Review part 2: MealPayPlus monitors your child’s school lunch choices online
To cap off March’s National Nutrition Month, I reviewed a product called MealPayPlus that allows parents to monitor what their child buys with his lunch money.
With MealPayPlus, parents make online prepayments for their child’s lunch, or any other school activity. You don’t have to figure out what happened to the $20 bill you gave your son yesterday. In fact, he doesn’t even have to carry any cash or check to school. Instead you have an online account where you deposit funds and gets it replenished if it falls below a certain amount.
The software also has the added feature of a purchase history, so you know where that money was spent - on a nutritious sandwich, or five chocolate chip cookies.
I talked with Debbie Beauvais, the District School Food Service Supervisor for Gates Chili Central Schools in Rochester, NY. Her school district has been one of the first clients of the software. One-third of her parents use MealPayPlus and “they absolutely love it!”
“More kids now eat at school since we began using it three years ago,” Debbie Beauvais said.”Many parents call to ask me what the school can do about their child’s food choices, and I point them to the software. It really helps parents help their children make better food choices. The food history is updated nightly. Parents have an almost-instant availability to see what their kids are eating. And if a parent forgets to give her child lunch money, or just doesn’t have time to prepare one, she can just call us. We can have her set up an account and the child can use it within 20 minutes.”
I asked her why there was only 1/3 of parents using MealPayPlus and she said that the other 1/3 of parents do not have the need to enroll because their children have the free or reduced-price meal subsidy. “Every year, the number of households that enroll in MealPayPlus increases. It appeals more to tech-savvy parents with younger kids who want the extra convenience. On the other hand, high school kids would rather use cash.”
I learned from Debbie that the cost to use the software is paid for by the school district. That district can pass that fee onto the parent or not.
Check the current list of school districts that offer the MealpayPlus service in the “availability” section of this site. If your school district is not signed up yet, you will have to contact your Board of Education and request the district sign up to use the MealpayPlus service.
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POSTED IN: Family and Home, Healthy Development and Habits, Nutrition and Recipes
1 opinion for Review part 2: MealPayPlus monitors your child’s school lunch choices online
healthyfoodstoday
Apr 2, 2008 at 12:21 am
In today’s world, our bodies still require the complete balance of pure nutrients and energy provided by live whole foods. The modern demands of our fast-paced world have led to the processing of food to the point of non-nutrition.
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