Posted on 07/18/2006 12:27:35 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
More than half of California's K-12 public education students enrolled in free or reduced-price meal programs last year, the first time that the majority of youngsters were approved for assistance, according to state and federal officials.
California was one of a dozen states where the majority of students were certified for such programs, said Jean Daniel, a U.S. Department of Agriculture spokeswoman.
In Contra Costa, almost a third of all students signed up for the federally subsidized lunch and breakfast programs, the third school year in a row the county has seen an increase in the percentage of students. Nearly seven out of 10 Pittsburg students enrolled, the largest percentage in Contra Costa, and an increase for the fifth year in a row. Roughly six out of 10 West Contra Costa students registered, according to the state Department of Education.
"That's what schools are combating -- the impact of poverty," said Tom Tesler, director of categorical programs for Antioch schools, where almost 40 percent of students are enrolled in meal assistance. "The overlying factor that no one argues with is why students perform poorly is poverty. The socio-economic condition makes it difficult for them to do well in school."
State and federal officials, food-policy advocates and scholars point to a variety of factors for the increase, such as higher costs of living and stagnant wages, improved efforts to enroll students and changing views that school-meal programs are an important tool for families.
More funds for meals
Although some scholars consider the milestone another sign of public school decline, school food service managers and food-policy advocates see the increasing percentage of enrollees as a boon. Not only does it mean more students are being served, it also brings more federal money to school districts.
"It's good for me financially," said Heidy Camorongan, director of food services for West Contra Costa schools. "The more free-and-reduced students I have who qualify -- I can feed them. Then once I feed them, I can claim reimbursement from the (federal government) and the state."
The larger trend of growing need may be difficult to address, but the federal government's capacity to change nutrition is huge, said Matt Sharp of California Food Policy Advocates.
"On the micro level it positively influences the long-term eating habits of half of public-school children in the state," he said.
To be eligible for free meals, the income of a student's family must be at or below 130 percent of the federal poverty line. For a family of four, that will equal $26,000 next school year.
To qualify for reduced-price meals, for which students are not charged more than 40 cents, annual income must be from 131 percent to 185 percent of the poverty line, which would be at or below $37,000 next year for the same-sized family. A full-cost lunch is $2.50 at Antioch secondary schools, for instance, and $2.25 at elementary schools.
'Psychological marker'
Although the percentage of the enrolled students hovered under 50 percent for the three previous school years, crossing the majority threshold is a psychological marker for California, said Sean Reardon, an education professor at Stanford University.
That does not mean that half the state's families are poor, said Deborah Reed, an economist with the Public Policy Institute of California. But free and reduced-price lunches commonly are used to gauge child poverty and are a prime marker of a school's socio-economic structure.
A 2003 Public Policy Institute study shows that a school's academic performance tends to decline when the percentage of students who receive free or reduced-price lunch increases.
The state's child poverty rate stayed relatively the same from 2000 to 2004, at about 20 percent, according to the National Center for Children in Poverty. The percentage of low-income children, which includes poor children, declined slightly in that period to about 43 percent.
Meanwhile, state Department of Education figures show that the percentage of students who receive free or reduced-price lunch has increased over the past five school years. Kathleen Walden, assistant director of child nutrition services for Pittsburg schools, said she sees more students approved for reduced-price lunch and fewer free lunches.
Federal law
Part of the 2004 reauthorization of the National School Lunch Act, which President Truman signed into law in 1946 as a response to malnourished young men rejected in the World War II draft, was a requirement for all schools to use an existing streamlined process to enroll students whose families receive food stamps.
Direct certification, which may have contributed to the increase, will be phased in over three years, but now applies only to school districts with more than 25,000 students, Daniel said.
Officials, advocates and scholars said they believe many more students are eligible but do not apply for meal assistance. They attribute this to fewer older students signing up for the programs because they have more food choices and believe there is a stigma associated with free or reduced-price meals. Program participation in California was about 1 million students fewer than enrollment in 2004-05, said Madeleine Levin, senior policy analyst for the Washington-based Food Research and Action Center.
