A law recently passed in the Delaware General Assembly provides free breakfast and lunch to all public school students regardless of family income.
House Bill 125, sponsored by Rep. Ray Moore, D-Middletown, and Sen. Elizabeth Lockman, D-Wilmington, is designed to address student isolation and stress while also providing healthy, nutritious meals to support improved classroom performance.
“As a teacher, I’ve seen firsthand what can happen when basic needs aren’t met,” Moore said during a May 24 roundtable discussion at Everett Meredith Middle School in Middletown. “When students are hungry, their energy is depleted, their attention is weakened and their potential is not used.”
According to Milton Elementary School Social Worker Gloria Ho, food insecurity affects students, resulting in lower grades, difficulty paying attention and poor social interactions.
“They came in tired, hungry and angry,” she said. “It affects academically, behaviorally, and socially.”
Some students in the Cape Henlopen School District live in food deserts, areas without easy access to food or close proximity to healthy, nutritious food, she said.
“When students are prepared, focused, and engaged in instruction, it benefits the entire class,” she says.
Providing free breakfast and lunch to every student eliminates the stigma associated with such programs for low-income students, she said.
“Lunch is embarrassing,” she said. “It can identify and exclude children from families who don’t have money to buy school meals.”
She said many students are dealing with family situations that are completely out of their control.
“I believe parents are doing their best, but when their income is limited and the cost of food increases, children may not always get the proper and adequate nutrition they need,” she said. “Healthy foods can be expensive. Families can’t always afford what they need.
Reduced-price or free-meal programs in schools fail to capture all disadvantaged students, she said.
“It doesn’t capture our working families who are hovering above the income requirements, but are still struggling to make ends meet,” she said.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, the US Department of Agriculture eased program restrictions to provide free meals to all students. Those simple income requirements expire on June 30, 2022.
Colleen Carter, nutrition supervisor at the Brandywine School District, said she saw a difference in the universal free meals that were made at the time. In addition to avoiding stigma, she said, students are eating healthy food.
“We were seeing students eating healthier food at school than what they were carrying from home,” she said.
Now that the first year out of the USDA Universal Program is coming to an end, she says she’s seeing students spend more money on lunch than on food.
“We have requirements for our snack program that meet the nutritional guidelines; however [students] They don’t have fruits and vegetables with snacks,” she said.
She said her district is starting to see more food debt.
“We have families that don’t qualify for reduced-price meals or free meals. We have students who qualify for reduced-price meals, but we still can’t afford the reduced-price meals,” she said. “So our student food debt is really starting to balloon.”
Under HB 125, the state would pay for all costs not covered by the USDA through the school breakfast program and the National School Lunch Program.
The draft was submitted on April 20 but was not assigned to any committee.
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