By SALLY BELL
Staff writer
The student body in Cranberry School District doesn’t meet the income guidelines needed to participate in the federal free breakfast and lunch program.
The news came Monday night out of a Cranberry School Board meeting.
To be eligible, districts must certify that 40 percent or more students meet the low-income guidelines, food service director Kim Daugherty said in a presentation to the board.
Thirty five percent of Cranberry’s students meet the income guidelines, Daugherty said.
Oil City is the only Venango County school district currently participating in the Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) program, Daugherty noted. In that district, 55 percent of students meet the income guidelines.
The CEP became available in Pennsylvania in 2015. It allows districts to serve breakfast and lunch at no cost to all enrolled students without having to collect household applications.
Oil City has been participating in the CEP since last year.
“It’s a good program for the kids,” said Pat Gavin, the Oil City superintendent. “The board’s been very supportive.”
So far, the program has been paying off for the district, Gavin went on to say.
Reimbursement revenue is on target to exceed $100,000 and more students are being fed nutritious meals, he said.
It is up to school districts to participate in the CEP program if students meet the 40 percent threshold and if they find it a viable option.
Students in both Franklin and Valley Grove area school districts meet the eligibility requirements but those districts don’t participate in the CEP program.
In Franklin, 43.7 percent of students are certified as income-eligible for the program; in Valley Grove, 41 percent of students are certified eligible.
The CEP program has not been an option for very long, Daugherty went on to say. There are a lot of factors that would figure in to whether a district participates, she said.
In Pennsylvania, one out of every five children live in a household that struggles to put food on the table, according to a letter from Pedro A. Rivera, the acting Secretary of Education.
