It was common practice, although it isn’t any longer: handing out three different colored lunch tickets. The red ones were for children who paid full price for lunch; the blue ones were for children who paid a reduced price for their meal; the green ones were for the children who got their lunches for free. It was an easy way to count up how many of each were purchased every day. It made it easier to know the percentage of students who were in each category, and to report the numbers to the federal agency in charge of funding free lunch programs. But revealing for all to see who could pay full price for lunch and who could not was a daily exercise in cruelty. Humiliation was portioned out just as surely as the whipped potatoes and carton of milk. As they got into the upper grades, many students skipped lunch altogether, preferring hunger over embarrassment.

One of the blessings of the digital age is that every child does the exact same thing at lunch: they punch in their student ID number, they grab a tray, and they pick up their lunch. No one knows who receives assistance and who doesn’t (in my sons’ elementary school, food assistance forms had to be filled out for each child, whether they needed the help or not. Everyone handed in the forms, no exceptions and no embarrassment.). It may not be as flashy as multiplying loaves and fishes, but it’s a miracle of hospitality and generosity all the same.