The Community Eligibility Provision and Student Outcomes
By: Amy J. Shelton
The COVID-19 pandemic has caused financial strain for many Missouri families. Enrollment in safety net programs such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) increased dramatically in recent months, and this has important implications for schools. More schools and districts in Missouri and nationwide are now eligible to participate in the Community Eligibility Provision (CEP), which allows high-poverty schools to serve free breakfast and lunch to all students. While the primary goal of the program is to address food insecurity, participation could possibly impact achievement outcomes related to child nutrition. This blog briefly explains the CEP and then summarizes the existing research on whether CEP participation impacts behavior, attendance, and test scores. In the limited number of studies available, CEP adoption is associated with reduced suspensions across grade levels, increased elementary and possibly middle school attendance, and increased elementary school math scores.
Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) Overview
During the 2014-15 school year, the CEP became available nationwide to address food insecurity and reduce the administrative burden of school meal programs. Instead of collecting household income forms to determine student eligibility for Free/Reduced-Price Lunch, schools “directly certify” eligible students using enrollment data from SNAP, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), and the Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations. Schools, districts, or groups of schools can adopt the CEP if at least 40 percent of students are directly certified, and participating schools can remain in the program for four years without reapplying. Sixty-nine percent of eligible schools nationwide and 61 percent out of approximately 700 eligible schools in Missouri participated in the CEP in 2019-20. Missouri CEP schools served about 144,000 students. Later this month the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) will release CEP participation numbers for 2020-21, and we will update the blog accordingly.
DESE highlights many benefits of the program:
Students receive free, healthy meals with no stigma attached and spend less time in cashier lines.
Parents no longer have to fill out a household income application or worry about meal accounts.
Schools have less paperwork and can streamline cafeteria service.
CEP Participation Has a Modest Effect on Behavior, Attendance, and Test Scores
While the primary goal of the CEP is to serve more meals and to do so more efficiently, CEP participation might also affect achievement outcomes. Food-insecure students not participating in school meal programs may experience positive effects related to better nutrition. Low-income families who were paying for meals may have additional resources available to support their children's education in other ways. Universal meal programs may improve school climate by eliminating a perceived or actual stigma associated with free and reduced-price lunch participation. Finally, if better nutrition improves student behavior, this could create a more optimal learning environment even for students not directly affected by CEP adoption.
At this time, seven publicly available studies examine the relationship between CEP participation and outcomes such as behavior, attendance, and test scores. Four studies focused on a single state, one examined numerous pilot states, and two used data from all CEP schools and districts nationwide. All three studies that examined behavior found that CEP adoption is associated with reduced suspensions, and these effects are spread across grades. CEP participation is also associated with increased elementary school and possibly middle school attendance, but neither study examining high school attendance found an effect. Whether a meaningful relationship exists between CEP adoption and test scores is less clear, as many of the effects reported applied only to specific subgroups of students or schools. However, three studies examining test scores found some effect on elementary school math scores.
You can read more about the CEP and achievement-related outcomes in our Evidence PRiMER: “The Community Eligibility Provision and Student Outcomes.”
Studies Cited:
Bartfeld, J. S., Berger, L., & Men, F. (2020). Universal access to free school meals through the Community Eligibility Provision is associated with better attendance for low-income elementary school students in Wisconsin. Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, 120(2), 210-218.
Fuller, S. & Comperatore, A. (2020). Leveraging the Community Eligibility Provision: Can universal access to free school meals benefit students’ school outcomes? Working paper.
Gordanier, J., Ozturk, O., Williams, B., & Zhan, C. (2019). Free lunch for all! The effect of the Community Eligibility Provision on academic outcomes. Working paper. *(Edited to add: This paper was published in Economics of Education Review after our search for CEP studies was completed).
Gordon, N. E. & Ruffini, K. J. (2019). School nutrition and student discipline: Effects of schoolwide free meals. Education Finance and Policy. Just Accepted MS. https://www.doi.org/10.1162/edfp_a_00307.
Gruber, A. F. (2017). Economic analysis of the impact of free school meal access on elementary school children in Community Eligibility Provision pilot states. Montana State University. Master’s Thesis.
Kho, A. (2018). Free meals for all: The effect of the Community Eligibility Provision program in Tennessee. Three Essays on School Reform. Vanderbilt University. Doctoral Dissertation.
Ruffini, K. (2020). Universal access to free school meals and student achievement: Evidence from the Community Eligibility Provision. The Educational Opportunity Project at Stanford University. Working paper.