Lunch Information

2024-2025 Lunch News

Hello SJS students and families!

We hope you are all having a great summer! It’s hard to believe school starts in just a couple weeks.  Massachusetts is continuing universal free school meals for the 24-25 school year! This means breakfast and lunch will be free to all students regardless of their eligibility status through June 2025. We encourage all families to take advantage of this program to access nutritious meals.
 

Although it is not necessary, it is still very important for families to submit a household application to
determine eligibility for free and reduced-price meals. This information will allow students to qualify for any additional benefits the state has to offer. We will include an attachment of this application in the Wednesday Weeklies as well as send a paper copy home with students.
 

As most of you know, we use ezschoolapps.com for families to pre-order meals. We are asking families to preorder for the minimum of one week to ensure the correct amount of milk and food is ordered and available. The deadline for preordering meals is every Friday by 8pm. We understand the end of the week can be very busy, so we encourage families to think about ordering one month at time. We will continue to remind families of this deadline in our Wednesday Weeklies and will try on a monthly-basis as well. If you do not preorder by the deadline and your child needs a lunch, they will receive an alternate lunch which is a cheese sandwich.
 

The first deadline for orders is Friday, September 6 th for the following school week of September 9 th .  A la carte items or a second lunch will not be free, however students who wish to purchase these items can do so by having funds available in their ezschoolapps accounts. We suggest making sure any new students are added on the EZSCHOOLAPPS website and that every account is up to date. If you are new to ordering school meals, you can create an account on the website as well! Please go to ezschoolapps.com to begin the process.
 

Please refer to the “Parent Signup” attachment included in the Wednesday Weeklies for step by step
instructions for both returning and new parents .If you have any questions, please reach out to Amie at agabriel@sjs-peabody.com. We can’t wait to see everyone’s smiling faces in a couple weeks!

Thank you and God bless!
-SJS Food Service Department

St. John the Baptist School Meal Charge Policy

St. John the Baptist School recognizes that healthy, nutritious meals are an important component for
a student’s ability to learn. St. John the Batist School shall provide nutritious and well-balanced meals in its school meal program. By statute, the St John’s Food Service Department is a self-supporting fund that shall not have a negative balance at the close of a fiscal year. Unpaid charges place a financial strain on the Food Service Department. To be fair and equitable, and to ensure compliance of all who participate in the school meal program, the policy establishes procedures for methods of payment and collection methods.
                                                                                  
Protection of Students with Unpaid Meal Debt from Public Identification and Punishment
                                  
M.G.L. Chapter 71, Section 72B also protects students with unpaid meal debt from public
identification, embarrassment or any disciplinary action due solely to unpaid meal debt. M.G.L. Chapter71, Section 72B (b) states the following:
 

• No agent, employee, or volunteer of a school or school district shall:
  Take any action that would publicly identify a student when payment has not been received for
  a school meal or for meals previously served to the student.
• Serve a student with an unpaid meal debt an alternative meal that is not available to all students at the cafeteria.
• Deny a student a meal as a form of behavioral discipline or punishment.
• Dispose of an already served meal because of the student’s lack of funds to pay for the meal
  or because of unresolved meal debt.
• Prohibit a student or a sibling of a student from attending or participating in non-fee based
  extracurricular activities, field trips or school events solely because of the student’s
  unresolved meal debt.
• Prohibit a student from receiving grades, official transcripts, report cards or from graduating or
  attending graduation events solely based on unresolved meal debt; or
• Require a parent or guardian to pay fees or costs more than the actual amounts owed for
  meals previously served to the student.
  St. John the Baptist School establishes the following goals:
• To establish a consistent policy regarding the method of payment for meals, charge availability
  and collection methods for charges in the St. John’s meal program.
• To mitigate student debt while trying to address student health and safety needs by not
  allowing any student to be food insecure.
• To waive costs for students who are eligible and approved for free or reduced-price school
  meals after completing the Massachusetts Free and Reduced-Price School Meal Household
  Application or qualifying through the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Department of Health
  and Human Services, Virtual Gateway.  
• To support positive interactions with students, parent(s)/guardian(s) and St. John’s staff to
  the maximum extent possible.
• To encourage the parents/guardian to assume responsibility for payments and to promote self-
  responsibility of the student.
   

