Policy Priorities
Provide Healthy School Meals for All
Healthy School Meals for All
In Rhode Island, we believe that every child deserves access to nutritious food to fuel their learning and growth. Healthy School Meals for All is a policy initiative that ensures all public school students receive breakfast and lunch at no cost, regardless of their household income.
Prioritizing our Children, Families, and Schools
Reduces Food Insecurity and Improves Learning
School meals play a critical role in student health, well-being, and academic success. Increasing access to school meals alleviates hunger, supports good nutrition, and positively impacts attendance, behavior, and cognition, particularly in the 38% of RI households with children who are are food-insecure. (2023 RI Life Index)
No More Stigma in the Cafeteria
When all students can eat for free without concern for whether a parent/guardian has provided money for meals or completed a qualified meal benefit application, stress and stigma vanish. The children who need meals the most don’t feel singled out. All students become equal in the cafe. No child should have to prove they are worthy of nutritious food.
Elimination of Meal Debt
Student meal debt in schools across RI has ballooned following the end of the federal free meal program during the pandemic. School districts must often pay off this debt with general education funds when student unpaid meal accounts aren’t cleared. Turning educators into “bill collectors” isn’t compatible with building positive and productive relationships between schools and families.
Federal income guidelines for free/reduced-price meals are nowhere near sufficient to meet the needs of struggling families. The meal benefit application process can also be intimidating, confusing, or shameful for some families.
Better Quality Meal Programs
Schools can better invest in food service programs as a result of greater participation with increased reimbursement. New equipment, staffing, local food, and more wholesome scratch cooking can be budgeted. With less of an administrative burden, programs can spend more time on engaging students in menu development, taste tests, and the cafeteria experience.
Legislative Update, 2024 Session:
A limited number of food access-related bills became law this year. The final FY2024 budget includes sufficient funding to eliminate the reduced-price category for school meals, enabling students who would otherwise pay the reduced-price cost for meals to be offered meals at no charge to their family. Similarly in the realm of school food, SB3045/HB8094A enabled a two-year waiver of whole grain requirements for meals served in public schools. These changes will be seen in the upcoming academic year.
Learn about the success of free school meals in Massachusetts!
“As a as a parent myself, I can, I can. I know for a fact that students will not eat a lunch unless it is something desirable and something that they want to eat. So the fact that over 60,000 more kids are eating school lunch, it certainly, can be attributed to the fact that meals are free or are free of charge to families. Which is alleviating, additional costs, and burden for many families. But also that something must be going right in school cafeterias in terms of students continuing to come back to participate, in lunch and breakfast.” – Rob Leshin, Director of the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education Office for Food and Nutrition.
Join us in supporting SB 2320 (Cano) and HB 7400 (Caldwell) to make Healthy School Meals for All a reality in Rhode Island. Together, we can ensure that every child has access to the nutrition they need to succeed.