A Tennessee lawmaker introduced a bill once again to provide free breakfast and lunch to all students in every school district.
Rep. John Ray Clemmons (D-Nashville-55), has proposed a similar plan every year since 2018 without success. Past estimates of the program’s expense have run between $500 million to $700 million.
The proposal calls for the state to cover the cost of providing free breakfast and lunch to students after all available federal funding from the National School Lunch Program has been applied.
The leading argument opposing students paying for their meals seems to always fall back on: students paying for school meals isn’t inherently “wrong,” there are significant concerns about the potential for food insecurity and stigma associated with it, particularly when students from low-income families can’t afford to pay, leading to issues like “lunch shaming” and potential negative impacts on their learning and well-being; advocates often push for universal free school meals to address this problem.
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