Connecticut restricting 'share tables' concept to feed hungry students
WALLINGFORD >> Efforts to share perfectly good food with some of the local school district’s less fortunate students are being hampered by new regulations from the Connecticut Department of Education.
School officials and parents met Tuesday night with John Frassinelli, bureau chief from the state Department of Education’s Bureau of Health/Nutrition, to discuss the agency’s rules governing share tables. The idea of share tables is to allow students who bought and paid for their cafeteria-made lunches to put aside food they haven’t touched so that it can be eaten by others.
While share tables are much more established in other parts of the country, Frassinelli acknowledged that only a few Connecticut schools have embraced the concept. But that didn’t stop state education officials from issuing a set of rules governing share tables in August and then further refining them last month.
“If we can’t control every step of the process, we’re going to regulate the heck out of it,” he said.
After the meeting, Frassinelli said the state education department has legitimate concerns that food left on share tables will spoil or somehow become contaminated, making those who eventually eat it sick.
“We still believe there is some room for discussion on this, though,” he said.
Wallingford Superintendent of Schools Salvatore Menzo said the district launched a share table pilot program in one of its elementary schools last spring and was prepared to phase it in at other schools during the current school year.
“The decision to introduce these guidelines in August and then refine them in January has left us kind of perplexed,” Menzo said. “The guidelines other states like Vermont have for share tables is far more permissive than what Connecticut has.”
The goal of the share tables is to keep from having to throw out perfectly good food, he said. At the same time, Menzo said school officials want to use the untouched food to feed the district’s growing group of students that either need free lunches or partially subsidized meals from the cafeteria.
The number of students requiring either free or subsidized lunches in the Wallingford district has doubled from 2008, he said.
“The demographics of our schools are changing,” Menzo said.
Tammy Raccio, chairwoman of the district-wide parent and teacher organization, said Connecticut’s restrictive policies governing the use of share tables “is directly opposite of states like Indiana, Texas, Vermont or New York.”
“We continue to try to find ways to help students who are from food insecure homes in our community,” Raccio said.
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