The connection between nutrition and learning is undeniable, particularly in the earliest years, when children’s . Research has proven that hunger and food insecurity . There’s evidence that in the first 1,000 days of a child’s life can affect various elements of development and even change the structure of their brain. And researchers have suggested between household food insecurity in early childhood and kindergarten readiness. 

It’s difficult for a child who arrives at their school or child care program hungry to engage fully with educational activities, build relationships and develop the self-regulation skills essential for later academic success. CACFP addresses this fundamental barrier to learning by ensuring that children in child care programs and schools receive nutritious meals and snacks throughout the day, but the program is underused and unevenly accessed due to barriers including a lack of awareness among providers and administrative overload for participants.

indicates that among children from low-income families, CACFP participation can increase consumption of healthier foods. “If you compare centers that do participate in CACFP and those that don’t, the ones that are doing CACFP are oftentimes serving healthier meals because they have to have fruits, vegetables, whole grains [and foods with] reduced sugar and low sodium,” said Clarissa Hayes, deputy director of Child Nutrition Programs at the (FRAC). These requirements align with federal dietary guidelines and are regularly updated to reflect the latest nutritional science, she noted.

This nutritional quality has made CACFP “an indicator of quality when it comes to child care settings,” Hayes explained, because it demonstrates that programs are committed to supporting children’s overall well-being and development. 

The program helps kids “develop those healthy habits really early on,” said Alexia Thex, vice president of the , a national organization that supports the CACFP community. If children don’t build those habits when they’re very young, it’s extremely difficult to make changes through elementary, middle and high school.

CACFP operates through a reimbursement system in which eligible providers working in child care centers and family child care settings receive federal funding for serving meals that meet strict nutritional guidelines. Typically, providers use their own money to buy approved foods, which they prepare themselves, and then apply for reimbursement, but sometimes a program facilitates a contract for ordering and delivering prepared meals. Reimbursement levels are decided using a tiered system that was introduced in 1997. Providers serving children from low-income families receive higher reimbursements than those with children from more affluent families. 

Implementation varies from state to state. According to Thex, the reimbursement process is managed by various nonprofit in each state that are responsible for “maintaining program integrity while still getting tons of people fed and in all kinds of different areas.” These organizations also organize scheduled and surprise inspections to check in on how providers are using the funding. 

For many early learning programs, CACFP provides crucial financial support. Alethea Etinoff, who runs POC Learning Academy in Washington, D.C., has participated since 2013 and sees the program as beneficial on multiple levels. She uses the funding to cover the groceries needed to prepare healthy foods for the children in her program. “CACFP allows you to serve nutritious meals. I think it’s kind of fun because you get to introduce the kids to food that they may not get at home.” While her brussels sprouts received mixed reviews, she said the kids and families enjoy the exposure to a variety of options.

Early educators who participate with the program also gain valuable nutrition insights. “You don’t really think about how much sugar is in yogurt,” noted Etinoff. 

Despite its benefits, CACFP participation has declined significantly since 1997, primarily due to its administrative burden. The tiered system designed to direct resources to those most in need has created substantial paperwork requirements that many small providers find overwhelming. Consequently, 39% of eligible child care centers and 33% of eligible family child care homes do not participate, the National CACFP Association . 

In 2023, The association called for . “The paperwork has gotten a little bit crazy,” Thex contends. 

Rachel Bymun, who operates Luv Muffins Preschool and Child Care in Bay Point, California, described the daily reality: “The hardest part is having to track all the meals and having to plug that in every day for each one of the meals. And they’ve made the system so that if you don’t do it that day, you don’t get reimbursed for it.” Furthermore, she said, surprise CACFP inspections create an atmosphere of distrust. 

The process isn’t easy for providers. “If kids are in households that get SNAP, they’re automatically eligible for school meals,” Hayes explained. But that’s not the way it works with CACFP. The burden of eligibility falls on the provider, not the family — and many providers, who are already juggling multiple responsibilities may opt out due to time constraints and the complexity of the paperwork, which could jeopardize an important pathway to nutrition programs for families. 

