Due to the high number of students in the Free and Reduced Lunch Program, Freedom Elementary is eligible for the Community Eligibility Provision (CEP), which may result in free breakfasts and lunches for all students as well as increased Title 1 funding.

According to the United States Department of Agriculture, the CEP, which was first made a national program in 2014-2015, is designed to give students access to free breakfast and lunch for schools of need. At Freedom, the percentage of students in the Free and Reduced Lunch Program determined the eligibility.

Currently, the district’s Identified School Percentage (ISP) is 48 percent, which means that 48 percent of Freedom students are in the Free and Reduced Lunch Program. Families who receive government assistance or have an annual income of less than $44,863 for families of four or $75,647 for families of eight are eligible for the program. Schools with an ISP of 40 percent or greater are eligible for CEP.

In the CEP, the ISP is multiplied by 1.6. This calculation determines the percentage of meals the school would be reimbursed as free.

If the value is below 100 percent, the remaining percentage would be reimbursed as paid, which is 29 cents per meal. In order to have 100 percent of meals reimbursed as free, the school’s ISP must be at least 62.5 percent.
According to Food Service Director Mr. Randy Walker, Freedom’s ISP needs to be in the mid-50 percent range to avoid losing money.

“If you try to run the program at 40 percent, it’s going to be a loss,” Walker said. “Right now, being in the 40s, it’s not a viable option.”

Districts can choose to select one school, their entire district or a group of schools to be involved in the CEP. Currently, Freedom Elementary, the only Title 1 school in FASD, has the highest ISP with 52.1 percent. The middle school and high school have an ISP of 49.6 and 42.6 percent, respectively. .

If all students receive free meals, CEP helps to eliminate the stigma of only some students receiving this assistance.

By having a higher ISP, districts and schools are also eligible for increased funding for Title 1 programs, a financial assistance program for schools with a high number of low-income students. Because Freedom’s ISP is over 40 percent, Title 1 funding is used to help all students in the school through a schoolwide program. If the district had an ISP below 40 percent, funding would be limited to help students who are failing or are at risk of failing.

Title 1 funding will only be used on Title 1 programs; however, increased funding as a result of a higher ISP will allow the district to redistribute funds to other programs.

“[If] we were given more money, I can buy more supplies for K-4, which opens up funding somewhere else in the district,” Director of Curriculum and Instruction, Mrs. Misty Slavic said. “If we have more Free and Reduced Lunch numbers, we will most likely receive more Title 1 funding.”

There are three ways to apply to the Free and Reduced Lunch Program: receive government assistance through direct certification, complete a paper application or go to paschoolmeals.com to complete an online application. If families are not sure if they meet the requirements for the Free and Reduced Lunch Program, they are still encouraged to apply.

“If we can convince the entire district to fill out and return the Free and Reduced forms at the beginning of the school year, I think Community Eligibility could be possible for certain schools within the district. I’d say the most likely candidate is the primary center,” Walker said.