Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

huffpost.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

711–720 of 918 posts

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#711

Post by Suppafly »

tecirpinslime wrote: post #59
candiddevmike wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

During COVID, school lunch was free, and most school served free bag lunches over the summer too. That ended in June 2022. Congress could've kept it going for a pittance, but alas...

My significant other work at a school during Covid where they were giving free breakfasts and lunches. The waste I witnessed from it all was atrocious, due to the fluctuations from day-to-day how many students would come in. The staff always wanted to err on the side of caution, because they didn’t want any kids to miss out. We’re talking sometimes over 200 lunches that were discarded in a day. Some things could be r…

>The waste I witnessed from it all was atrocious, due to the fluctuations from day-to-day how many students would come in.

The waste is just a necessary component even in for profit systems. It's still better to feed everyone than to not. Even if the only thing you are allowed to do is to give to students, then you send them home with several meals worth to use up the leftovers.

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#712

Post by em-bee »

choeger wrote: post #460

What I don't get about lunch in school is where this assumption comes from that it has to be a warm and complete meal, ideally with starter and dessert. I am really wondering about that. School is more like an office job than a construction site or other heavy work and thus would not a sandwich and a salad be more appropriate? It would be much easier to offer good quality this way, especially when it comes to fruits…

because that is what a lunch looks like in our culture. you can get away with a something simple for a mid morning break if you come home early enough so that you can have a lunch at home.

even at an office job i expect a warm meal for lunch.

and i would also say that school for children is more hard work than an office job is for adults so the comparison is not fair.

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#713

Post by Suppafly »

zdragnar wrote: post #248
mjevans wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds like there were a few problems identified. * Against the rules to hand them out to non-students (even after some priority window) * Operating in an unusual context where relative load is highly unpredictable * No system of reservation to try to forecast load There's also a bunch of data that's absent, like any potential causes for the variable load. Plausibly it might have been weather related, or related t…

These problems aren't easy to solve. The first is food regulation and safety law; the same applies to restaurants who serve buffet style as well. The second isn't going away. Attendance is spotty at best in underperforming schools, in particular the ones that need free lunch the most. Many kids also won't eat some foods. The amount of waste just gets shifted from "too much prepared" to "not enough served food was eat…

>The first is food regulation and safety law; the same applies to restaurants who serve buffet style as well.

This, food waste is built into the system. It'd be nice if it wasn't but every restaurant and cafeteria throws away just as much food as they sell, most people just don't realize it because they've never worked in food service.

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#714

Post by vel0city »

qmr wrote: post #429
socalgal2 wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can want kids to be fed and fully believe that the government giving out free meal to all kids will eventually lead to kids not being feed. I can think of lots of arguments Budgets might be cut directly, so can not feed some percent, budgets might be cut indirectly (less tax revenue). Giving out free food might make people feel entitled and less likely to learn to be self sufficient. The "give a man a fish he eat…

Yes those little shit free loading five year olds. Whining about lunch when they should be in the mines.

Need to start charging my toddler market rate rent. No more free rides, I ain't raising woke communist kids!

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#715

Post by throwawayqqq11 »

presentation wrote: post #700
throwawayqqq11 wrote: post #538

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine paying the kids a small amount for their work. Outliers will be everywhere, you only have to select the right ones, and not fix an entire suburbs culture, and ofc the obligatory: tax the rich.

Part of the point of the Japanese way is to communicate that keeping public spaces clean is everyone’s responsibility. Paying kids for it communicates the opposite.

You have pushing (social pressure) and pulling (payment) motivators and there are small didactive tasks to teach children the worthyness of effort up to large societal goals, taught with them. Your comparison is weird.

Expecting payment does not make you a self centeted capitalist. Children could become one if they seen the normalization of exploitation all around, when payment is more then just fair compensation but someone elses dire expense and you cant have nice things otherwise.

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#716

Post by em-bee »

ta1243 wrote: post #461

> and eliminated lunch debt at 12 schools. That’s 12 schools where kids don’t get their trays taken away For a few weeks. Then presumably there will be debt again. If you get a major wound then applying a tourniquet can be a great move to stabilise the patient until the problem can be fixed. If you have a memory leak, killing the process and restarting it is a great move to get the system working again, but you need…

yes, and that takes lobbying effort. and who is going to do that lobbying? this project introduces new people to the problem, and thus increases the amount of people motivated to lobby for a change.

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#717

Post by Suppafly »

ponector wrote: post #174
SSJPython wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only people that do this are ones that have no understanding of marginal tax rates and progressive taxation.

Is it? There are situations where it makes sense to avoid a rise and stay in the tax bracket. Like if with 5k rise you loose a 10k childcare benefits provided by local municipality.

That's not tax brackets though, that's income. Talking about tax brackets is weirdly indirect way to talk about income. The people who avoid raises because they think they'll be taxed higher on all their income because they don't understand how brackets work aren't the same people who avoid raises because it'll cause them to earn too much to be eligible for government assistance programs.

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#718

Post by Symbiote »

smileysteve wrote: post #674

When I read the first paragraph, my immediate question is, is the PB&J alternative meal actually healthier and more reflective of the nutritional needs (and desires ) of a student than the more expensive normal meals (my thoughts turn to chicken tenders, pizza, corn dogs) I personally reflect back to realize that I started requesting parents / personally making sandwiches ~3rd grade because I was tired of flavorless…

"Cafeteria style" doesn't have to mean chicken tenders and pizza.

Today at work in Denmark, the cafeteria served vegetable stroganoff with mushrooms and roast potatoes, chili con carne with rice, and/or turkey with mushroom sauce, pearl barley and roast root vegetables.

The salads were a potato salad with red onions, chives, mustard and radish; pearl barley with apricot, soya beans and peppers; lentils, beetroot and feta cheese.

Schools/universities here have similar options.

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#719

Post by westurner »

xarope wrote: post #333
pfannkuchen wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The idea that lunches can be freshly made, on site, out of healthy ingredients and children Excellent garden path sentence.

A friend who's a pre-school teacher has this excellent t-shirt (I LMAO the first time I saw it): let's eat, kids. let's eat kids. punctuation saves lives. https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/B1pppR4gVKL._CLa%7C2140%...

"Eats, Shoots & Leaves" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eats,_Shoots_%26_Leaves

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#720

Post by BobaFloutist »

idrios wrote: post #686
pnutjam wrote: post #575

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why the wealthy should be required to use public schools.

The wealthy do use public schools. They pay huge amounts to live in upper class neighborhoods with wealthy peers, where a lot of tax money goes into the schooling system so the kids can take all sorts of extracurriculars and AP classes. It gets the same results as private school but the cost comes from living in that neighborhood rather than paying the school directly

California actually has a pretty solid school tax-redistribition system that more or less solves this problem (of course districts still can and do fundraise for direct donations to the PTA/music fund and bond measures to upgrade facilities, but it's still vastly more fair).

In a completely unrelated phenomenon, private schools are incredibly popular among Californians of means.

Post reply on HN