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Pennsylvania school district superintendent speaks out on "lunch shaming" story

PITTSBURGH -- The superintendent of a western Pennsylvania school district said the district isn’t about shaming students at lunch and that reports of hot meals being snatched away from kids simply aren’t true, CBS Pittsburgh station KDKA-TV reports​.

KDKA-TV: The story that this woman tells of taking the lunch away from the child, the hot lunch, that’s not true?
Superintendent Michael Daniels: That is not true. By all accounts that have been shared with me, that is not true.
KDKA-TV: She was never instructed to do that? She never did that?
Daniels: She was not, and she did not.

A former cafeteria worker at Wylandville Elementary told a different story. She resigned after she said she was instructed to take hot lunches from two students as part of a new program to crack down on deliquent lunch bills.

“His eyes welled up with tears,” said Stacy Koltiska. “I’ll never forget his name, the look on his face.”

Koltiska posted about the incident on Facebook after she said a supervisor ordered her to take a hot meal away from the second child.

“The woman I was working with was trying to get my attention, but I didn’t see ‘cause we’re serving so many kids, to tell me before I gave him the chicken to give him the cheese. But it was too late. He already had his tray,” she said.

The superintendent said what really happened was that the cashier realized the boy’s account had been paid up, so the alternative cold meal was replaced with chicken nuggets.

“When we realized his account was no longer delinquent, he received a hot lunch,” Daniels said. “He ate chicken nuggets that day, yes. There were no tears. There was no embarrassment.”

That’s the opposite of what the former lunch lady said.

KDKA-TV: Why do think she is telling this story on Facebook and to television stations?
Daniels: I really can’t answer that. But it is quite unfortunate.

Koltiska said she’s insulted that the superintendent would accuse her of not telling the truth.

“The one thing I am not is a liar,” she said. “Why would I make this up? I’m not a liar, and I don’t lie, and I don’t appreciate this attack on my character.”

She maintains she was told to take two children’s hot lunches away, and she said even giving alternative lunches from the start shames the kids.

“This is a bad policy,” said Koltiska. “You made a bad choice, and instead of fixing it or having a discussion about it, you’re now going to blame an employee over policy.”

But the superintendent said the program is working. He said delinquent accounts have dropped dramatically and that when implemented correctly, it shames no one.

In years past, it’s been taxpayers who pick up the tab when parents don’t pay.

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