Data & Research
This report responds to the legislative requirement of PL 110-246 to assess the effectiveness of state and local efforts to directly certify children for free school meals. Under direct certification, children are determined eligible for free school meals without the need for household applications by using data from other means-tested programs.
To ensure program integrity, school districts must sample household applications certified for free or reduced-price meals, contact the households, and verify eligibility. This process (known as household verification) can be burdensome for both school officials and households. Direct verification uses information from certain other means-tested programs to verify eligibility without contacting applicants. Potential benefits include: less burden for households, less work for school officials, and fewer students with school meal benefits terminated because of nonresponse to verification requests.
This is a report of the National Academies' National Research Council, Committee on National Statistics. It is available here by permission. It may also be obtained through the National Research Council's website. An earlier, prepublication version was made available in May 2010, but should no longer be used.
The third School Nutrition Dietary Assessment Study provides the most comprehensive measurement available of: (a) the nutritional quality of reimbursable meals served in the National School Lunch and Breakfast programs, (b) the nutritional quality of the breakfasts and lunches consumed by children who participate in these programs, and (c) student participation rates. The study data enable analyses of school meal policies that were not previously possible. This report describes exploratory work to develop a simulation model to predict the potential implications of changes that may be coming in policies and practices related to school meals and school food environments.