How does a family qualify for free/reduced lunch?

[Anonymous]

Is this in FCPS? If not, what county? This is beyond sad.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The school I work at is 93% free/reduced price lunch. Only 2 of my 33 students brought in any school supplies and only one of them could afford to pay the $7 fee for our field trip. Only a handful of them have crayons, glue sticks, etc at home and only 3 or 4 of them have a family car. They don't go to the library b/c it is too far to walk and the bus fare is too much. We don't have a librarian at our school so nobody can check books out of the library. Everyone gets free breakfast. This is what makes kids show up to school on time/at all. We just had a dentist visit us and gave out free toothbrushes. Some of the kids didn't want to put them in their lockers because they were afraid they would lose them. Many of them don't have their "own" toothbrush. It is another world right here around us.

Is this in DCs

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The school I work at is 93% free/reduced price lunch. Only 2 of my 33 students brought in any school supplies and only one of them could afford to pay the $7 fee for our field trip. Only a handful of them have crayons, glue sticks, etc at home and only 3 or 4 of them have a family car. They don't go to the library b/c it is too far to walk and the bus fare is too much. We don't have a librarian at our school so nobody can check books out of the library. Everyone gets free breakfast. This is what makes kids show up to school on time/at all. We just had a dentist visit us and gave out free toothbrushes. Some of the kids didn't want to put them in their lockers because they were afraid they would lose them. Many of them don't have their "own" toothbrush. It is another world right here around us.

Is this in DCs

Sorry. I meant, is this in DC.

[Anonymous]

This is in MD.

[Anonymous]

14:08 - that's great to know. I would hate for kids not to take advantage of programs like this out of shame.

I am a huge supporter of programs that feed kids. Yes, in an ideal world, people should be personally responsible and be able to feed themselves and the kids that they have. But the real world we live in means that this is not always the case, and I hate the idea of kids going hungry because their parents are experiencing a run of bad luck or are chronic screwups or whatever the reason. I like the programs that provide free lunch, free breakfast, backpacks with food for the weekend, etc. 22:44 - your post broke my heart a little.

[Anonymous]

download the form from the school website and fill it out and submit it. let them tell you if you are eligible.

[Anonymous]

When my aunt was teaching in an urban area, her school was a block away from the projects where most of her students lived. She used to get to school when it was still dark so she could make the rounds, banging on doors and making sure the kids were up so they could be on time for breakfast at school. This is only one reason the "teachers are incompetent/only want summers off" threads irk me to no end.

[Anonymous]

Why would she take that on? I am a teacher and would never take it upon myself to make sure another person's child is up for breakfast. That is a bit much and crosses the line, IMO.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why would she take that on? I am a teacher and would never take it upon myself to make sure another person's child is up for breakfast. That is a bit much and crosses the line, IMO.

I'm not saying all teachers have to do that, but that was her choice--she knew that she'd have a mostly empty classroom otherwise. Certainly no parents ever complained.

[Anonymous]

Thank you for reminding us in this thread that poverty and need exist in this area, and that we have to help our neighbors in the public schools.

[Anonymous]

Why would she take that on? I am a teacher and would never take it upon myself to make sure another person's child is up for breakfast. That is a bit much and crosses the line, IMO.

Not the op, but she must have done it because she really cared. I, too, have been a teacher. I did lots of extras--but nothing like that.

[Anonymous]

I'm curious about how many schools serve breakfast. Ours doesn't, and I wonder how many others don't serve it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thank you for reminding us in this thread that poverty and need exist in this area, and that we have to help our neighbors in the public schools.

The parents were so lazy they couldn't get their kids up for free food , wtf

[Anonymous]

The parents were so lazy they couldn't get their kids up for free food

Sad for the kids. I taught a first grade child who was kept home from school to watch his 2 year old brother while his mother drank.

[Anonymous]

I am the teacher who works in a high poverty school. Maybe my school population is the exception but the reason most students are absent/late at our school is because their parents often work very early in the morning. A lot of them clean houses, etc so they have to take the kid with them to work. Then they have to get them to school on the city bus so they are often late. Sometimes the kids say that they missed school b/c their parents didn't have the bus fare to bring them to school from their job. Many of these parents work 2-3 jobs. They have a great work ethic and they do the best they can. Most of them are immigrants.