The financial challenges are equally daunting. Many providers, particularly those in family child care settings, cannot access bulk purchasing discounts and must shop at local retailers. Meanwhile, reimbursement rates, while adjusted annually for inflation, do not justify increased administrative demands.

Janna Rodriguez, who runs Innovative Daycare Corp in Freeport, New York, said the reimbursements can feel paltry. “I’m spending $2,500 to $3,000 on food monthly on 16 children who are here from 7:30 in the morning till 5:25 in the afternoon, and they’re receiving breakfast, morning snack, lunch and dinner. They only reimburse me for two meals and a snack.” 

“As a child care owner, I appreciate the reimbursements,” said Rodriguez. “But the bureaucratic part is causing some of us to wonder if it’s really worth it.”

Despite its challenges, CACFP does offset food costs for many providers and demonstrates remarkable adaptability in serving diverse communities. Thex noted that programs can be culturally responsive and customize their menus, for example, serving halal foods for Muslim families, accommodating plant-forward preferences and even sourcing organic ingredients when possible.

Similarly, the program supports children with special dietary needs. Bymun started her child care program because her daughter had severe food allergies. She regularly adapts meals for children with various allergies and dietary restrictions, though this flexibility comes at a significant additional cost.

CACFP helps, but the program only works if it’s accessible for the providers, Bymun noted. 

As the cuts take effect and families lose access to SNAP benefits, Etinoff anticipates that “CACFP is going to be a lifeline for the parents.”

WASHINGTON — Amid persistent  in the United States, lawmakers and advocates on Wednesday stressed the importance of school meal programs during a U.S. Senate Agriculture subcommittee hearing.

Hunger severely impacts  and can lead to negative outcomes in school, . Last year, 47.4 million people lived in food-insecure households, according to the .

Federally funded efforts, such as the National School Lunch Program and School Breakfast Program, provide free and reduced-cost meals to students across the country.

Get stories like this delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for ����Ӱ�� Newsletter

Advocates say these programs play a crucial role in helping to reduce child hunger and urged the panel to expand them.

“School lunch should always be free and definitely free of judgment,” said Sen. John Fetterman, who chairs the Subcommittee on Food and Nutrition, Specialty Crops, Organics, and Research.

“Honestly, it shouldn’t be a conversation — it would be like asking the kids to pay for the school bus every morning or to pay for their own textbooks at school,” Fetterman said.

Fetterman and fellow Pennsylvania Democrat Sen. Bob Casey  in June aiming to expand free or reduced-price meals access for kids. Part of the initiatives also call for amending the Community Eligibility Provision, which allows schools and school districts in low-income areas to offer free meal options to all students.

Fetterman also sponsored the Universal School Meals Program Act, an effort introduced by  last May, which would “provide free breakfast, lunch, and dinner to every student — without demanding they prove they are poor enough to deserve help getting three meals a day,” according to Sanders’  of the bill. U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, a Minnesota Democrat, introduced .

Subcommittee ranking member Mike Braun of Indiana said he introduced the  last July with Ohio Democrat Sen. Sherrod Brown in an effort “to better prioritize and support the use of American food in school meal programs.”

That bipartisan bill would increase requirements for school meals to include U.S. products.

States a model

Crystal FitzSimons, interim president of the Food Research & Action Center, pointed out that eight states  that offer school meals to all students, regardless of one’s household income. Those states are California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico and Vermont.

The national nonprofit aims to reduce poverty-related hunger in the U.S. through research, advocacy and policy solutions.

“While those eight states are showing us what is possible, there are critical steps the subcommittee and Congress should take to enhance the reach and impact of school meals nationwide,” FitzSimons said.

As one piece of the puzzle, FitzSimons said Congress can “ensure that all children nationwide are hunger-free and ready to learn while they are at school by allowing all schools to offer meals to all their students at no charge” and the Universal School Meals Program Act “creates that path.”

