What is the threshold at which a school gets community eligibility for FARMs?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I seem to recall it used to be that when we were touring PS programs in 2011, 80% FARMs was the threshold where they stopped bothering to make anyone pay for lunch -- it just wasn't worth the administrative work to collect from the 20% who could pay.

My daughter's school is a community eligibility school that's listed as 99% FARMs, but I am fairly certain it's in the mid-80s.

The 99% FARMs number is a placeholder; I'd much rather DCPS used something like "N/A" on the profiles of community eligibility schools, b/c I think putting in a fake number of 99% is misleading.

No, because there are schools that are in the 90s but not 99%. They only don't collect for the 99% schools.

For example, Garrison is 90%, not 99%: http://profiles.dcps.dc.gov/Garrison+Elementary+School

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I seem to recall it used to be that when we were touring PS programs in 2011, 80% FARMs was the threshold where they stopped bothering to make anyone pay for lunch -- it just wasn't worth the administrative work to collect from the 20% who could pay.

My daughter's school is a community eligibility school that's listed as 99% FARMs, but I am fairly certain it's in the mid-80s.

The 99% FARMs number is a placeholder; I'd much rather DCPS used something like "N/A" on the profiles of community eligibility schools, b/c I think putting in a fake number of 99% is misleading.

No, because there are schools that are in the 90s but not 99%. They only don't collect for the 99% schools.

Do you mean collect lunch money or collect FARMs info?

Either way, it's misleading. My daughter's schools is less than 90% FARMs (it might even be less than 80% FARMs). They don't collect lunch money, and they don't collect FARMs info, and it's listed on DCPS' website as 99%.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I seem to recall it used to be that when we were touring PS programs in 2011, 80% FARMs was the threshold where they stopped bothering to make anyone pay for lunch -- it just wasn't worth the administrative work to collect from the 20% who could pay.

My daughter's school is a community eligibility school that's listed as 99% FARMs, but I am fairly certain it's in the mid-80s.

The 99% FARMs number is a placeholder; I'd much rather DCPS used something like "N/A" on the profiles of community eligibility schools, b/c I think putting in a fake number of 99% is misleading.

No, because there are schools that are in the 90s but not 99%. They only don't collect for the 99% schools.

Do you mean collect lunch money or collect FARMs info?

Either way, it's misleading. My daughter's schools is less than 90% FARMs (it might even be less than 80% FARMs). They don't collect lunch money, and they don't collect FARMs info, and it's listed on DCPS' website as 99%.

Schools that are designated by DC as community eligible for FARM do not collect applications, so if it says 99% FARM, you don't know what the actual FARM rate is. It's not that if it's 90% or above that it gets reported as 99% automatically.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I seem to recall it used to be that when we were touring PS programs in 2011, 80% FARMs was the threshold where they stopped bothering to make anyone pay for lunch -- it just wasn't worth the administrative work to collect from the 20% who could pay.

My daughter's school is a community eligibility school that's listed as 99% FARMs, but I am fairly certain it's in the mid-80s.

The 99% FARMs number is a placeholder; I'd much rather DCPS used something like "N/A" on the profiles of community eligibility schools, b/c I think putting in a fake number of 99% is misleading.

No, because there are schools that are in the 90s but not 99%. They only don't collect for the 99% schools.

Do you mean collect lunch money or collect FARMs info?

Either way, it's misleading. My daughter's schools is less than 90% FARMs (it might even be less than 80% FARMs). They don't collect lunch money, and they don't collect FARMs info, and it's listed on DCPS' website as 99%.

Schools that are designated by DC as community eligible for FARM do not collect applications, so if it says 99% FARM, you don't know what the actual FARM rate is. It's not that if it's 90% or above that it gets reported as 99% automatically.

Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying. That's why I wish they'd say something like N/A instead of a real number.

[Anonymous]

Or report actual percentage figure along with whatever designation that comes with being past the threshold.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Or report actual percentage figure along with whatever designation that comes with being past the threshold.

The problem is, at community eligibility schools, they don't collect FARMs data -- no one has to fill out a FARMs form -- so no one has the actual percentage to report.

& like others have said, I'm don't think there's a specific threshold for the CEO (the schools that are listed as 99%). I'm not sure how they determine which schools are in that category.

[Anonymous]

So do all the kids get free lunches including little larla?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So do all the kids get free lunches including little larla?

Yes. At a community eligibility option school, there is no effort to collect FARMs applications, and there is no mechanism to collect payment for lunches from any child. Everyone eats for free.

(I have a theory -- but it's really just a theory, I have no evidence beyond my suspicion -- that some of the CEO schools are ones that have gained just enough high-SES families through gentrification that they've fallen close to or below the 80% percent threshhold for all students to eat free. Since they are right on the borderline, rather than start taking FARMs data & adding payment mechanisms, which would be huge administrative PITAs, they just make them CEO schools. If the enrollment settles at a figure below 80%, they might go ahead and deal with payment, but they don't want to do all that for a school that could go back up above 80% with a change of administration. But like I said, it's just a theory.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's based on the percentage of students who are federally direct-certified as low-income (i.e. students who already receive SNAP or TANF assistance). Schools with more than 40 percent of enrolled students identified are eligible. Schools may decide to opt-in and provide "free" meals for all students, or continue to collect applications and identify each student individually.

It sounds like there is some sort of threshold (i.e. 40% SNAP or TANF). I'm not sure how income cutoffs for SNAP/TANF compare to income cutoffs for FARMs. But if they are similar, this would suggest that a school theoretically be around 40% FARMs and still be listed as 99% by DCPS. While this is certainly not the biggest problem DCPS has, it is misleading and could discourage more high SES families from sending their kids to these schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I seem to recall it used to be that when we were touring PS programs in 2011, 80% FARMs was the threshold where they stopped bothering to make anyone pay for lunch -- it just wasn't worth the administrative work to collect from the 20% who could pay.

My daughter's school is a community eligibility school that's listed as 99% FARMs, but I am fairly certain it's in the mid-80s.

The 99% FARMs number is a placeholder; I'd much rather DCPS used something like "N/A" on the profiles of community eligibility schools, b/c I think putting in a fake number of 99% is misleading.

No, because there are schools that are in the 90s but not 99%. They only don't collect for the 99% schools.

Do you mean collect lunch money or collect FARMs info?

Either way, it's misleading. My daughter's schools is less than 90% FARMs (it might even be less than 80% FARMs). They don't collect lunch money, and they don't collect FARMs info, and it's listed on DCPS' website as 99%.

Schools that are designated by DC as community eligible for FARM do not collect applications, so if it says 99% FARM, you don't know what the actual FARM rate is. It's not that if it's 90% or above that it gets reported as 99% automatically.

Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying. That's why I wish they'd say something like N/A instead of a real number.

Sorry, when I replied I had meant to reply to the person who was stating that if you're 99% FARMs on the DCPS site, then that's because you're really high (in the 90% FARM rate). Replied to the wrong message, which is why I confused you. I completely agree with you that N/A is much better than 99%.

Question--for the schools that are community eligible, how do they deal with aftercare? Is that on a sliding scale, or does everyone get free after-care?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Or report actual percentage figure along with whatever designation that comes with being past the threshold.

The problem is, at community eligibility schools, they don't collect FARMs data -- no one has to fill out a FARMs form -- so no one has the actual percentage to report.

& like others have said, I'm don't think there's a specific threshold for the CEO (the schools that are listed as 99%). I'm not sure how they determine which schools are in that category.

That makes no sense. If nobody fills out the forms and they don't collect any data then how do they know they actually have a significant enough percentage? Sounds to me like they are just winging it based on assumptions.

[Anonymous]

Re the question about aftercare, there was a charge at one 99% free lunch for all school I toured. But it seemed lower than other schools. (It also did not sound like it was very organized, however.)

I just noticed that the great schools website has farms numbers, too, and in at least one case they didn't match dcps. They had an actual % where dcps had 99.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So do all the kids get free lunches including little larla?

YES. Even rich little blue-eyed, blonde Hansel and Gretel could well end up getting free lunches because DCPS would sooner not collect applications and not actually verify incomes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So do all the kids get free lunches including little larla?

YES. Even rich little blue-eyed, blonde Hansel and Gretel could well end up getting free lunches because DCPS would sooner not collect applications and not actually verify incomes.

Collecting applications, verifying income, & collecting lunch money aren't free -- at a school that has a small percentage of non-FARMs kids, it might end up costing more to collect than you'd actually bring in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So do all the kids get free lunches including little larla?

YES. Even rich little blue-eyed, blonde Hansel and Gretel could well end up getting free lunches because DCPS would sooner not collect applications and not actually verify incomes.

Collecting applications, verifying income, & collecting lunch money aren't free -- at a school that has a small percentage of non-FARMs kids, it might end up costing more to collect than you'd actually bring in.

So in other words, schools just wing it and fake the numbers and it's all just a bunch of bullshit. After all, how can they ever be sure if they don't actually check anything?