FRAC Chat

Back-to-school season is in full swing. Students and families across the country are meeting new teachers, adjusting to new classrooms and routines, and getting out backpacks and school supplies.

Along with pencils, markers, glue sticks and gym shoes, there is another back-to-school essential, healthy food to fuel student achievement.

Eight states — California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, and Vermont — have passed Healthy School Meals for All policies so schools can offer all students school breakfast and lunch at no cost to families. These policies reduce childhood food insecurity, stretch family budgets, and ensure all children are hunger-free and ready to get the most out of their school day.

Organized by the Heritage Foundation, Project 2025 is a “presidential transition project” that makes numerous policy recommendations that would negatively impact the federal nutrition programs as well as other critical federal anti-poverty, education, and health programs. The policy proposals would also weaken federal offices, departments, and regulatory agencies.
The over 900 page Mandate for Leadership 2025: The Conservative Promise includes 30 chapters, with . Chapter 10 detailing their proposals for the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the federal nutrition programs:

This August marks the 60th anniversary of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), A lot has happened in six decades. Find six key things to celebrate about SNAP.

Millions of college students will return to campus worrying about hitting the books on an empty stomach.
A recent report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) highlights the prevalence of food insecurity among college students and underscores the critical role that the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) plays in supporting student success.

This week, the Food Research & Action Center (FRAC) released Hunger Doesn’t Take a Vacation: Summer Nutrition Status Report. The report finds that just over 2.8 million children received a lunch through the Summer Nutrition Programs on an average day in July 2023, a decrease of 170,926 children from July 2022.

The summer of 2023 marked the return to normal operations for most summer meals sites, after the end of the nationwide pandemic-era waivers. These waivers allowed summer meals sites to operate in every community, and provided operational flexibilities, including a non-congregate waiver for families to pick up meals to take home instead of children eating meals at the site.