Rural families more likely to be poor, but rural schools are less likely to participate in free lunch programs - Entrepreneur Generations

Though rural families are more likely to be poor, rural schools are less likely to participate in district-wide free lunch and breakfast programs according to an analysis by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Economic Research Service.

The USDA Community Eligibility Program allows schools in high-poverty areas to provide free meals for everyone rather than doing so only for students in need. That means schools don't have to process individual applications, and the reduction in paperwork saves schools money. More than 10 million students in more than 20,000 high-poverty schools participated in the program in the 2016-2017 school year, but rural schools did so at a lower rate than their urban counterparts. The study "found that only a third of eligible rural schools participated in the program, while 46% of eligible schools in urban areas did. The study also found that the Southeast had the highest percentage of eligible schools participating in the program," Bryce Oates reports for The Daily Yonder.

Why would schools decide not to participate in CEP if the program feeds kids and saves money? The study's authors speculate that, in some cases, "switching to CEP might increase demand for school meals in ways that put a strain on the district or a specific cafeteria. Also, districts might not be able to overcome the initial administrative hurdle of qualifying for CEP, even though it would save staff time in the long run," Oates reports. "CEP is a relative new approach to school nutrition programs that followed the update of school meal standards in 2012. Once the new standard was implemented, according to ERS, 'schools in rural areas were more likely than other schools to report increases in student complaints, decreases in meal participation, and higher costs due to lower meal volume.'"

from The Rural Blog https://ift.tt/2y7I79w Rural families more likely to be poor, but rural schools are less likely to participate in free lunch programs - Entrepreneur Generations

Posted by Entrepreneur Generations

Tweet