Navigating Charter School Meal Service for the 2020/2021 School Year
/On July 1, our team and Better 4 You Meals hosted a virtual town hall where charter school leaders joined us for a deep-dive on the USDA waivers, alternative service models for school meals, program best practices, student eligibility during COVID-19.
While we don’t have all the answers, we wanted to provide you with an opportunity to hear from industry experts who are navigating these circumstances with schools across the country. Here is the link for the Q&A.
“This was an outstanding presentation today - well organized, covered myriad topics and provided attendees with ideas on which to truly "navigate" the coming school year with regard to ensuring a quality nutrition program for enrolled students.” - Lauren in North Las Vegas
“It was a really good presentation, now we have ideas on how to run a meal program with everything going on.” - Raquel in Lynwood, CA
“This town hall was extremely helpful. I am taking over our lunch program this year and didn't know what was what.” - Cindy in Los Angeles
We’re having continued conversations with all our clients to help them make decisions and meal program plans (and back-up plans) that suit their school and local community. First, we are recommending that our school clients apply for all of the available USDA waivers. The meal pattern flexibility waiver allows for some leniency in case your food vendor start to run into trouble sourcing all the required components. The meal times flexibility waiver will allow you to serve lunch outside of the normal 10am-2pm time window if necessary. That waiver along with the non-congregate feeding waiver allows you to service multiple meals at a time. So, if you have students participating in distance or virtual learning, their families can pick up a week’s worth of meals from you all at once. To help streamline service models, the Offer vs. Serve waiver eliminates the requirement for high school lunch, allowing you to pre-bag meals for that age group. Finally, the parent pick-up waiver allows for parents to pick up meals for their enrolled children without the child needing to be present. Regardless of whether you plan to use these waivers…things may change requiring plans to change. If you apply now, you’ll have them available in the case you need them at any point this school year.
The other big conversation we’re having with our school clients is their approach to eligibility. More families than ever will likely benefit from free school meals. This summer, look at your most recent direct certification numbers and see if it is feasible to elect into a Provision program. Community Eligibility Provision has many benefits for both your school and your students. In this economic landscape, you may find that this will be the most favorable year to certify your school for this program.
For more information, our video above covers a variety of topics and scenarios. Block off some time to watch it and certainly reach out to us if you have more questions. If you’re curious about the ways School Food Solutions supports school meals programs, visit our overview page here.