Cafeteria ethics

Quite some time ago, I caught on to the fact that my little spitfire diabetic was not much of an eater, at least not for the school lunch. (I can't blame her: it's noisy, and the food is...well, pretty much totally disgusting.) She gets free lunch though, so I knew she had to be picking up a tray. It doesn't take a detective to deduce, then, that she was throwing away plenty of good - or at least semi-edible - food every day. As a joke, after she would come to my office to check her blood sugar and she was on her way to the cafeteria, I started telling her, "Bring me back a banana!" Well, she has. More days than not now, she returns with a banana (on the days they don't run out of them in the cafeteria first), or some pretzels, or some other equally transportable food item that would have otherwise ended up in the garbage can. I was thinking this was  no big deal, because she is just taking food that would literally have been garbage if she didn't bring it to me. That was until I saw the sign: "DO NOT TAKE FOOD OUT OF THE CAFETERIA." Oops. I am sure she is enjoying bringing me a "treat," but I didn't realize she was having to sneak it out. Will I tell her to stop on account of the posted sign? Probably not. This girl gets very little positive anything in her life, and I'm not about to tell her to stop doing something we always get a good smile out of. Am I encouraging her to break rules? Yeah, but there are worse things in life than taking things out of the cafeteria. They can blame me if they catch her, and whatever: I hate for food to be wasted. Also to the objectors, I'd tell them to take a look in the garbage cans of the cafeteria: they are FULL of untouched food. It's a shame they can't donate the food to the hungry, really.

 

Totally unrelated, I had a first today: I told a "sick" kid - a frequent flyer - to go back to class after a brief rest, and he refused. Though I have had many, many kids try to delay the return for as long as possible, and have seen my share of tantrums over the ordeal, not once has a child absolutely refused. It ended up being esclated to a principal visit. No child says no to me!