2. What is it?
Who does it help?
The National School Lunch
Program (NSLP) “is a federally
assisted meal program operating in
public and nonprofit private
schools. It provides nutritionally
balanced, low-cost or no cost
lunches to children each school
day” (U.S Department of
Agriculture).
&
This program helps by feeding tens
of millions of children nationwide.
3. 30 million
children!
Around 30 million children count on these low cost or free meals that they
receive at school.
For many these meals are the only nutritious meals they eat because they cannot
afford to otherwise.
5. School closings!
In order to slow the spread of the coronavirus schools were forced to shut down
and keep children at home.
“The school lunch program is the second-biggest anti-hunger initiative in the
country, after SNAP, or food stamps” (Kamenetz and Turner).
6. How can we
prevent these
children from going
hungry?
● Curbside grab-and-go
operations
● twice -weekly delivery routes
● Take value of school meals and
transfer it to SNAP EBT cards
7. Bus Delivery Routes
Bus delivery routes are the safest
way to get meals to kids.
Instead of a meal a day, package a
box of meals that can sustain them
for the week.
There is minimal contact required.
Children can remain home.
Parents can sign up to be put on the
delivery route.
8. Cafeteria workers are essential and deserve to be protected!
● Two weeks of paid sick time
● Employer-provided health
insurance
● Hazard pay
● Child care
● Adequate safety protections
9. Key take away points
● NSLP is an essential program that provides nutritious meals to
children.
● Cafeteria workers are essential and important.
● These people always go above and beyond for these students.
● There is a need to support and protect these workers.
● There is also a need to have a plan in place to get these meals to
students, should something like this ever happen again.
10. Works Cited
Fadulu , Lola. “Court Strikes Down Trump Rollback of School Nutrition Rules.” New York Times, 14 Apr.
2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/14/us/politics/trump-school-nutrition-rule.html.
Gaddis, Jennifer, and Amy Rosenthal. “Cafeteria Workers Need Support during the COVID-19 Pandemic.”
USA Today, 5 Apr. 2020, https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2020/04/05/cafeteria-workers-risking-
their-health-feed-vulnerable-students-column/2939584001/.
“National School Lunch Program Fact Sheet.” Dna.usda.gov, 20 Mar. 2019,
https://www.fns.usda.gov/nslp/nslp-fact-sheet.
Sugar, Rachel. “The Scramble to Feed the Kids Left Hungry by the Coronavirus Crisis.” Vox, 17 Apr. 2020,
https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2020/4/17/21220016/school-lunch-coronavirus-meal-programs.
Turner, Cory, and Anya Kamenetz. “Schools Race To Feed Students Amos Coronavirus Closures.” Npr.org,
20 Mar. 2020, https://www.npr.org/2020/03/20/818300504/schools-race-to-feed-students-amid-coronavirus-
closures.
Editor's Notes
I will be covering the National School Lunch Program and the importance of not only the program itself, but also the cafeteria workers who make nutritious meals for children.
For those of you who don't know the National School Lunch Program is a federally assisted meal program operating in public and nonprofit private schools. It provides nutritionally balanced, low-cost or no cost lunches to children each school day. It helps children and especially beneficial to those who come from low-income households who cannot afford to eat a balanced diet otherwise.
Around 30 million children benefit from these meals that they receive at school. That is an incredibly big number of children.
The coronavirus is an ongoing concern and has impacted the national lunch program tremendously, specifically the children of low income households.
This may seem scary due to the colossal amount of children this program feeds. The question now is where are these children who depend on this program going to get these nutritious meals now?
This has never before happened, so people are trying to come up with solutions as they go. There is no correct way of approaching this. It is working on a system of trial and error.
The goal is to learn from this experience and have a plan in place in case something like this were ever to happen again. Establishing sign ups for bus delivery routes would be proficient at keeping people home and making sure that the kids do not have to worry about about how they are going to get their lunch.
During this trying time cafeteria workers need these benefits in order to stay healthy and continue to serve meals to children in need. Their work goes highly unnoticed while children are in school. Hopefully people wake up and see how valuable cafeteria workers really are not only now while children are stuck at home, but also while children are in school. Protecting these workers is protecting these children’s right to food.
The National School Lunch program provides nutritious meals for children. Nutritious meals are essential for the growth and development of children. People often oversee the importance of a program like this one. Cafeteria workers are also left unappreciated for all the work they do. It is pivotal that going forward there be a plan to get these meals to these students who depend on them as their only nutritious meals.
