A La Carte Items
Deciding what items to sell a la carte next school year? Don’t forget to ensure items meet smart snacks requirements. The Alliance for a Healthier Generation Smart Snacks Product Calculator is the recommended way to ensure compliance. The USDA Guide to Smart Snacks in Schools is also a great resource for questions related to smart snacks requirements.
Now Available! Free and Reduced Applications and Instructions
The 2023-2024 Application for Meal Benefits, parent letter/instructions, and notification letters have been updated on IDOE’s Free & Reduced Forms webpage. The updated 2023-2024 income guidelines can be found here. Applications cannot be distributed until Saturday, July 1.
Please note the following changes:
- Adult and child income sections have swapped positions.
- Annual income has been added for each income type.
- Some sections have updated wording or have had instruction boxes removed.
- The parent letter/instructions have the updated income guidelines for reduced benefits.
- All paperwork has the updated program year.
The application is a PDF with fillable space at the top and bottom for customization. The parent and notification letters are Google Docs. In order to update templates with contact information, click File and then Make a copy to revise, or click File and Download into your preferred file format.
If distributing your own applications or letters, make sure the information matches the templates.
While the textbook disclosure signature is optional for households to complete, it should still be included on all applications (paper and online) because it remains part of Indiana Code. Missed the Meal Benefit Application Walkthrough and New School Year Preparation webinar on Tuesday, June 20? Watch for the webinar recording to be posted in Moodle soon.
Questions? Contact Gretchen Huntzer.
End-of-Year Reminders
As we approach the end of the school year, here are some end-of-year reminders, including important dates and deadlines school sponsors should follow for effective USDA Foods inventory management and use of Department of Defense (DoD) Fresh Fruits and Vegetables allocations and entitlement funds.
USDA Foods Surplus is Available for Dilgard Frozen Foods, McFarling Foods, Stanz Foodservice, and Wabash Foodservice State-Assigned Warehouses
IDOE is in the process of clearing USDA Foods out of state-assigned warehouses. USDA Foods surplus is available for school sponsors on the Food Distribution Program (FDP). If your school is interested in attempting to retrieve surplus items, please navigate to CNPweb under the FDP link, and click the Add Surplus button listed under the Allocations tab to see if surplus USDA Foods are still available. Delivery periods must still be available under the Orders tab to place orders. If no delivery periods are available, the warehouse has completed deliveries in your school’s area for the school year.
Direct Delivered USDA Foods and DoD Funds Will Be Lost After Friday, June 30
Now is the time to remove USDA Foods from the state-assigned warehouses and processors, as well as spend USDA DoD Fresh Fruits and Vegetables Program funds before Friday, June 30. USDA Foods are intended to be utilized during the school year allocated. IDOE will sweep all Direct Delivered (Brown Box) USDA Foods from school inventories as of Friday, June 30.
Free and Reduced Webinar Series
Calling all Free and Reduced processors! Join IDOE for an application and direct certification webinar series. Each training session will credit toward professional development training hours and fulfill the training requirement for application processors.
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Direct Certification (DC) Basics - Learn about upgrades to the system for Program Year (PY) 2024 and how to pull and read reports.
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Application Processing - Walk through how to identify a completed application and the steps of the approval process.
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Verification for Cause - Learn how to select applications to verify for cause and the basic steps of the process.
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DC: Processing Possible Matches - Review the process to examine possible matches and approve or deny them correctly.
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Eligibility Disclosure - Learn when free and reduced eligibility may be disclosed to groups outside of food services for purposes other than meal benefits, along with tips and tricks to ensure the information is used as intended.
Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) Deadline Approaching
It’s not too late for schools to submit documentation to be approved for CEP for the 2023-2024 school year, but the Friday, June 30, deadline is approaching quickly. CEP is an alternative way to claim meals for reimbursement for USDA Child Nutrition Program schools. Instead of collecting, approving, and verifying household eligibility applications for free and reduced-price meals, high-poverty local educational agencies (LEAs) and schools participating in the National School Lunch and School Breakfast Programs are approved for federal reimbursement by using a claiming percentage determined from direct certification data. CEP percentages should not be confused with a school’s percentage of free and reduced students.
To be eligible to use CEP for school year 2023-2024, the school or group of schools within an LEA must have one or more schools having an identified student enrollment percentage of 40% or greater as determined based on April 1, 2023 data. Once approved, the LEA and school must agree to offer all students breakfast and lunch meals at no cost (free) and cover any cost above the federal reimbursement with non-federal funds. CEP is approved for four successive school years, with an option to return to traditional meal counting and claiming procedures on an annual basis.
Reimbursement for schools participating in CEP is based on claiming percentages (free and paid only) derived from the percentages of identified students multiplied by an USDA-established factor. Applications and CEP worksheets are due to IDOE no later than Friday, June 30. Validation of the submitted application will take place prior to the beginning of the 2023-2024 school year. Interested schools should reach out to their assigned IDOE school nutrition field specialist. For more information, visit IDOE's Community Eligibility Provision webpage.
Agriculture in the Classroom Grant Funding
The disciplines of agriculture and education have been related for much of our nation's history. When most Americans lived on farms or in small towns, students often did farm chores before and after school. Old schoolbooks have numerous agricultural references. As the farming population began to decline, agricultural emphasis decreased in educational materials as well. The National Institute of Food and Agriculture’s (NIFA) Agriculture in the Classroom Program (AITC) serves nearly five million students and 60,000 teachers annually through workshops, conferences, field trips, farm tours, and other educational activities. The AITC program works in partnership with state AITC organizations and support activities engaged in a variety of issues relating to agricultural literacy in rural and urban America.
The deadline for application is Thursday, July 6.
For more information, visit the National Institute of Food and Agriculture webpage.
Upcoming Dates |
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Thursday, June 29
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April claim date
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Friday, June 30
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Direct Delivered USDA Foods and DoD Funds will be lost this date
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Friday, June 30
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Application deadline for CEP
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Thursday, July 6
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Application deadline for Agriculture in the Classroom Grant funding
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Friday, September 1
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AFR due
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This institution is an equal opportunity provider.
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