GARDENDALE, Ala. – Jon Bivens doesn’t appreciate Gardendale Elementary School officials “branding” his son in the lunch line.

“They herd these kids like cattle,” he told AL.com.

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Last week, Bivens’ son came home with a large stamp across his arm with a happy face, and a message underneath.

“I thought it was a good job stamp,” the father said. But when he looked closer, he realized the stamp was actually for him. It read: “I need lunch money.”

The 8-year-old boy’s lunch account still had a positive balance – $1.38 – but officials contend they wanted to alert the family that it was running low. Bivens told the news site his son typically brings lunch from home, but uses the lunch account for treats and he didn’t plan on depositing more money with only days left in school.

“When you start stamping a message on a child’s body instead of calling … it’s not okay,” he said. “It’s a form of bullying and shaming the kids.”

Bivens, who opted to keep his son home the last few days of school over the incident, said he typically receives emails from the school when his son’s account runs low, but didn’t see a notice before the recent “branding.” Regardless, he doesn’t believe the shame stamp is appropriate in any situation, AL.com reports.

“I don’t care if my son has a -$100 balance … I don’t care,” he said. “Send a note home or an email … Where can I draw the line regarding my parental rights?”

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Gardendale principal Laura Ware told the news site she was unaware of the incident, but acknowledged that lunch room staff use a variety of means of notifying parents about school lunch accounts, including emails, notes, stickers and stamps.

Ware said school officials typically send emails before resorting to the other options.

“We want to communicate in a way that our parents are happy with,” Ware said, adding that parents can request emails only if they prefer. “That’s part of our jobs.”

The incident involving Bivens’ son is among numerous examples of school officials using extreme means to shake parents down over school lunch accounts.

In April, a parent complained that his daughter was denied lunch over an unpaid $4 tab at Killen, Alabama’s Brooks High School. Another parent wrote in an email about the incident to WHNT: “96 students at Brooks High School had their lunches taken away and thrown in the trash.”

In January, Hayward, Wisconsin school officials pursued criminal charges against a student who receives free lunch but “stole” a second lunch because he was still hungry, the Sawyer County Record reports.

The student was ultimately fined $200.50 for the “theft,” though community outrage about the incident sparked a GoFundMe page that raised more than $1,000 to cover the fine and extra meals for students in need, according to ABC 13.

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