A lunch inspector at a daycare in North Carolina took one look at a four-year-old child's homemade lunch and determined that it was not healthy.
According to the school police, the lunch did not meet state regulation which reads:
“When children bring their own food for meals and snacks to the center, if the food does not meet the specified nutritional requirements, the center must provide additional food necessary to meet those requirements.”
The daycare made a decision to send the uneaten lunch back home with a note along with a bill for $1.25 to cover the cost of a replacement lunch. They assured that the new lunch was USDA approved, containing one serving of meat, one serving of grains, and two servings of fruit or vegetables.
Of that lunch, however, the child only ate three chicken nuggets, and the school officials let it go at that. Like mindless robots, the programmed officials fulfilled their responsibility in making sure food offered was deemed nutritious by the government. They didn't discern that what she actually ate was not nutritious.
What did the original home-packed lunch contain? It consisted of a turkey and cheese sandwich, a banana, some chips, and apple juice--things the mother knows the child likes and will eat....and, by the way, it also met USDA regulations.
Who in a free country wouldn't be outraged?
Imagine the mother's surprise when her child returned with her packed lunch uneaten. In response to this insult, she wrote anonymously to Carolina Journal, the local newspaper, and told them,
“What got me so mad is, number one, don’t tell my kid I’m not packing her lunch box properly. I pack her lunchbox according to what she eats. It always consists of a fruit. It never consists of a vegetable. She eats vegetables at home because I have to watch her because she doesn’t really care for vegetables.
She came home with her whole sandwich I had packed, because she chose to eat the nuggets on the lunch tray, because they put it in front of her. You’re telling a 4-year-old. ‘oh. you’re lunch isn’t right,’ and she’s thinking there’s something wrong with her food.” (Source)
The alarmed mother also called state representative G.L. Pridgen of Robeson County.
In turn, Rep.Pridgen called the school and obtained an apology for the mishap. Was the apology for interfering with a mother's right in knowing and proceeding with what was best for her own child? No. The school apologized because they made a mistake in not realizing that the lunch did indeed meet government approval.
Pridgen's office is looking further into the issue.
Comments