Meg Bruening, professor and department head at Pennsylvania State University’s Department of Nutritional Sciences, said “the school meal programs in the U.S. provide a critical safety net for almost 30 million children with meals each year” — comprising 60% of children in the country.

Bruening said these school meal programs align closely with the , “ensuring a variety of healthy foods are offered to children while at school, where children spend most of their waking and eating hours.”

The guidelines, developed by the USDA and the Health and Human Services Department, are .

Summer EBT

Georgia Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock underscored how child hunger increases in the summer months when kids lack access to regular meals at school.

Thirty-seven states, the District of Columbia and multiple territories and tribal nations opted in this year to a new effort, known as Summer EBT, to feed kids during the long summer months.

Also called Sun Bucks, the USDA initiative provides low-income families with school-aged children a grocery-buying benefit of $120 per child for the summer.

But 13 states,, chose not to participate in the program in 2024. The USDA said states have until Jan. 1 to submit a notice of intent if they plan to participate in the program next year. Iowa has to receive federal money for an alternative summer meal program.

Warnock said he hopes  on Summer EBT.

“Unfortunately, my home state — the state of Georgia — has not opted in to Sun Bucks, with some officials saying it does not result in higher nutritional outcomes for students, and that existing programs are ‘effective,’” he said.

“I heard our state leadership say: ‘We don’t need it,’” he added. “I’m still trying to figure out who this ‘we’ is — for whom are you speaking when you say: ‘We don’t need it?’”

A spokesperson for Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp has said the governor has concerns about the program’s dietary standards and cost.

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Iowa Capital Dispatch maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Kathie Obradovich for questions: info@iowacapitaldispatch.com. Follow Iowa Capital Dispatch on and .

COLUMBIA — Just over $8 million meant to help families afford groceries went unused last month, according to state data.

Last August, the state Department of Social Services mailed nearly 537,000 debit cards loaded with money for groceries to families across the state. The money was part of a temporary federal program during the COVID-19 pandemic meant to help families buy groceries during the months when their children weren’t in school.

The last round of cards, which gave families $120 per child, expired in May, nine months after they were issued. Nearly 470,000 cards — 87.5% of those mailed — were activated, totaling $56.2 million.

Get stories like this delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for ����Ӱ�� Newsletter

Whether families used up all of their allotment is unknown. DSS doesn’t track how much of a card is used once it’s activated. But with the cost of groceries, it’s expected that families who activated their card at all quickly used their total available.

Cards remain good nine months after they’re used for an initial purchase of any amount. That means the 1,300 people who first used the cards between April and May have until next January or February to use the remaining money before it, too, returns to the federal government.

The exact reasons 67,000 families did not use their cards at all are unknown. There could be several reasons a parent didn’t use the money, DSS officials and advocates have said.

Some cards may have been lost in the shuffle of other pandemic assistance, Sue Berkowitz, an advocate with Appleseed Legal Justice Center, said previously. Others may have thrown it out because they didn’t know what it was or that it was legitimate.

The social services and education departments tried to get the word out through news interviews and social media posts, agency spokespeople said.

Still other families may have intentionally discarded the aid. The cards went to the addresses listed for any student who qualifies to eat free or reduced-priced meals at school.

And the vast majority of schools statewide qualify for a federal program that allows all students to eat for free, regardless of their parents’ income. That means families who normally don’t qualify for any public assistance received the grocery debit cards anyway.

The cards sent out in August were the final of seven rounds of federal pandemic grocery aid.

In all, the state distributed 2.26 million cards between July 2020 and last August providing $1.04 billion for groceries. Parents used 90% of those cards at least once, according to DSS data.

While no complete database of states’ usage exists, South Carolina families seem to have used the money at a higher rate than other states. For instance, Missouri had about in unused grocery aid in February, and Louisiana had in April, just ahead of their cards’ expiration dates.

A new, permanent version of the program began in 35 states this summer. South Carolina was not among them after Gov. Henry McMaster declined to participate, pointing to that feed children over the summers.

