FNS Documents & Resources

Questions have arisen regarding the eligibility for reimbursement of meals served to children who are placed by a public school district in special schools or institutions which are either not eligible to participate or choose not to participate in the NSLP and/or SBP.

This two-part rule allows limited poultry substitution and full substitution of all other commodities except for beef and pork; and reduces current commodity recordkeeping and reporting requirements for some local level recipient agencies, such as schools.

The Food and Nutrition Service, Food Distribution Division, will hold a meeting to discuss methods of value-pass-through of USDA donated commodities in food service management company fixed-rate-per- meal contracts in the National School Lunch Program. The purpose of this meeting is to offer state agencies, school food authorities, advocacy groups, food service management companies, and other interested parties the opportunity for dialogue prior to proposed rulemaking.

The aim of this pilot is to study the impact of the availability of universal-free school breakfast on breakfast participation and measures related to students’ nutritional status and academic performance. This pilot is not intended to evaluate the current SBP or the value of consuming breakfast.

Provision 2 requires that the school serve meals to participating children at no charge but reduces application burdens to once every 4 years and simplifies meal counting and claiming procedures by allowing a school to receive meal reimbursement based on claiming percentages.

This Instruction establishes policy for charging allowable costs associated with the administration of TEFAP, and for assigning such costs to states and eligible recipient agencies (ERAs).  Such classification of costs is necessary in order to demonstrate compliance with the statutory and regulatory requirements described in section II, of this document.

Twenty-two school food authorities across 16 states began testing pilot procedures in 2000-01 to determine and verify the eligibility of children for free and reduced price school meals. Three pilot F/RP eligibility determination models are being tested over a three-year period. 

Notice is hereby given that the national average minimum value of donated foods, or cash in lieu thereof, per lunch under NSLP (7 CFR part 210) and per lunch and supper under the Child and Adult Care Food Program (7 CFR part 226) shall be 15.25 cents for the period July 1, 2002 through June 30, 2003.

This rule incorporates in the Child and Adult Care Food Program regulations the changes mandated by the Agricultural Risk Protection Act of 2000 and the Grain Standards and Warehouse Improvement Act of 2000.

Research conducted in the early 1990s indicated that school meals, on balance, were failing to meet certain key nutritional goals. In light of these findings, the USDA launched a far-reaching reform of the school meals programs, a reform aimed at upgrading the nutritional content of school meals. Several elements of this reform are collectively referred to as the School Meals Initiative for Healthy Children (SMI). The status of this initiative, together with an examination of selected operational issues of these programs, are the principal subjects of this report.