Alabama schools are encouraging eligible families to apply for free and reduced-price meals this year following the end of a federal government program to provide universal free meals to students during the pandemic.
In June, federal waivers that provided children free meals through their schools beginning in March 2020 expired. Lawmakers tried to help mitigate the impact of ending that program with a bill that reduced lunch reimbursement rates for schools and allows children who meet income requirements for reduced-price meals to not have to pay a copay during the 2022-23 school year.
But the bill did not go as far as to extend the universal meal waivers as many hoped, and parents must once again fill out the paperwork to enroll their children and free and reduced meal programs.
Packets of information containing application materials should have either been mailed out to families by their local school districts, made available online or provided in paper format on the first day of school, according to ALSDE.
All children in households receiving SNAP, Alabama TANF or the Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations (FDPIR) are eligible for free meals. Only one application should be filled out per household, and they can be submitted on a rolling basis throughout the school year.
You can find out more information about eligibility for services, or access extra copies of forms, here.
Families who have applied for the program in previous years still need to submit an application.
Reminder, school lunches are no longer free for all Athens City Schools students. Find out if your family qualifies for.
Posted by Athens City Schools on Monday, August 15, 2022
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About 45% of children enrolled in Alabama public schools were eligible for free meals in 2019-20 under pre-pandemic eligibility guidelines. Another 5% of students were eligible for reduced-price meals.
This school year Alabama has been approved by the USDA to directly enroll students who are on Medicaid into the free and reduced price meal program. School districts can now “electronically match” students from Medicaid data files to identify who is eligible to receive meals without the need for household applications.
According to USDA, more than 1.2 million students were directly certified for free meals in 13 States through the program during the 2019-20 school year.
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