No students in Newport News Public Schools will have to worry about lunch money when they come back from summer break.
Last week, the school division received approval from the Virginia Department of Education to use a federal program that reimburses meals at schools with a certain proportion of students from low-income families. NNPS executive director of child nutrition services Cathy Alexander presented the news to the school board Tuesday evening.
It’ll be the first division in Hampton Roads and the largest in the state to make both breakfast and lunch free for all students.
“My goal is always to feed as many students as possible,” Alexander said in an interview Wednesday. “I’m just glad we can provide that now at no charge.”
Newport News has gradually made meals free at schools across the district using the Community Eligibility Provision, part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National School Lunch Program. The first Newport News schools were added in 2015, and the program rolled out nationwide in 2014.
Last school year, the number of schools charging for lunch was down to six. Lunches at the remaining elementary schools cost $2.45, and lunches at the middle and high schools cost $2.55.
The school district has taken a cautious approach to adding schools, according to Alexander, because they wanted to make sure the financials balance out. The student nutrition division is self-supporting and doesn’t take money from the rest of the school system’s budget.
Newport News’s hesitancy is a common trait among school divisions in Virginia, according to Kathleen Murphy, a child nutrition specialist with Virginia Hunger Solutions. The nonprofit is part of a consortium of groups that have been advocating for participation in the program with the department of education.
“In a lot of divisions, we’ve heard ‘Well, my student at the elementary school has CEP,’ ” Murphy said. “But once they move up to the middle or high school level, they don’t have CEP and the family has to start paying for lunch and breakfast again.”
Eligibility is based on the percentage of students who participate in certain public benefit programs; they’re usually automatically eligible for free meals already. If at least 40% of students at a school or group of schools are in that category, the schools are eligible for CEP funding.
But the actual reimbursement rate for each meal from the USDA, if they choose to stop charging students and rely on it, also depends on that percentage.
In Richmond City Schools, the second largest district in the state to not charge, about 63% of students district-wide fell into that category as of April 1, according to department of education statistics. That’s just high enough that it gets 100% of meals reimbursed.
Newport News is much lower — only about 47% of students met those criteria. That’s less than Portsmouth (51%) and Norfolk (49%) schools, neither of which use the program across the board.
Virginia Hunger Solutions director Salaam Bhatti said it’s a surprise to see a division with that low a rate choose to expand.
And Alexander said that adding the six extra schools will drop its reimbursement rate even more. But that’s okay — the drop in reimbursement has in the past been made up for by more students eating meals.
In addition to balancing things out financially, advocates with Virginia Hunger Solutions and Alexander say more students eating breakfast and lunch at school brings a number of other benefits.
Bhatti said that research shows students who eat nutritious meals at school are more likely to pay attention and not act out. It can also improve scores on standardized tests.
Providing free meals reduces the stigma for students from low-income families, Murphy said. It also reduces stress for families and the amount of paperwork required for families who might otherwise apply to get free or reduced lunches for their children.
Alexander said that families that still have money on school accounts can either keep it there — the program won’t cover things like snacks or ice cream — or ask her department for a refund.
Virginia Hunger Solutions expects that Newport News won’t be the last to make this decision. Atlanta Public Schools in Georgia announced last week that they would offer free meals to all students.
“By and large, schools that are only getting partial reimbursement are starting to see the light on how CEP is so beneficial,” Bhatti said.
