With pandemic aid gone, U.S. schools owe for free meals: report

NEW YORK, Jan. 13 (Xinhua) -- As schools around the United States reopen after winter break, their students are being reminded of the lunch debt they've racked up this school year.

This is "an ugly reality that follows the end of federal assistance that paid for school meals for more than 50 million students during the pandemic," reported USA Today on Friday.

Congress ended the free-lunch-for-all program in June, reverting to a system in which low-income families had to fill out paperwork to qualify for aid based on their income.

"But some families have been left behind because they do not understand the application process, and others are rejected because they do not qualify," said the report. A family of four must earn about 36,000 U.S. dollars a year or less to qualify for free lunch.

Schools often feed these students, requiring them to pay later and creating a debt many families cannot pay down. For some children, the debt can get so big that schools stop giving them a full meal.

Community organizations, social media influencers and national nonprofits are trying to help fill the void with donations to cover the more than 19 million dollars in debt students have accrued just halfway into the school year, the report noted.