Ninety-two Guilford County Schools will offer free meals to all students next year, which is 27 more than the year before.
These schools qualified for Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) status, which means enough students at a school are participating in assistance programs, experiencing homelessness, or are migrant youth or runaways.
Superintendent Whitney Oakley explained the increase in schools with CEP status at a Board of Education meeting on Tuesday.
"It tells us that more families are accessing services, which would indicate that there are higher levels of poverty in more places than we had the last time we went through the certification process," Oakley said.
GCS Executive Director of School Nutrition Services Travis Fisher said 74% of schools in the district will have CEP status next year, and 72% of the student population will receive free meals at those CEP schools.
“Based on CEP participation, and projections from historical free and reduced lunch application data from the non-CEP schools, GCS may be able to provide 81% of our students with breakfast and lunch at no cost this coming school year," Fisher said.
Fisher said this should have a big impact on the district’s meal debt which totaled $117,000 this year alone. More than half of that amount came from the 27 schools that just received CEP status, and therefore won’t contribute to the debt next year.
Families at non-CEP schools may still qualify to receive free or reduced-price meals by completing the application for meal benefits at www.lunchapplication.com, which will open July 1.
Amy Diaz covers education for WFDD in partnership with Report For America. You can follow her on Twitter at @amydiaze.