In this program guidance, Secretary of Agriculture, Brooke L. Rollins, strongly encourages child nutrition program operators to familiarize themselves with the key recommendations and consider how the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, 2025-2030 can be incorporated into program meals and snacks to promote healthy outcomes and healthy families.
This data collection fulfills states' reporting requirements and describes trends in program participation during the COVID-19 pandemic from July 2021 through September 2022. It is part of an ongoing study series examining child nutrition program operations, repurposed to collect waiver usage and trends in program participation and operations during the pandemic.
The third annual survey of School Food Authorities found that 95 percent of SFAs faced supply-chain related challenges in school year (SY) 2023-24, but that the number of reported challenges and impacts they have on school food service have largely declined compared to SY 2022-23. This report is the third in the series and, like the others, reports findings from a 20-minute online questionnaire sent to all SFAs operating child nutrition programs in schools to gather information on the impacts of continued supply chain challenges
USDA’s school meal programs are important to millions of children every school day. These meals give children the healthy food they need to learn, grow, and thrive. Many families will need to fill out an application to find out if they can get free or reduced price meals.
This memorandum and attachments provide information on the revised Form FNS-418: Report of the Summer Food Service Program for Children that is used to report data on meals served in the SFSP, and the revised Form FNS-10: Report of School Program Operations that is used to report data on meals served in the National School Lunch Program and School Breakfast Program.
On April 25, 2024, FNS published the final rule, Child Nutrition Programs: Meal Patterns Consistent With the 2020-2025 Dietary Guidelines for Americans. This rule includes minor updates to the Child and Adult Care Food Program and Summer Food Service Program to better align Child Nutrition Program requirements. These updates represent continued progress toward supporting the nutrition quality of school meals, strengthening the Child Nutrition Programs, and advancing USDA’s commitment to nutrition security.
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 rulemaking finalizes long-term school nutrition requirements based on the goals of the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, 2020-2025, robust stakeholder input, and lessons learned from prior rulemakings.
This webinar gives an overview of the rulemaking process, highlights specific regulatory changes and provisions that impact the school meal programs, and provides information regarding resources for the final rule.