Unlike the pandemic-era aid, which the federal government fully funded, the new program requires states to chip in half the administrative cost.

Democratic legislators for his decision, but that would have required him to sign on and asking Congress to extend the Jan. 1 deadline to sign up went nowhere.

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. SC Daily Gazette maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Seanna Adcox for questions: info@scdailygazette.com. Follow SC Daily Gazette on and .

Elementary school children enjoyed breakfast foods, snacks and milk at Waverly East School in Lansing Wednesday morning as leaders announced a program that will bring free breakfast and lunch to kids around the state — even when school is out for the summer.

U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Lansing), chair of the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee, led an initiative to pour federal funds into expanding food access during the summer for children. While some children have had access to free food during the school year, this program will make summer meals permanent.

“We have this great opportunity for breakfast and lunch and in many cases, for snacks in school,” Stabenow said. “But then we get to the summer, and what we have seen is far less funding available, fewer flexibilities and support for summer meals.”

Get stories like this delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for ����Ӱ�� Newsletter

According to Food Bank Council of Michigan Executive Director Phil Knight, Michigan is the first state to implement the program, which is .

Other states are also expected to implement their share of federal funds, but several Republican governors rejected the aid.

“Feeding children should not be a partisan issue,” State Superintendent Michael Rice said.

Stabenow predicted the program will feed 900,000 children in Michigan this summer. The new, permanent funding breaks up into three different categories, so families in different situations have flexibility to get food.

“We’ve had meals on site for a long time, although you basically have to fight for money every year,” Stabenow said. “Every year we have to fight to get summer meals, so now this is permanent.”

The first is a “traditional summer meals” program, which serves children meals at a specific location and does not require an application. Another program offers “meals-to-go,” which are available in more rural areas. Families can pick up multiple meals at a time or get food delivered.

“We have set up all these flexibilities so that there’s more opportunities to pick up food,” Stabenow said.

The final option is for kids who attend a school that participates in the National School Lunch or Breakfast Program and receives free or reduced-price lunch or if the child is on Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) or Medicaid.

“We’re helping people where they are, not where we wish they were. And we understand that this is not just an expense; it’s also an investment,” Knight said.

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Michigan Advance maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Susan J. Demas for questions: info@michiganadvance.com. Follow Michigan Advance on and .

The most recent state budget made changes to allow more students to be fed at no cost, but the battle to quell child hunger is still ongoing in Ohio.

The budget bill passed last year provided more than $4 million in funding to allow any students qualified for reduced-price of free breakfast and lunch can get the meals at no cost for the .

It’s not quite the universal meals that when budget talks began, but the are progress in the right direction, child and education advocates in the state concluded.

Get stories like this delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for ����Ӱ�� Newsletter

The programs that are still attempting to help stem the flow of student hunger are seeing the struggles that inflation has on the cost of food, and Katherine Ungar, senior policy associate with the Children’s Defense Fund of Ohio, said the stigma of the income-based school food programs is still a barrier.

“It’s creating these categories that can create that stigma,” said Ungar.

Ohio has taken strides to help in the future by pledging to use federal dollars to establish a summer program that will give low-income families with child of school-aged children “grocery-buying benefits” while schools are closed, according to the USDA, who estimates more than 29 million children nationally could benefit.

“During the summer months, we estimate almost 1 million kids … lose access to meals,” Ungar said.

CDF-Ohio researched the whole-child impacts of categories like housing, health care and food insecurity. In fiscal year, 2023, the group’s showed an increase in the state’s students who were eligible for reduced-price or free school meals and considered “economically disadvantaged.”

The number of kids qualifying for the no-cost or low-cost lunches, for which any student in a household with up to 185% of the federal poverty line is eligible, when from 46.6% in the 2021-22 school year to nearly 50% in the 2022-23 school year.

This new summer benefit will be eligible to about 837,000 Ohio children, according to Ungar, and the economic impact of the benefit could bring $150 million into local economies.

