Topic: School Meals

Remember This December: Hunger is Solvable With School Lunch

Deputy Director, School and Out-of-School Time Programs

During the holidays and all year long, millions of individuals and families who struggle against hunger are able to access healthy food with support from the federal nutrition programs. This year, the federal nutrition programs have played a critical role in ensuring people can continue to put food on the table during the twin COVID-19 public health and economic crises.

To celebrate the nation’s nutrition safety net, FRAC is releasing a seven-part “Remember This December” series that will highlight the impact of seven important federal nutrition programs.

This is the second installment of the series, which focuses on school lunch. Read the previous installment on afterschool meals.

FRAC’s Early Success Strengthening School Feeding Programs

Food Research & Action Center

In this #FRACTurns50 blog, FRAC’s Founding Executive Director, Ron Pollack, shares the organization’s critical role in the expansion of the school meals programs. This is the third installment of a three-part blog series on FRAC’s early role in strengthening the federal nutrition programs.

When FRAC began its operations in 1970, the National School Lunch Program had been in existence for almost a quarter of a century. Enacted in 1946, the program was designed for two purposes: safeguarding the health and well-being of our nation’s children, and encouraging the consumption of agricultural commodities, especially those in surplus so that domestically grown food would yield better prices for U.S. farmers.

Status Update: P-EBT Approved in 50 States, the District of Columbia, and the U.S. Virgin Islands

Emerson Hunger Fellow

At the beginning of March, I joined FRAC’s child nutrition team as a Bill Emerson Hunger Fellow. Two weeks later, schools across the country were closing, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and my team started working to ensure students and their families had access to meals during this unprecedented time. Schools and community partners started offering meals through a variety of models, but families needed more. In its second response package, the Families First Coronavirus Response Act, Congress authorized the Pandemic Electronic Benefit Transfer (P-EBT) program.