Financial support provided by the Legislature helps to ensure Washington children have access to healthy school meals. In fiscal year 2022, the Legislature provided $11.5 million to eliminate the co-pay for reduced-price meals, support summer meal programs, provide school districts with financial support for breakfast meal service, and provide…

The federal child nutrition programs provide assistance to schools and other institutions in the form of cash, commodity food, and administrative support (such as technical assistance and administrative funding) based on the provision of meals and snacks to children. The programs provide financial support and/or foods to the institutions that…

The federal government has a long history of investing in programs for feeding children, starting with federal aid for school lunch programs in the 1930s. Today, federal child nutrition programs support food served to children in schools and a variety of other institutional settings. The child nutrition programs support meals and snacks served to…

As this paper was being written, school systems across the country were increasingly announcing plans for full or partial distance learning to respond to COVID-19, and it seems likely that more school systems may implement these plans should the pandemic surge in the fall or winter. As a result, working parents with school-age children are faced…

The next President of the United States has an enormous responsibility--and opportunity--to provide an equitable foundation for a new generation of learners. The magnitude of the coronavirus pandemic has demonstrated the importance of schools as community anchors that children and families rely on for much more than an education. This document…

Schools are the ideal setting for combining state health and education goals for all children. Children and adolescents spend more time in schools than in any other environment outside of their homes. They also form foundational health habits during their school years. By emphasizing school health and wellness, state leadership can support both…

The Special Milk Program provides milk to children in schools, child care institutions and eligible camps that do not participate in other Federal child nutrition meal service programs. The program reimburses schools and institutions for the milk they serve. In 2008, 4,676 schools and residential child care institutions participated, along with…

The School Breakfast Program 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 School Breakfast Program is administered at the Federal level by the Food and Nutrition Service. At the State level,…

"Kids Count in Colorado!" is an annual publication of the Colorado Children's Campaign, which provides the best available state- and county-level data to measure and track the education, health and general well-being of the state's children. "Kids Count in Colorado!" informs policy debates and community discussions, serving as…

The first witness in this oversight hearing on the school lunch program, the Assistant Secretary for Food and Consumer Services (Department of Agriculture), presented the findings of a study on child nutrition programs mandated by Congress and discussed the Reagan Administration's view of the status of the programs as a whole, including its policy…

This hearing transcript presents testimony on the effects of placing federal nutrition programs in state block grants as required by the Personal Responsibility Act, the welfare bill contained in the "Contract with America." Witnesses testified that federal food programs such as Women Infants and Children (WIC), the Senior Nutrition…

Three witnesses gave testimony at this hearing on restoring $150 million in entitlement funding to Federal child nutrition programs. They were Ernest Morial, Mayor of New Orleans, representing the U.S. Conference of Mayors' Task Force on Joblessness and Hunger; Faith Gravenmier, representing the American School Food Service Association; and Lynn…

The first witness in this hearing was the Assistant Secretary for Food and Consumer Services, Department of Agriculture, who presented the Reagan Administration's 1984 budget proposals for cuts in child nutrition programs. The proposals included changes in the school lunch program, a freeze on the funding level of the WIC program, elimination of…

"New Jersey Kids Count 2011" again documents both advances and setbacks in key areas that affect child well-being--poverty, health, child protection, education, including early learning, and adolescent well-being. To better gauge New Jersey's progress in essential areas, a "New Jersey Kids Count Report Card" that identifies…

More than 50 million meals are served annually to Colorado's children through the National School Lunch Program, School Breakfast Program, Special Milk Program, and Summer Food Service Program for children. Most of this report is comprised of tables showing average daily participation, meals served, and other statistics about school meal programs…