Getting your player ready...
PHILADELPHIA — For students at Thurgood Marshall Elementary School, there is such a thing as a free lunch — and a free breakfast too.
With no strings attached.
The Philadelphia school district’s unique program provides free food for all children in schools with a high percentage of low-income students, dispensing with the cumbersome forms parents must fill out elsewhere to qualify their kids for free meals.
Although federal officials recently threatened to kill this paperless model, other cities are looking to replicate it.Food service directors say it eliminates the costly bureaucracy that both deters needy families from applying for subsidized meals and stigmatizes those who do complete the forms.