KEY TERMS
Reimbursable Meal: We participate in the “Offer vs. Serve” program. A lunch must offer the 5
components of what the NSLP considers to be a well-balanced, nutritional, reimbursable meal. The 5
components are.
1. Meat or Meat alternative (Proteins such as Legumes, Tofu, Cheese)
2. Grains (Breads, Rice, Cereal, Pasta)
3. Fruits
4. Vegetables
5. Milk (Can be purchased individually at the POS system. The students can either pay cash or
have their parents add funds to their EZ School Apps account)

Second Meal: After a student receives their reimbursable meal for the day, a second portion of food is considered a second meal. Some examples of second meals are: additional slices of pizza, second
portion of lunch or cheese sandwiches. Second meals are not part of the USDA program and do not
qualify as a free or reduced-price meal and must be paid for at full price at the time of sale with cash
or prepaid funds from the student’s lunch account.
 

A la Carte Items: Any single component of a meal, a snack, bottled water, juice or milk priced
individually, not as part of a reimbursable meal. A la carte items do not qualify for free or reduced price and must be paid for at the time of sale with cash or prepaid funds from the student’s lunch account.

Charge: Students are only charged for A la Carte items and second lunches. A student is not charged
for the reimbursable meal. A reimbursable meal is confirmed in the POS at zero dollars. If a student has a zero or negative balance in their lunch account, they cannot purchase any items.
 

Good Standing: A school meal account with a zero or positive balance.
 

Non-Reimbursable Meal: A non-reimbursable meal is purchased at the full price. Non-reimbursable
meals are not part of the USDA program and do not qualify for free or reduced price and must be paid for at the time of sale with prepaid funds from the student’s account. A non-reimbursable meal
consists of fewer than three (3) of the five (5) offered meal components (grain, meat or meat
alternative, fruit, vegetable and milk), or lacks a fruit and/or vegetable component.
 

Payment: Cash or prepaid funds from the student’s account.

School Lunch Account: An account assigned to every student at St. John the Baptist School whether
or not they participate in the school meal program. School lunch accounts maintain data required to be reported to federal and state agencies. Information pertaining to a student’s eligibility status is
securely contained within the account to assure confidentiality.
 

Uncollectible Account: An account that has gone through the entire resolution process and remains
not in good standing. St. John’s will cover uncollectible, or “bad debt,” through an allocation from the
operation budget, as required, by federal regulation 2 CFR 200.426.

ADMINISTRATION OF POLICY
St. John the Baptist School is responsible for ensuring that the school meal accounts are properly
managed and accurately reported. St. John’s will closely monitor student school meal accounts with
the goal of eliminating negative balances and delinquent accounts.

Parent(s)/guardian(s) are strongly encouraged to register for a login to ezschoolapps.com, which
gives access to parents/guardians to: 
 

• View student transaction history.
• Request email alerts for low balances.
• Make payments and pre-payments to a student’s lunch account.
• Set up automatic deposits to a student’s account.
   

STUDENT ACCOUNTS
Second meals, non-reimbursable meals, and a la carte items are not part of the USDA program and
must be paid for at full price at the time of sale with prepaid funds from the student’s account if the
account is in good standing. This applies to all students.

• Prepaid student account balances which remain unspent at the end of a school year may be
  used in the following school year if the student is still active.

MANAGEMENT SCOPE OF RESPONSIBILITY FOR UNCOLLECTED MEAL CHARGES
The Food Service Department will maintain records of charges and will notify the student’s
parent(s)/guardian(s) of low and/or negative account balances.

• Management will make a direct certification eligibility determination for all students every 30
  days and will communicate determination to the families.
• The Food Service Department will provide information on applying for free/reduced priced
  meals, as well as local food and other assistance resources.
• Parent(s)/Guardian(s): Families are responsible for timely and responsive communication with
  the Food Service Department and for making full payment of any outstanding or delinquent
  balance.