FNS Documents & Resources

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. At the state level, the program is usually administered by state education agencies, which operate the program through agreements with local school food authorities in more than 78,000 schools and institutions.

The National School Lunch Program is a federally assisted meal program operating in public and nonprofit private schools and residential child care institutions. It provides nutritionally balanced, low-cost or no-cost lunches to children each school day. The program was established under the Richard B. Russell National School Lunch Act, signed into law by President Harry Truman in 1946.

School meals are required to meet specific nutrition standards to operate the school meals programs. The standards align school meals with the latest nutrition science and the real world circumstances of America’s schools.