The (EBT) gives eligible families who apply pre-loaded cards with $40 per child per month. The EBT program works in conjunction with Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, Women, Infants and Children (WIC) funds and other nutrition assistance efforts.

But the program can only be used if eligible families apply. Children who are certified as eligible for free or reduced-price meals at school would be eligible for the Summer EBT as well, but still have to apply through the same process as the free-or-reduced-lunch application.

“We know there are families who qualify but have not completed the application form,” Ungar said. “Some families may not think they’re eligible, but it’s important that anyone who could be eligible applies, so that those benefits can get to the people who need them.”

A similar program was available during the COVID-19 pandemic, and the USDA found that the program decreased “children’s food hardship” by 33%, and took between 2.7 and 3.9 million out of hunger across the country.

According to research by the , the pandemic EBT program brought Ohio children an estimated $2.2 billion in nutrition assistance between Spring 2020 to Summer 2023, the end of the pandemic program.

is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Ohio Capital Journal maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor David DeWitt for questions: info@ohiocapitaljournal.com. Follow Ohio Capital Journal on and .

WASHINGTON — As Congress barrels toward a partial government shutdown, the White House Monday warned that a program that helps millions of low-income families afford healthy food could see substantial cuts.

The White House released a , estimating that nearly 7 million people who rely on the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, also known as WIC, could be at risk of losing funds to purchase select food and receive vouchers for vegetables and fruit.

The program provides financial support for those who are low-income and pregnant or nursing, as well as for children up to 5 years old.

U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said during a Monday White House briefing that WIC recipients could feel the impact of the shutdown within days.

“Millions of those moms, (babies) and young children would see a lack of nutrition assistance,” he said.

Vilsack, Iowa’s former governor, said some states have leftover WIC benefits and “could extend (WIC) for a week or so.”

“The vast majority of WIC participants would see an immediate reduction and elimination of those benefits, which means the nutrition assistance that’s provided would not be available,” he said.

For example, in Alabama, about 112,000 WIC recipients could lose their benefits, and in Florida, more than 421,000 as well. In Michigan, more than 207,000 recipients could lose their WIC benefits and in North Carolina, it’s more than 268,000 WIC recipients.

Additionally, new eligible participants could face a backlog.

“Without the urgent investment of additional funds, state WIC offices could soon be forced to consider waiting lists for prospective participants — a drastic step not seen in nearly 30 years,” Kate Franken, board chair of the National WIC Association, which is the non-profit advocacy arm of WIC, said in a statement.

The impending shutdown comes after President Joe Biden with Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy earlier this year to raise the debt ceiling. set maximum spending levels for the next fiscal year.

However, none of the 12 appropriations bills has been passed by the House, and a handful of far-right Republicans are , even if it means a partial government shutdown.

“House Republicans have turned their backs on the bipartisan budget deal that a large majority of them voted for just a few months ago and proposed a continuing resolution (CR) that makes devastating cuts to programs that millions of hardworking Americans count on,” the White House said in a press release.

A continuing resolution, or CR, is regularly used to keep the government funded for weeks or a couple of months while the House and Senate finish work on the 12 annual spending bills.

Without a CR by Saturday, the end of the fiscal year, a partial shutdown will occur and programs that have discretionary funding, like WIC, will lapse.

Funding for WIC is not mandatory spending, meaning the program won’t be automatically funded regardless of a government shutdown. It’s funded through the Agriculture appropriations bill, which has not been passed by Congress.

The White House criticized the Agriculture appropriations bill the House passed out of its committee that did not include the supplemental funding the Biden administration requested.

“Without the Administration’s funding request, states could soon be forced to institute waiting lists for WIC, causing mothers and children to lose access to the vital nutrition assistance,” the White House said.

WIC funding is distributed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition Service to states through a formula. The share of eligible people who participate in WIC can vary between states — California, Massachusetts, and Minnesota, have a coverage rate for WIC by over 60%.

is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Arkansas Advocate maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Sonny Albarado for questions: info@arkansasadvocate.com. Follow Arkansas Advocate on and .