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Federal school breakfast and lunch
programs: Do they really benefit districts?
By Dr. Bill Phillips
IASA Field Services Director
superintendent of Gardner-South Wilmington High
School, that district left the school lunch program.
Since this is such an unusual occurrence, I thought
that I would discuss their rationale and some facts
about the National School Lunch Program (NSLP).
Superintendent Gary Lewis of Catlin felt that some
students were “going away hungry” due to dietary
restrictions placed upon school districts participating
in the NSLP. Some of the concerns included the
facts that nutrition guidelines have become overly
restrictive, there were new calorie limits placed on
school districts, and, most importantly, kids seemed
to be leaving the lunch still hungry.
Having duplicated this removal from the NSLP in
the late 1970s, I can concur with Superintendent
Lewis’ analysis of the issue. Currently, it appears that
most districts feel safe within the environment and
regulations of NSLP, and this unusual solution should
bear some observation.
Here are some salient facts about NSLP:
The National School Lunch Act was granted and
received permanent status in 1946, and from this
legislation came the NSLP.
The NSLP is a federal and state reimbursement
program that provides cash reimbursements per meal
to schools as an entitlement to provide nutritious
meals to children.
All NSLP sponsors are required to offer free and
reduced-price
lunches
that
meet
federal
requirements.
Any public school, intermediate unit, charter
school, area vocational technical or career technology
school, public child care institution, and tax-exempt
non-public school, or residential child care institution
can apply to be an NSLP sponsor.
All eligible schools can participate and all children
attending those schools can participate if eligible.
Schools participating in NSLP also receive
agricultural commodities (unprocessed or partially
processed foods) as a supplement to the per-meal
cash reimbursements, in amounts based on the
number of lunches they serve.
Congress created the NSLP after an investigation
into the health of young men rejected in the World
War II draft showed a connection between physical
deficiencies and childhood malnutrition. In response,
Congress enacted the 1946 National School Lunch
Act as a “measure of national security, to safeguard
the health and well-being of the Nation’s children.”
The NSLP provided nutritionally balanced, low-cost or
free lunches to more than 31 million children in 2011.
The School Breakfast Program (SBP) is a
federally assisted meal program operating in public
and nonprofit private schools and residential child
care institutions. It began as a pilot project in 1966,
and was made permanent in 1975. The SBP is
administered at the federal level by the Food and
Nutrition Service. At the state level, the program is
usually administered by state education agencies,
which operate the program through agreements with
local school food authorities (USDA, 2012).
The SBP operates in the same way as the NSLP
in that qualifying schools that elect to participate
receive cash subsidies from the U.S. Department of
Agriculture for each meal that they serve. The meals
must meet federal, USDA guidelines and be offered
at free or reduced prices.
The eligibility requirements for the SBP and the
NSLP are income-based. Students identified as living
in poverty and students identified as homeless
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