After a year of free lunches for everyone, some Franklin High and Highlands School students will pay $4 for school lunches this year.
Macon County Schools is encouraging more parents to complete the school meal applications to determine if students qualify for free or reduced lunches.
During the Aug. 18 Board of Education meeting, School Nutrition Director David Lightner discussed the situation with the school nutritional supplements, which the county has not funded, and the school system could not justify based on data gathered from 2024-25.
“Last year, the county commission was gracious to fund Franklin High and Highlands School lunches for 2024-25 school year. Unfortunately, there was no funding approved in this year’s budget for that. At this point, Franklin High and Highlands are going to pay $4 for lunches – Franklin High School students and Highlands students that do not qualify for free and reduced meals,” Lightner said. “When we asked commissioners last year to fund the meals, the goal was always to be able to hopefully have the data to support adding Franklin High and Highlands as [Community Eligibility Provision] schools, but the data just didn’t support it. If we added Franklin High and Highlands, we would come up close to a million dollars short on what we normally receive in funding for meals.”
During Monday night’s meeting, the board approved nine academic or faculty handbooks for Bartram Academy, East Franklin Elementary School (for students and faculty), Franklin High School, Highlands School, Iotla Valley Elementary School, Macon Middle School, Macon Virtual Academy and Nantahala School ahead of school starting back. All student handbooks contain wireless device policies compliant with new state statutes requiring wireless policies be prohibited during instructional time.
The board discussed developing a stricter, more aggressive wireless policy using observations from teachers and administrators on what would work best.
The board approved a pair of contracts for financial services. A contract with Hurd Isenhour Lopes LLC would provide a mentor for financial personnel at the school system. Mentorship is required by the state for employees with less than five years of experience, according to finance officer Alayna Ledford, but as of the 2025-26 year the state is not funding that mandate.
The cost for the contract is $18,600. Another contract with Sessions Consulting will help the school manage and calculate its sales tax refund, costing a total of 10% of the refund, Ledford said.