How Much Do Students Spend on Non-Nutritional Food at School?

Students eating in the school cafeterias at Hillsborough middle and high schools for the last few years have had a wealth of choices, from carefully prepared meals, to popular treats and sweet snack foods.

And while they've been able to use a debit-like card drawing from money parents deposited in their accounts, some school board members are looking to limit what the point-of-sale (POS) cards can be used for.

At the June 24 Board of Education meeting, board member Lorraine Soisson said she analyzed the purchases through the online account statement made by her daughter with a POS card after the end of the school year and discovered more than 25 percent of her total spending for the year went for "items that do not meet our nutritional policy." 

She said students can use the cards to buy cookies, nachos and other less-than-nutritious foods.

"We've spent countless hours... talking about 30 potential cupcakes in the classroom and this is all being blown away," Dr. Soisson said.

She added she didn't want to bar the students from being able to purchase Otis Spunkmeyer cookies or Little Debbie cakes, she just didn't think it should be possible to use the POS cards for the purchases.

"Let them search for coins in the sofa to buy them," she said.

Board member Greg Gillette had reported during the meeting that the district's contract with Sodexho to operate the cafeterias set the terms for the items which can be purchased with the POS cards. 

"The school lunch prices, the POS items—all of these things are sort of tied in to the bids we get," he said, adding the district has one more year under its current contract with Sodexho, but said bids could be requested for the next contract which limit what foods the cards can be used to purchase.

Have you analyzed your child's school lunch spending? Do you feel the cards should allow students to buy non-nutritional foods? Tell us what you think in the comments below.