After-School Meals
AFTER SCHOOL IS A LITTLE-KNOWN PROGRAM
When analyzing statewide data for after school meal participation in 2023, we learned that only 4 percent of children eligible received an evening snack or meal.
There were only 13,950 children participating in the federal nutrition program statewide where the total number of eligible school age children was 266,363.
The charts below reflect the number of sites eligible to participate statewide.
“At-Risk” in this context refers to the challenge of meeting nutritional needs when kids are away from school or home.
Background
The federal program is called CACFP At-Risk and is easier to implement than CACFP.
At-Risk also has a higher reimbursement value.
Unfortunately, the low participation rate is attributed to schools and community organizations needing to develop the complementary academic programming and then adhere to the congregate dining policy required to operate this meal program.
Although it also requires additional staffing and start-up funding, once operational the reimbursement revenue does sustain the meal or snack program ongoing.
We continue to see a large opportunity to increase the number of sites offering after-school meals to improve health and academic outcomes by funding staff positions at school districts to start programs and support promotional efforts to build awareness and enrollment.
Challenges
There are many challenges with these lesser-known programs.
- They have complex tracking and reporting requirements, utilization and access to the program is rising, and relatively few sites offer the program.
- There are limited administrative hours and staffing challenges for food service workers.
- Compliance requirements are also cumbersome, and there is a shortage of the required program sponsors.
- It’s difficult to feed kids after classes end when they’re participating in such after-school activities as sports, drama, debate and other extra-curricular interests.
Our approach
We collaborated with our colleagues at the Minnesota Department of Education and identified two initial strategies to feed hungry children after school:
- Enlist more out-of-school activities in CACFP At-Risk meal program at sites that participate in CACFP.
- Move more programs from snacks to serving more substantial evening meals. Snacks generate less federal reimbursement money and give kids less food.
The At-Risk program is relatively new to Minnesota. In partnership with our stakeholders, we are:
- Raising awareness of the program and of the greater opportunity reflected in supper versus snack service.
- Reaching out to after-school academic programs in schools and communities.
- Working with summer feeding sites to offer CACFP suppers.
- Migrating existing snack participation to supper or adding supper service to a program.
- Using incentives to spur participation.
Our Goal
Provide 1 million more meals by working with Minnesota Department of Education and our stakeholders to increase the number of sites offering after-school meals.
