Contreras
GREENSBORO — On Dec. 21, former Guilford County Schools Superintendent Sharon Contreras made a $20,000 donation to Guilford Education Alliance to help pay off student meal debt in the district.
Several schools in the UK are starting to use facial recognition software to allow children to pay for their lunches.
Contreras made the gift in honor of her brother, Erick W. Contreras, a Nassau County, New York, police detective who died at the age of 53 from cancer. Erick Contreras was a 9/11 responder, and his cancer may have been linked to his onsite recovery work there. He served on the police force for 26 years until his death in January 2021.
During the pandemic, federal waivers allowed all students to eat school meals for free, regardless of their financial status. The federal government ended that program this summer. Students and their families are now required to apply for benefits and GCS has processed nearly 16,000 applications for free and reduced-price meals.
A fee-based meal plan will resume in January 2023. Once students have charged the value of five breakfasts and five lunches, which currently costs $19.25, schools are allowed to serve an alternative meal to students who don’t qualify for the free and reduced lunch program. An alternative meal consists of fruit and/or vegetable choices from that day’s menu, milk and/or water and a roll.
People are also reading…
More than 5,700 Guilford County students have meal debt totaling more than $111,000. Contreras’s contribution will go directly to the district to offset this balance. Community members who wish to make a donation to offset meal debt can visit www.gcsnc.com/Page/83656.
After serving as the superintendent for six years, Contreras announced that she would be leaving the district in January 2021. She is now CEO of The Innovation Project, a nonprofit organization that includes a cohort of N.C. superintendents. TIP focuses on equity, racial disparities and challenges of the pandemic. Whitney Oakley was appointed as the new Guilford County Schools superintendent in August 2022 after a national search.
