Students at all middle schools in the Daviess County Public Schools district will receive free breakfast and lunch meals starting with the 2024-2025 school year. All elementary schools, along with Heritage Park High School, will continue receiving free meals.
The free meals are possible due to DCPS’ participation in the Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) program. Under the CEP program, all students will receive free meals no matter what their household income is, and families are not required to fill out the free and reduced form.
According to DCPS Food Service Director Connie Beth Fillman, the CEP program is based on “categorical eligibility.” Schools are reimbursed using a formula based on the percentage of students categorically eligible for free meals based on their participation in other specific programs, such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF).
The DCPS Board of Education approved adding the middle schools to the program during a special called luncheon on Thursday. DCPS joined the CEP program last year, only including the elementary schools for 2023-24.
“Last year, we were able to move all of our elementary schools into this program so they are all having free breakfast and lunch,” said DCPS Director of Finance Sara Harley. “We have done really well with that program. We looked at our numbers again. We’re not to the point where we can move our high schools into it, but we would be able to add all of our middle schools in this program.”
Earlier this year, Fillman reported that joining the program led to a 12% increase in the number of students eating lunch at elementary schools.
“I knew it would go well and that our participation would increase,” Fillman said Thursday. “But we wanted to test it out with elementary first, and it’s gone really well. Now we’re able to add middle.”
Heritage Park is also part of the CEP program, but Harley and Fillman said that Apollo and Daviess County high schools aren’t close to being able to qualify for the CEP program. In large part, that’s due to the number of students who don’t eat meals at the schools.
“A lot of students aren’t even there at lunchtime because they are off site for college courses, so our participation wouldn’t increase that much,” Fillman said.
Fillman said she and Harley are continuing to look into ways to make Apollo and Daviess County eligible.
