FNS and Direct Certification Pilot Projects
October 18, 2021
August 2, 2021
As part of the Russell School Nutrition Program, currently known as the Healthy, Hunger Free Kids Act, the USDA Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) conducts additional demonstration projects to expand the evaluation of direct certification with Medicaid for both free and reduced price punch meal eligibility under the National School Lunch Program and School Breakfast Programs. Direct certification of Medicaid is the use of Medicaid data files to ID children eligible to receive meals through NSLP and SBP at free and reduced price without need of application (yay for reduced paper pushing!).
As you know, 19 state agencies are already directly certifying income-eligible children receiving Medicaid benefits to receive free/reduced price school meals. The Biden administration announced its plan to expand these efforts and is inviting additional state agencies to initiate similar direct certification with Medicaid demonstration projects for school years 2022-23 and 2023-24. To that end, FNS released a request for applications last week, which you can access here and share with your respective state agency contacts.