To disguise participating students, Mt. Diablo schools encourage the use of prepaid student cards to pay for meals, said Kathleen Corrigan, the district's director for food and nutrition services. Cashiers scan the card at the register, but no one can tell whether a student has prepaid or gets free meals.
Another push in poor schools, such as Grant Elementary in West Contra Costa, is to apply for a schoolwide designation so all students receive meal assistance, said Phyllis Bramson-Paul, director of the Nutrition Services Division of the state Department of Education.
At Turner Elementary School in Antioch, where about 67 percent were signed up for free or reduced-price meals, students are proud that they are "free," said cafeteria cashier Suzanne Ferraro. "They think it's a bonus. It's out of control."
Private schools
Although there is a perception that more students are fleeing public education, enrollment in private schools decreased by 9 percent from 2000 to 2005, according to the state Department of Education. In Contra Costa and Alameda counties, the percentage of students enrolled in private schools has stayed about the same the past three years, about 10 percent and 11 percent, respectively.
Still, the converging trends of deteriorating public service, globalization and the marketization of schools leave the state in bad shape, said Barrie Thorne, a sociology professor at UC Berkeley who has studied students' attitudes toward meal-assistance programs.
"The larger message is the growing gap of rich and poor and the hourglass shape of the class structure in California," Thorne said. "It really is a tragedy. Our ability to think about these problems depends on our exposure to them."
Yes - because we must let the children believe that getting free stuff from the pay of other taxpayers is normal...
I wonder how many of these kids have the new "X-Box"?
Ain't that grand!
In the school district where I live they have a no-questions-asked free lunch program. My wife took my kids down there once. When I found out about it I had to speak crossly to her and that put an end to that. Didn't seem right to me to ask my fellow citizens to feed my kids since I was perfectly capable of doing it. I had a couple of neighbors that didn't have any problem at all with the program even though they both had household incomes of $50K+.
I will probably catch hell for suggesting it but couldn't the chubby kids give some of their food to the skinny ones or the poor famished students anyway?
Nothing like the cradle to grave approach to stop and make one wonder where it will all end.
I wonder how many of these kids are overweight.
How many of these kids are immigrants? Article doesn't say.
What I love is that they don't say why California has so many kids on the free lunch program: illegal immigration.
Bet he makes the trains run on time and gives out free healthcare. How sweet.
Most of them are illigal immigrants.
This is the face of American-style socialism, with lots of money in it for "service providers".
It ought to have the same effect as federal handouts to aboriginal Americans, namely social destruction and the creation of dependency.
I have come to realize that this is the meta-strategy of "democratic" socialism - killing with kindness.
>>>To disguise participating students, Mt. Diablo schools encourage the use of prepaid student cards to pay for meals, said Kathleen Corrigan, the district's director for food and nutrition services. Cashiers scan the card at the register, but no one can tell whether a student has prepaid or gets free meals.<<<
Ah, so this is how they are going to get around the stigma of chipping the children.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1339911/posts
Parents Protest School Mandate That Students Wear Radio ID Tags
Make it a prepaid lunch card for P.C. reasons.
AND, for those that still make the children lunches...the Model School Nutrition Program already has intentions of banning bringing food to school encrypted in the No Sugar rules.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1561077/posts
Animal Tagging and SCHOOL LUNCHES???
Does this mean that more than half of the K-12 students are illegals?
Read this and see my post please.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1563271/posts
Healthy People 2010
In California, I think so.
And there the problem is, in a nutshell. They are trying to enroll every warm body, regardless of real need. The reasons?:
•The Feds get what they want, which is a foot in the door to impose Federal programs, because the schools are getting Fed aide.
•The local school bureaucracy gets money. The program reimburses more than it costs.
•The local Poverty Pimps get ammo for their false stats, since kids in the program are automatically assumed to be disadvantaged.
•The local Statists get more control over another aspect of kid's lives, feeding them breakfasts and lunches.
•The indifferent parents get shed of another bit of responsibility for raising their own kids.
This is nuts. I sure am glad my kid is grown and out of school. But I pity my little grandson, of what he has coming "his" way when he starts kindergarten. ack!
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