eldguidance.pdf

http://www.fns.usda.gov/fsp/rules/Memo/PRW...ubliccharge.pdf

I'm not reading that as the School Lunch program not being means tested (which it is in the dictionary definition of the term, whether or not all schools maintain the appropriate oversight is another question ) but rather receiving such a non-cash benefit does not make one a public charge.

[rebeccajo 14]

Public Charge and Means Tested Benefits:

http://www.fns.usda.gov/fsp/rules/Memo/PRW...eldguidance.pdf

http://www.fns.usda.gov/fsp/rules/Memo/PRW...ubliccharge.pdf

I'm not reading that as the School Lunch program not being means tested (which it is in the dictionary definition of the term, whether or not all schools maintain the appropriate oversight is another question ) but rather receiving such a non-cash benefit does not make one a public charge.

Well, that's the whole fal-de-rol. Look at the last section of Page 6 of the I-864 for a much shorter version.

[Heracles 417]

I've never been on welfare, or public housing, or any means-tested benefit. But I benefited mightily from a government program: federal financial aid for college. (As do many other middle-class taxpayers.)

Did taxes pay for that? Yup. Is society better off for sending bright kids like me to college when their parents can't write the check? I may be biased, but I assume we're better off.

were those loans or grants?

A combination. My first two years at school were all university-sponsored private scholarship + the standard amount in interest-subsidized Stafford loans. The last two years they bumped most of my funding to the generic 'financial aid pool' (I have no idea why, but I suspect it was because the 'name' scholarship was for freshmen and sophomores or something like that.) and moved about a quarter of my aid to named scholarships.

All in all I received a $120K education for about $10K out-of-pocket and the usual amount in loans. I graduated with some debt, but it's not soul-crushing and it's manageable.

What field did you major in??

Edited August 27, 2007 by Boo-Yah!

[Trompe le Monde 1,107]

Still not reading it Becs - I only see that

"If an intending immigrant becomes a permanent resident in the United States based on a Form I-864 that you have signed,then until your obligations under the Form I-864 terminate, your income and assets may be considered ("deemed") to be available to that person, in determining whether he or she is eligible for certain Federal means-tested public benefits and also for State or local means-tested public benefits, if the State or local government's rules provide for consideration("deeming”) of your income and assets as available to the person."

with the exception of

public benefits specified in section 403© of the Welfare Reform Act such as, but notlimited to, emergency Medicaid, short-term, non-cash emergency relief; services provided under the National School Lunch and Child Nutrition Acts; immunizations and testing and treatment for communicable diseases; and means-tested programs under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.

I don't see it where this benefit is described as not being so (not being argumentative, since we're on the same page, just trying to understand what I might be missing)

[rebeccajo 14]

Still not reading it Becs - I only see that

"If an intending immigrant becomes a permanent resident in the United States based on a Form I-864 that you have signed,then until your obligations under the Form I-864 terminate, your income and assets may be considered ("deemed") to be available to that person, in determining whether he or she is eligible for certain Federal means-tested public benefits and also for State or local means-tested public benefits, if the State or local government's rules provide for consideration("deeming”) of your income and assets as available to the person."

with the exception of

public benefits specified in section 403© of the Welfare Reform Act such as, but notlimited to, emergency Medicaid, short-term, non-cash emergency relief; services provided under the National School Lunch and Child Nutrition Acts; immunizations and testing and treatment for communicable diseases; and means-tested programs under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.

I don't see it where this benefit is described as not being so (not being argumentative, since we're on the same page, just trying to understand what I might be missing)

Oh I understand you're not fussing with me.

It's more of an 'implied' thing, IMO. The affidavit says 'means tested' stuff will lable you a public charge. If they something specifically doesn't make you a public charge, then IMO it cannot be means tested.

Look at the first link I posted earlier. Go to the fourth page, first column, and read towards the bottom for the definition of nutritional programs as "supplemental in nature".