philando castile’s free lunch charity pays entire school district’s student “lunch debt”

Last year we reported on the school lunch fund, Philando Feeds the Children, that had been initiated in Philando Castile’s former school district in Minneapolis created to honor Castile’s spirit of selflessness for the kids at his school. The program ensured that no child would go hungry while at the school or be subjected to so-called “lunch debt”.

“When a student couldn’t pay for their lunch, a lot of times [Castile] actually paid for their lunch out of his own pocket,” said Stacy Koppen, nutritional services director for the St. Paul Public Schools, told WCCO. “No child goes hungry so we ensure that every student has breakfast and also lunch whether they can pay or not.”

According to an update on the fund’s website, enough donations have been made to wipe out the lunch debt of all 56 schools in the Saint Paul Public Schools district in Minnesota, meaning 37,000 children are being fed without issue.

Philando Castile was murdered by a police officer in front of his family during a traffic stop in 2016.