Eligibility for free and reduced-price lunches, however, depends on eligibility rules and not just income levels let alone poverty rates.
He is criticizing the sensationalist statistics that “half of public school children are in poverty,” when eligibility for free and reduced meals is not quite the same thing.
Still, I think that the percentage of FARMS students is a very useful indicator. For example, a couple of times I have downloaded data on standardized test scores for various Maryland school districts. The scores and the FARMS percentages line up very closely. In contrast, there is almost zero correlation between school spending and test scores. As far as spending goes, the null hypothesis holds.
The interesting question, then, is whether the FARMS proportion is rising because of changes in eligibility rules or because of changes in the demographics of the public school population. I suspect is is the latter, and I suspect that it is a leading indicator of worse outcomes, such as performance on stand in terms of standardized tests and high school graduation rates (provided that schools do not reduce the requirements for graduation).
“Still, I think that the percentage of FARMS students is a very useful indicator”
Sure. Students who are eligible, even when not poor, are still from lower SES households (or they attend schools with a high proportion of such households) — so you’d expect a measure of ‘percentage of students from families in the bottom half of the income distribution’ to be predictive of a school’s test scores. But I’d be really surprised if loosening of FARMS standards over time would predict a decline in a given school’s scores during that period.
The former is at least part of it. For instance, there were eligibility changes (and an easing of income verification) in a 2004 law, starting in 2005-06 school year, for instance: http://frac.org/changes-to-free-and-reduced-price-school-meals-eligibility-applications-and-verifications/
Then, starting for the 2008-09 school year, all districts were *required* to directly enroll students whose families were eligible for food stamps. Then in 2010, a program was phased in (just now completely active) whereby schools became able to enroll *all* students in free lunches on the basis of “community eligibility,” based on a sufficient percentage (20-30%) identified as eligible. The school is then credited with 1.6 * the number identified as eligible for reimbursement. (Picking up the tab on the rest, but still getting a 60% bonus.) http://febp.newamerica.net/background-analysis/federal-school-nutrition-programs
In addition, a high rate of NSLP (National School Lunch Program) participation is used to determine eligibility (and quantity received) for other federal funds, such as E-Rate by the FCC and funds from No Child Left Behind. Those other funds have increased in recent years, increasing the incentive to participate.
NSLP participation has historically dropped off considerably in high school, but that seems to have nothing to do with poverty (how would that make sense?) but only to do with a much lower participation in the program at the high school level, both by schools and individual students not applying.
Obama changed the eligibility for many cities. In Boston, my son has received “free” school lunches for 2.5 years now, thanks to a new program that gives “free” lunches to every student. By this ridiculous measure 100% of Boston students live in poverty.
http://bostonpublicschools.org/site/default.aspx?PageType=3&DomainID=4&ModuleInstanceID=14&ViewID=047E6BE3-6D87-4130-8424-D8E4E9ED6C2A&RenderLoc=0&FlexDataID=3160&PageID=1&GroupByField=DisplayDate&GroupYear=2013&GroupMonth=12&Tag=
Supply curves slope upwards, story at eleven.
Lunches went “free” for all Chicago Public School students this year too.
I can see making free lunch standard if the accounting is costly. It is already not a real market. What would be better would be to make the healthy food free and the unhealthy food a reward or paid for with scrip earned by exercise and healthy eating. This would be a form of education in healthy choices and self-control.