COLUMBUS, Ind. – At its Monday evening meeting, the Bartholomew Consolidated School Corporation (BCSC) board voted against a $781,000 proposal to expand the Community Eligibility Program (CEP) to help provide free hot lunches and breakfast for all BCSC elementary school students. CEP is a federal program provided as an option to all schools with a greater than 25% free student population.
District 6 board member Logan Schulz presented various studies showing a correlation between well-fed students and improved academic performance and stated that many families are going hungry because of the economy.
Dale Nowlin, district 4 board member, argued against Schulz, stating, “It would be a wonderful thing if they could feed all our students.” But, he also said the impact on student achievement was only 1 to 3 points away from the standard deviation, and he questioned whether those numbers were enough to justify expending $750,000.
District 3 Board Member Whitney Loyd argued that other programs assist struggling families in filling the gaps for funding school lunches and emphasized that “no child is going without lunch.”
Schutz countered by saying that parents may only be able to send their children with a bag of chips, and that is not “an adequate healthy hot lunch” that would allow them to be successful in their academic endeavors for the day. Ultimately, the majority of the BCSC school board voted against the proposal.
When asked for comment, Schulz said, “It’s disheartening to see the majority of the board approve moving forward to solicit bids on luxuries like turf with a $2M budget allocated in the same funding bucket that could have paid for 5,000 students receiving breakfast and lunch every day. Our role is to best position our students and staff in driving student achievement, and this decision does not do that, plain and simple. I encourage parents and taxpayers to drive accountability to us, as Board Members, to ensure we are spending the funds most appropriately for our students and staff.”
A link to the live stream of the June 16 School Board Meeting can be found here
