Students Denied Lunch at School, Parents Outraged at Hungry Kids (VIDEO)
Students were denied lunch at school because they were either unable to pay or were behind in their payments to the school system. The workers who denied the students have been suspended, and officials are looking into the incident.
"They told me to throw [my lunch] away because I didn't have enough money in my account," fifth-grader Victoria Greaves told Fox News. Her father, John, was incredibly angry about the situation and the fact that his daughter was denied a meal while at school.
"I'm pissed that when there are people in prison who are getting meals, my daughter, an honor student, is going hungry," Greaves told The Sun Chronicle.
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Greaves was not the only student told she could not eat the food. As many as 25 students were denied their lunches by cafeteria workers. If they were served, they were told to throw the food away immediately. Students are normally given a cheese sandwich and milk if they cannot pay or have unpaid bills, but that procedure was not followed yesterday.
Whitson's Culinary Group, the lunch provider, has extended an apology to all those affected by yesterday's actions and placed the school's representative on administrative leave.
"We agree that this situation was not handled correctly," Holly Von Seggern, Vice President for Marketing and Community Relations, told The Sun Chronicle. "We really want to apologize to the parents of the children who were affected."
"There is no way any child in my school district will ever go hungry," Superintendent Pia Durkin added. "Children need to eat." Durkin has scheduled a meeting with cafeteria workers and Whitson's officials and ordered her staff never to refuse a child food in the future.
Principal Andrew Boles is also "appalled and concerned" about the incident and the behavior of the Whitson's employee.
"They did not respect me; they did not respect my students, and they did not respect their parents," he said.
"They apologized for their actions," he told Fox News. "Their intent was not to humiliate or upset the students, which I stated to them they had done."
Watch a report on the situation here:
