Equitable Food Access for Afterschool Meals and Snacks
Cultivating Collaborative Pathways to Restorative Justice
Project Overview
At United Way of Greater Knoxville , we support individuals and community-based organizations in our food systems work to co-create a just, equitable food system rooted in community. This project is one of the many ways we open avenues for dialogue and sustainable collaborations within the food system. United Way also hosts the community school strategy. Community Schools supports 16 schools in Knox County and empowers neighborhoods by creating a place where everyone belongs, works together, and has the resources they need to thrive. This project was initiated to strengthen then connection between food systems and community schools.
Why Feeding Kids Matters
We know that school-aged children with access to healthy meals learn better. We also know that communities of color and economically marginalized communities suffer disproportionately when it comes to food insecurity.
Feeding school-aged children has become complicated. Engaging with stakeholders allows us understand the afterschool meal provision landscape, identify assets within communities and among stakeholders, and co-create a collaborative and sustainable path forward.
Project Goals
Data Collection and Visualization Tools
Asset Surveys
Community schools is a strategy that promotes student success by focusing on the whole child's development, from early childhood through to their career. Each community school has a site coordinator who identifies and coordinates available community resources. They develop partnerships to offer additional support to students and their families through confidential, developmentally appropriate, culturally sensitive interventions, services, and supports. One of the core pillars of the community school strategy is integrated student supports, which include essential resources like food, clothing, and after-school care. Each community school reflects the needs, assets, and priorities of its local community. As part of their annual practice, community school site coordinators conduct surveys to assess the resources available to each school, including food assets. The initial step in this data collection process involved gathering food-related data from asset surveys.
Interviewing Stakeholders
The final data collection tool was interviewing more than 15 stakeholders that currently provide food services to community schools. We started with USDA-funded programs, then moved to programs that are non-government funded, and finally interviewed programs that provide enrichment services to Community Schools. Interview questions were used to identify gaps, areas for growth, and opportunities for collaboration. We also explored innovative solutions and ideas—both practical, easy-to-implement options and more ambitious, long-term visions. Additionally, we sought feedback on how best to support these stakeholders.
Visual Maps
We worked with Community School Supervisors to visualize and map quantitative food asset survey data into relational maps. Utilizing an online mapping software called KUMU, all fifteen community schools in Knox County were mapped in relation to organizations, pantries, grocery stores, and After-School programs that provide food supports . These maps are the starting point for showing how the food system is connected to community schools. After creating a map for each school, we can conduct an impact assessment and gap analysis - to determine if schools have equitable access to resources.
Community Schools Asset Maps 2024
Child Nutrition Programs
Feeding children is complicated and includes a balance of programs and supports to ensure children are fed and ready to learn.
Federally funded meal programs address child hunger by providing nutritionally balanced meals to children at little to no cost to families. These programs play a key role in education equity. Research shows students are more likely to succeed academically when they receive adequate nutrition.
To better understand how child nutrition programs operate, we must first explore how they are funded. Different funding structures have different requirements that determine participant eligibility, the types of meals served, and how the programs operate.
In the United States, over 30 million students participate in the National School Lunch Program and nearly 15 million participate in the School Breakfast Program. The vast majority of students receive free or reduced-price meals.
Congress sets the basic structure, rules, and funding for child nutrition programs.
The USDA administers the programs at the federal level, issuing regulations and guidance that provide additional detail for implementing the laws set by Congress.
A designated agency administers the programs within each state. State legislatures may also pass laws that complement or extend federal laws and regulations.
In Tennessee, (TN), The Department of Human Services administers the Summer Food Service Program (SFSP), the Child and Adult Nutrition Program (CACFP) and the At-Risk Afterschool Meals and Snacks program funded through CACFP.
The Tennessee Department of Education houses the National School Lunch Program (NSLP), School Breakfast Program (SBP), NSLP Afterschool Snacks, and Seamless Summer Option programs.
School Food Authorities (SFAs) administer the programs within school districts and submit claims based on the number of meals served to eligible students. SFAs are typically synonymous with the district's school nutrition department.
The Knox County Schools Nutrition team serves 13,000 breakfasts and 33,000 lunches a day to students in Knox County.
Many students in Knox County receive one free breakfast and lunch.
The Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) is a USDA tool that allows the nation's highest poverty schools and districts to serve breakfast and lunch at no cost to all enrolled students without having to collected free and reduced lunch applications. A list of Knox County Schools that are CEP eligible as of September 2024 are shown to the right.
Non-CEP schools require students to fill out free and reduced lunch applications. More information here.
15-20 Knox County schools also participate in the USDA Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program that offers a variety of free, fresh fruit and vegetable snacks to students. The program requires state approval.
Several schools also participate in the NSLP Afterschool Snack Program and eligibility is determined using CEP status and on-site afterschool programs.
The Tennessee Department of Human Services oversees the Summer Food Service Program, the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP), and the at-risk afterschool meals and snacks program. These program are USDA funded and occur outside of school hours.
SFAs and other partners administers these programs within the counties they serve.
The Knoxville-Knox County Community Action Committee (CAC) sponsors the Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) , also known as SUN. CAC contracts with Knox County Schools for two months to provide over 205,000 meals to 140+ partner sites including summer camps.
Food Choice: The sun program provides no-cost, healthy breakfasts, lunches, and snacks to youth 18 years or younger.
Collaborative Effort: The KCS kitchen from West High School hires multiple cafeteria workers for the summer to prepare meals. CAC hires 20-25 staff that transported meals in refrigerated trucks to various sites and summer camps.
CACFP is one tool that provides funding to help offset the cost of providing healthy meals to infants, children, teens, and adults in a variety of care settings, including afterschool programs that offer enrichment or educational programming.
CACFP requires an administrator, or Sponsor, which is a big undertaking outlined here.
The At-Risk Afterschool Meals component of the CACFP, commonly known as the Afterschool Meals Program, allows educational or enrichment programs in eligible low-income areas to serve a free meal and/or snack each day to kids and teens ages 18 and under. State guidelines also stipulate that meals must be consumed on-site and the meals must be served within a certain time window.
Each location participating in the Afterschool Meals Program must be within the attendance boundary of a public elementary, middle, or high school where at least half the students are eligible for free or reduced-price meals.
Knoxville-Knox County Community Action Committee (CAC) sponsors CACFP for At-Risk After School Meals Program at 12 sites in Knoxville including 10 Parks and Recs sites, Wesley House, and Shora Foundation.
Food Choice: Currently provides snacks like peanut butter sandwiches, and goldfish.
Expansion Opportunities: If sites express the need for additional food supports there are areas for growth.
- Since CAC is already a program administrator they could provide a meal in addition to the snack for participating afterschool sites.
- CAC also administers the Commodity Food box program that contains about $30-35 dollars worth of free, bulked canned foods. The program could work alongside afterschool program to strengthen nutrition supports.
Boys and Girls Club sponsors 8 affiliate sites in Knox County for the afterschool clubs and PreK sites in: Norwood Elementary, Lonsdale Elementary and Pre-K, South Knox Elementary and Pre-K, and Mooreland Heights Pre-K
Collaboration: B & G contracts CAC's Mobile Meal Kitchen (MMK) to act as the vendor i.e the Kitchen prepares and provides meals and snacks. This partnership works well because MMK has the infrastructure to support meal preparation and delivery with input from their nutritionist. B & G also noted that the Kitchen has made efforts to encourage feedback from school-aged children and made changes based on their feedback.
Our Daily Bread (ODB) sponsors 600 feeding sites in Tennessee and Kentucky -including 3 afterschool sites in Knox County.
Greater Flexibility: ODB mostly sponsors independent child care facilities, and many sites get their meals catered or vended. The Knox County afterschool sites are all - Self prep meaning they prepare their own meals instead of going through an external vendor.
Expansion Opportunity: ODB specializes in logistical support, training, resources, claim reimbursements, technical support, and fiduciary responsibilities.
- Most of the facilities they serve are self-prep or central kitchens. We recommend they continue conversations with CAC to build alignment and collaboration, bringing each of their strengths to the table.
- ODP offers Health-Related Programs like Meatless Mondays and Taking Root Tuesdays. We recommend these programs become part of their afterschool sites in Knox County.
Non-USDA Funded Food Programs
Non-USDA funded food programs also play a critical role in addressing childhood hunger by addressing gaps, offering flexibility and innovation, and taking a whole-family approach. We interviewed stakeholders that offer programs that are not funded by the USDA.
The Knox County Health Department's, NEAT program focuses on nutrition education to ensure that healthy choices are not only taught but also readily available and appealing to students in the after-school space.
The newest initiative, NEAT Harvest Produce Boxes, partners with Second Harvest Food Bank of East Tennessee to promote fruit and vegetable consumption among 250 afterschool students and families. Alongside monthly distribution, the program offers fruit and vegetable education and activities to encourage consumption and reduce waste. The produce boxes are designed such that each member of a family of four could have a serving of apples.
Second Harvest Food Bank of East TN has three departments that provide food nutrition programming to adults and children: Nutrition Access, Empowerment Services, and Youth and Senior Programming.
Good EaTN Cooking Club is a curriculum based three day program that focuses on increasing cooking literacy by exploring topics in nutrition and food science. Second Harvest provides class instruction, ingredients and cooking utensils to participants. The program leverages online and digital platforms to increase access.
Food For Kids (FFK) is also known as the Backpack Program.
FFK started in Knox County Schools in partnership with ProjectGRAD in 2004 expanding to all schools in their 18 county footprint by 2010. There are currently 73 active Knox County FFK schools serving 3,400 kids per week
Food Choice: FFK food items are chosen based on nutritional content, perishability, packaging type (peel-open, pop-top options), unit cost, and market availability at scale. Each school receives the same inventory, FFK stocks between 25-30 different products for the program.
Collaboration: Each of the 27 school districts served receives FFK with minimal impact on the already burdened school staff charged with implementation. Directly addressing child hunger at a big scale while making the process as easy and accessible as possible to schools and the volunteers serving them is a notable success, along with the connections between schools and partners this program has facilitated.
The Knoxville Dream Center is a local non profit that provides support to various communities through programs that fill gaps in resources. The Dream Center serves school-aged children through several initiatives:
- The Food Rescue program, in partnership with Second Harvest, prevents waste by rescuing fresh fruits, vegetables, dairy, meats, and other household and basic needs goods to communities in need. The site rescues between 2000-9000 green pounds and 100-200 clothing items a week!
- Food truck sites are mobile pantries that go to areas of the greatest need (mostly food deserts) to help families put food on the table.
- Their KDC Service program connects KCS social workers to connect to basic needs fulfilling 50-75 orders per semester.
- Knox Dream Eats partners with under-resourced schools to cook up hot meals for parental engagement nights.
A Holistic Approach: The center partners with the mayor's office and the library to provide readers theater experiences for kids through the Bookmobile program. The Polar Express program brings children's literature to life through interactive performances, with a focus on incentivizing reading and rewarding top readers.
Thrive is a local non-profit afterschool program that prioritizes spiritual growth, physical activity and emotional development. Thrive provides healthy meals to children in need by sourcing non-processed ingredients from local farms and gardens. The organization serves 250 children at various locations for just $1.40 a day per child.
Collaboration: Volunteers, interns and staff collaborate to grow food at Beardsley Farm community gardens and deliver produce to Thrive locations. They value providing nutritious snacks and meals that are culturally appropriate, and inclusive of dietary preferences. They also utilize heart healthy recipes in English and Spanish.
Opportunities for Expansion: Thrive's model focuses on quality over quantity and allows for provision of food at an affordable cost by leveraging the power of community around each location. The model is scalable and replicable because it is community-driven. Since they do not receive government funding for their program, it is helpful to compare the challenges of USDA programs against one that is not.
Enrichment Organizations
We also interviewed stakeholders from organizations that provide enrichment programs for afterschool, weekend, and summer enrichment programs.
Enrichment activities are expanded learning opportunities that can include arts, physical activity, hands-on learning, and academic instruction. For this project, we focus specifically on those building food and nutrition skills.
Little Chefs Big Change (LCBC) operates on-site at schools where students prepare a full healthy dinner after each class exploring various taste profiles, building an identity around what they like to eat, and learning how to use different kitchen equipment under supervision.
Collaboration: The LCBC typically operates three days a week for eight weeks sessions. Second Harvest provides ingredients once a week, and the program relies on volunteers and partners with various organizations for program success.
How to participate: The cost of the cooking classes at afterschool sites can be negotiated depending on who provides ingredients, volunteers, transportation etc. Here's an example of 2024 partnerships:
- Wesley House offers LCBC to students at a sliding scale, because Wesley House has a food pantry that receives produce from Beardsley Farm, provides volunteers, a room for instruction and transportation to and from Wesley House.
- Knox County Public Defenders Office (KCPDO) provides holistic support for low-income children and client's kids. The defender's office covers volunteer needs and food expenses and Redbud Kitchen donates 10% of its proceeds to support the program.
Beardsley Community Farm offers food supports to school aged children through their school garden program and produce distribution programs.
Garden program: The initial collaboration began with conversations with School coordinators at South Knoxville Elementary and Dogwood Elementary in 2020. The program includes three components for sites at South Knoxville Elementary, Western Heights Boys and Girls Club, Lonsdale Elementary, Beaumont Elementary, and South Doyle Middle School.
- physical gardens
- educational programming
- produce distribution
Produce program: In partnership with Second Harvest, Beardsley farm provides produce distributions occur monthly, with Community School coordinators identifying families in need.
- Each produce bag contains 10-12 pounds of fresh produce and eggs, with some schools receiving produce from Two Chicks in a Farm and others from Second Harvest Food Bank.
- Currently, Beardsley distributes produce at Lonsdale, Western Heights, Beaumont, and South Knoxville Elementary, with additional distributions at Sarah Moore Green and Norwood Elementary.
- Surveys are conducted at the beginning and end of the school year to gather information on the use and satisfaction of the produce.
4H Provides research-based Extension educational experiences that empower young people to gain knowledge, develop life skills, and form positive attitudes to prepare them to become capable, responsible, and compassionate adults.
- Challenges: Clubs that operate after school rely on teacher sponsors or site coordinators to coordinate a meeting space that accommodates enrolled students. Transportation from school to home poses a barrier, especially for bus riders. At Green Magnet Elementary, the site coordinator had arranged a bus to take 4H students home-huge benefit to that partnership and that site coordinator.
Plant Chain is a new program where students learn basic plant care, how to grow plants, and, entrepreneurial skills. Participants pay $25 for seeds, soil, small planters, and fertilizers and can return in the spring to sell plants or choose to grow their own food. Interested participants have to enroll in 4H but they don't need to be part of a club.
Feedback Mechanisms: All programming is based on needs assessment. Agents practice active listening in informal settings with club members using interviews and other tools.
Opportunities for Growth and Collaboration
Meals/snacks: While 4H doesn't directly provide meals, they are open to community partners or sponsors who want to provide snacks for the after-school programs.
Increasing awareness: 4H seeks to build relationships with community schools and educate site coordinators on the versatile program topics offered. Clubs can choose from a variety of topic areas including creative arts and design, engineering, livestock, and quilting and sewing in summer. 4H has an impeccable ability to tailor programming based on community and school needs.
EFNEP
In Knox County, EFNEP targets five afterschool programs per semester for youth in community schools. EFNEP follows an approved curriculum for 3rd-12th grade and includes food safety, nutrition, and physical activity. EFNEP has the flexibility to adapt the program's frequency and structure to accommodate different school needs.
Feedback: Participants take a pre-test, complete a series of lessons and, take a post-test. Participants can only do the program once a year.
TNCEP
A nutrition education program for individuals and families who participate or are eligible to participate in SNAP. TNCEP is also known as SNAP-Ed. TNCEP follows a similar approved curriculum to EFNEP. The main differences between the two programs are the funding sources and target audiences.
Data Analysis
We analyzed qualitative data from fifteen stakeholder interviews that resulted in the themes discussed below. We utilized Otter.ai for interview transcription.
We have seen how impactful these programs are in providing food supports. Let's explore some of the challenges they face as we consider how to sustain collaborations rooted in community-driven solutions.
Federal Funding Barriers Limit Community-Driven Solutions
As we saw earlier, state departments receive regulations and guidance from the USDA. These regulations determine how afterschool meal programs are administered within each state. The interpretation of regulations at the state level varies between states. Federal guidelines limit food choice,
Organizations participating in USDA-funded programs must follow approved menu patterns and guidelines to receive funding. While menu patterns follow national standards, they ultimately limit the types of foods that school-aged children in afterschool care programs receive. To understand the factors that influence food choice, we first need to consider the financial structure of these programs.
- USDA-funded programs operate on a reimbursement basis. This means programs like CACFP submit an estimated budget and only get reimbursed for meals/snacks served following a menu pattern like the one depicted above.
- The food industry lags in manufacturing and distributing healthier bulk foods. Unfortunately, the food industry's lack of investment in health illustrates how it insists on an economic advantage. Food distributors stock bulk healthy options limited in nutrition and quantity, that fit into USDA programs' reimbursable rates. For operations that produce larger volumes like Knox County Schools which produces volumes of 45,000 meals, there's not a lot of customization that can be done.
While stakeholders from USDA-funded organizations value food choice and health, their hands are tied by top-down policy and rigid industry practices. Programs, like Thrive, that exist outside of federal funding offer more flexibility.
While there is more funding from federal sources for meal programs, the ability to provide nutritious fresh foods that align with most students' cultural and taste preferences is invaluable.
Investing in Human Capital
Human capital is second to funding when considering what these programs require to function effectively.
USDA-funded and non-USDA-funded organizations uplifted the value of having enough staff, invested staff, and enough money to pay their staff. SFSP operates on a massive scale.
- To run efficiently, this program relies on a consistent source of qualified personnel to produce and deliver thousands of meals. Some barriers to staff retention include a 2-month time commitment, low pay, and long hours.
- While federally funded meal programs are designed to fill hunger gaps, the state cannot continue to divest from compensating the human capital needed to operate these programs.
- Unfortunately, the onus is placed on local program administrators such as CAC or Knox County Schools to develop incentives that encourage personnel retention while advocating for budget policy changes.
For smaller organizations like Beardsley or Little Chefs, the barrier to program expansion is in acquiring funding to hire more staff. Most organizations that have limited funding rely on volunteers and other human capital such as interns and AmeriCorps.
Lack of Client Choice and Feedback Loops Limit Program Participation
Participation hinges on a continuous agreement between participants and providers. For meal programs, feedback loops are crucial in determining program effectiveness, and acceptability.
- Feedback Mechanisms: Some programs like Beardsley and N.E.A.T Harvest Boxes use informal feedback mechanisms. Building relationships with participants builds familiarity and trust so that participants can be honest about the quality or type of produce they prefer. Whether informal or formal, meal programs have a responsibility to inquire whether their programs are meeting the true needs of participants i.e. school-aged children.
- Student choice: During an interview with an afterschool program participating in a federally-funded After School meal program, we learned that students weren't eating the meals and snacks provided. The main barrier for school-aged children is food choice. As discussed earlier, choice is determined by several factors that result in students eating the same things for three out of five days. The site's director reported that the lack of variety in food results in a lot of waste during meal and snack time.
- Community Solutions: We interviewed No Kid Hungry, a non-profit that helps communities feed kids. They noted that in their community and advocacy work across Tennessee improving program participation continues to be a topic of exploration. Having feedback loops and clear communication between partners can help uncover the true barriers to program participation. When school-aged are denied dignity in their right to food, then the meal programs are failing, and we have to re-examine how we are feeding kids from a policy perspective and a community perspective.
Restorative Justice
Restorative Justice aims to address the historical harm and disinvestment in Black and Brown neighborhoods that has led to food apartheid, food inequities, and racial health and wealth disparities. Identifying what is needed to heal and make people “whole”.
Restorative Justice asks the question, “How do we restore relationships of ‘rightness’?
Learn more about how our community defines justice in our collective governance storymap!
When exploring pathways of restoring relationships of rightness, we first looked at how Black communities in Knoxville fed school-aged children through archival research at the Beck Cultural Center. As stewards of resources, we have to include more community in solutions.
The Knoxville Negro, an archival historical document of a thriving Black community, gifted by Mrs. Pearl Davis.
An excerpt from The Knoxville Negro tells of the abundance of food at markets
This excerpt shows the communal care and social capital that factored into feeding kids at schools from Remembering Lonsdale.
One of the factors that perpetuate disenfranchisement is loss of memory. When people don't remember a time or know of a time of self-sufficiency and self-reliance then it is very easy to repeat cycles that keep inequity in place.
To learn more, visit our Storymap about Rooted East who is curating a docuseries that highlights food apartheid and its effects in East Knoxville, while uplifting and amplifying the stories of Black residents.
Fannie Lou, a mobile food distribution truck, is operated by Chris Battle, owner of BattleField Farm and Gardens.
Community-Driven Solutions
Recommendations
Federally funded meal programs insist on regulations that limit program effectiveness. These programs limit administration budgets, set strict protocols, and expect quality execution. Their conception was fueled by a collective agreement that school-aged children have a right to food after school. Policymakers have to re-evaluate these structures because when we listen to program participants i.e school-aged children, we can start to tailor programs that meet their needs, with dignity.
All organizations rely on human capital. Some meal programs are expected to feed thousands of students but no investment is directed to the people who make this possible. Thrive is a smaller organization that models how investing in interns, staff, and volunteers results in supportive and enriching environments where students want to return. Thrive's model leverages the community to make their day-to-day operations successful. Showing care and investing in their staff is a key piece of their model.
So we have a large number of retired teachers who volunteer, and they'll test the kids on their reading level and do like an intensive reading, tutoring with the students... they come in, like once or twice a week for several hours, and they work hand in hand with the teachers of the classes. So that's, I mean, we couldn't do what we do without volunteers, there's no way we could raise that or have the level of expertise of having a teacher who taught for 40 years who's tutoring our children for four hours a week. like that's huge! it would cost so much. So that's been a huge blessing for sure.
Innovative Solutions
When we share what works well within our respective organizations, we can start to transform how we feed kids.
Many stakeholders uplifted the need for more collaborative partnerships. Many organizations that steward resources provide services that serve similar populations. Community-driven solutions are possible when we listen to community members, amplify their voices around shared tables, share knowledge and resources, and take collective action to address community needs.
Magic happens around food that has little to do with the food." When we recognize that community partners and stakeholders are integral to our shared success, we foster an environment where restorative justice can thrive.
Some organizations are creating capabilities within their staff and increasing food access using digital platforms.
The Knoxville Dream Center has a mobile app where you can find the food truck schedule, truck sites, and hours of operation. Their app also allows KCS social workers to order food and non-food items for families and students in need. During COVID, Little Chefs Big Change increased family participation through virtual programming that engaged school-aged children and their families. Second Harvest is developing virtual classes that expand the reach and access of their nutrition education programs while reducing the need for additional staff.
Pastor Ross shares the guiding principle that propels his work as a change-maker.
In Closing
Knoxville has a strong foundation in the after-school food space. To make a lasting impact, we must embrace restorative practices by meeting people where they are and involving the community more deeply in our solutions.
