This data collection fulfills states’ reporting requirements and describes trends in program participation during the COVID-19 pandemic from July 2020 through Dec. 2021. It is part of an ongoing study series examining CN program operations, repurposed to collect waiver reports from all states. A previous report in the series detailed waiver usage and trends in program participation and operations from March through Sept. 2020.

This report responds to the requirement of PL 110-246 to assess the effectiveness of state and local efforts to directly certify children for free school meals.

Phase II was a methodological study, conducted in six sites during 2015–2016, to test an approach to determine its feasibility for a national evaluation.

The USDA Food and Nutrition Service’s 1990 WIC Medicaid Study I found that prenatal WIC participation was associated with improved birth outcomes and savings in Medicaid costs. A 2003 study by Buescher, et al., found that WIC participation during childhood was associated with increased health care utilization and Medicaid costs, and concluded that WIC enhanced children’s linkages to the health care system.

SNAP Education (SNAP-Ed) is the nutrition education and obesity prevention component of SNAP; its goal is to improve the likelihood that persons eligible for SNAP will make nutritious food choices within a limited budget and choose physically active lifestyles consistent with the current Dietary Guidelines for Americans and the USDA food guidance.

WIC Participant and Program Characteristics 2016 (PC 2016) summarizes the demographic characteristics of participants in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) nationwide in April 2016. It includes information on participant income and nutrition risk characteristics, estimates breastfeeding initiation rates for WIC infants, and describes WIC members of migrant farm-worker families. PC 2016 is the most recent in a series of reports generated from WIC state management information system data biennially since 1992.

The WIC Infant and Toddler Feeding Practices Study 2 (WIC ITFPS-2)/ “Feeding My Baby” Study captures data on caregivers and their children over the first 5 years of the child’s life after WIC enrollment to address a series of research questions regarding feeding practices, associations between WIC services and those practices, and the health and nutrition outcomes of children receiving WIC.