School Meal Charges
Did you know Food and Nutrition Services is an enterprise fund that does not receive General Fund support? As a result they must earn money through meal and snack sales in order to pay all operating expenses.
The child nutrition department has a charge policy which has been adopted at all schools. Unpaid charges reduce revenue which affects our ability to pay food bills, employee salaries, and many other expenses. Unpaid charges and the costs associated in collecting these charges may result in higher meal prices for all students.
Alvarado ISD meal charge system goals are:
· To treat all students with dignity and respect;
· To maintain a positive experience for your child during meal service;
· To establish practices that are age appropriate; and
· To promote parents’ responsibility for meal payments.
Payment in advance for meals enables the district to achieve these goals.
Below are the notification steps we take so you and your student know when money is needed:
1. Alvarado ISD Cafeteria Staff tell each student the balance in their account as they go through the line each day.
2. We provide parents the ability to check their child’s balance online using family access.
3. Our point of sale software automatically calls parents each Thursday if their child has a balance of zero or less.
For your convenience credit card charges can be made online using Skyward Family Access. You are also welcome to call the school kitchen to check on your balance. We accept cash or check payments at both the school cafeterias and the Operation’s office.
Remember that you may have applied for free or reduced price meals and have a pending application, but you must pay for all school meals until you receive an Approval Letter. We receive thousands of applications each year, and we work hard to process them as fast as possible. It, however, may take up to thirteen days to begin receiving benefits after the application is received by the Child Nutrition Department.
Because of the time it takes to process applications, students who were free or reduced in the previous year remain at their previous year’s status for the first thirty days of the new school year or until a new application is received and processed. One a new application is processed the new status takes over, so if a child was free last year, and an application is processed in the second week of school that qualifies the student for reduced meals, the student’s status will be changed to reduced status on the date that the application is processed not at the end of the thirty day period.
Students, who do not turn in an application that can be processed within this thirty day window, will roll over to paid status and will be responsible for paying for all meals consumed. For this reasons it is very important for parents who feel that they may qualify for free lunches to promptly complete and return an application at the beginning of each school year. Parents, who do not qualify for free meals, may qualify for reduced price meals. Reduced price breakfast costs 0 cents, and reduced price lunch costs 0 cents.
Administrative and Child Nutrition staff have met and developed the following charge policy:
Students may charge up to $5.00.
Please do not put anyone at the school in the position of having to deny your child a meal – NO ONE wants to do that! If you make sure your child has adequate funds for purchasing school lunches, this can be avoided. Thank you.
Alternative Meals
Principals may purchase a student an alternative meal, if a child does not have money in their account, and the principal feels that there is a special circumstance that warrants the purchase of an alternative meal. Alternative meals typically consist of a sandwich, fruit, and milk.
NSF Checks
When a check is returned to the Alvarado ISD Child Nutrition Department for NSF, a letter will be sent to inform the parent(s) from the CN Office. The deposit to the child(ren)’s account will be reversed, and an additional fifteen dollar fee for processing the NSF check will be posted to the child(ren)’s account. Payment must be received within ten (10) days of the date of the letter. If payment is not received, the matter may be turned over to the County Prosecutor’s office.