Fifth Graders File Lawsuit Claiming Cafeteria Food Violates the Eighth Amendment
Mrs. Schwartz's fifth grade class filed a federal lawsuit against the Eden Park School Corporation and the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) on Monday. The lawsuit stems from repeated requests from students and parents to improve the quality and variety of the school cafeteria food. The school corporation has so far made no changes to school lunches. Since many of the students are on a USDA-funded free or reduced school lunch programs, those students have fewer choices for meals. Mrs. Schwartz's class decided that a lawsuit was their best option to force a change. The law firm of Stuart, Humboldt, & Chesney took on the case, pro bono, and filed suit in federal court. In a surprising legal strategy, the complaint states that students are subjected to a federally funded school lunch program as form of cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The students have amassed a mountain of evidence collected throughout the school year, including lunch menus with bizarre descriptions of meals, unflattering and stomach-churning pictures of school food, surreptitiously taken videos from the cafeteria kitchen, and DNA analysis of several mystery meats. Legal experts disagree on the merits of the case and the specifically the use of the Eighth Amendment argument. Sally Thomas, the head of Eden Park Food Services and former county jail food service manager, took a strident tone in rejecting the students’ claims: “Our school lunches have always met federal guidelines for quality. However, the guidelines are less clear about requirements for school lunch to be appetizing, aromatic, delectable, savory, scrumptious, or even appealing to fifth graders.” The school corporation has already hired a law firm and plans to mount a vigorous defense.