Everyday I would go to the school cafeteria with my packed lunch, looking enviously at those in the lunch line. I always wondered why the only guaranteed Halal meal was always the same: sunbutter and jelly.
So I was furious to think that Loudoun County Public Schools does not provide halal meals to students who need them. For the past two years that I’ve been going to LCHS, I thought there wasn’t a meal for Muslim students to eat. However one day I decided to speak up, and I found the Dietary Accommodations program.
I wanted to learn about this program, and why I never heard anything about it at Loudoun County High School. In fact, there is only one student in the 2025-2026 school year who is enrolled in this program here. So as a result, I immediately reached out to the amazing Nutrition and Procurement Coordinator of LCPS, Brittany Palaschak. Palaschak explained the entire program to me in depth. The program’s driving initiative is to provide students who have dietary restrictions with nourishing alternatives, promoting inclusivity to all.
According to Palaschak, the county is required by law to make dietary accommodations, noting that there has been a push for halal options recently. Palaschak said that if the accommodation is medical, such as food allergens, then medical documentation is required, though vegetarian options are offered daily.
When I came to find out that LCPS provides a halal and gluten free menu upon request, I was thrilled to share the message with students and friends who don’t get school lunch because of their restrictions. Along with this information, Palascak mentioned that the dietary accommodations program has been provided to students districtwide for two years. They’ve been broadcasting this program through community newsletters.
Any student can apply for this program, and here’s how:
Go to the LCPS website, click on “meal related information,” and you will be directed to the dietary accommodations request form. Here is the link for easy access: https://www.lcps.org/o/lcps/page/menu-information
Once you’ve clicked on the “Dietary Accommodations Request Form” button and fill out the Google form with your parent or guardian. Palascak will connect your parent or guardian with the cafeteria manager, explaining the procedure and sending them the new menu.
If a student would want the menu on specific days, that’s when the parent will communicate with the cafeteria manager, letting them know when they would like to have the halal or gluten free option. The meal options will be different each day. For the halal menu, weekly main courses vary from halal chicken and waffles, halal burgers, halal breaded chicken sandwiches, and halal beef hot dogs. The cost for students of every specialized menu cost the same as the student’s typical school lunch, so students are not being charged more for purchasing the meal.
LCPS started off with tailoring halal options onto the traditional menu. For example, if there was a traditional chicken nugget main course, there would also be the halal equivalent, but according to Palascak, a lot of the time the students with the dietary accommodations who needed the alternative items, were the ones that weren’t getting it. Another reason why LCPS changed the process of students getting these dietary alternatives is because it was not financially sustainable. The halal options are more expensive, and LCPS nutritional services are self operated, meaning they do the work within their own budget. Therefore, they changed the procedure to get students with dietary restrictions their nourishing meals while still providing affordable meals to everyone.
