Indicator 1.4: % of children experiencing food insecurity
Current Value
18.7%
Definition
Line
Bar
Comparison
Story Behind the Curve
What are the positive factors that are contributing to you reaching your desired result?
- Schools: When schools are open they provide food to kids for breakfast and lunch. In the summer, all kids can pick up lunch and sometimes even breakfast.
- Access to food pantries in the county: Compassion, Northside Care Center, Salvation Army, etc.
- Churches and schools: provide backpacks for weekends and holidays.
- Public assistance: SNAP and WIC provide food for low-income families.
What are the negative factors that are restricting you from reaching your desired result?
- COVID-19: Loss of employment for families leading to loss of income.
- Citizenship: fear of signing up for public assistance and reaching out for help
- Transportation: ability to pick-up food at schools during virtual learning
- Rural county schools: small group of students, not offering school lunch supports remotely.
- Food deserts: places in rural areas where you can't walk to food.
- Locations where SNAP is accepted
- Lack of resources to purchase food.
What populations are the most disadvantaged and what causes these disparities?
- Rural communities: food deserts
- Non-english speaking
- Low socioeconomic status-less funds, make choices between necessities
- Grandparents raising grandchildren: lack of knowledge of eligible services to assist families
Are there foreseeable factors that will affect your work over the next few months to a year?
- COVID-19: Continued job losses and uncertainty
- Election year: potential change in administration
- How many children will attend school in person this year?
What additional research is needed to better understand the factors that influence the slope of the curve and related disparities?
- Correlation between eligibility for free and reduced lunches and food insecurity
- How many kids access free and reduced lunches out of thos who qualify?
- How does COVID effect rates of eligibility next year?
- How has being away from healthy meals at school effected child health?
Partners
Who are the partners that can help you reach your desired outcome? List partners and their roles.
- Residents/Parents: Educated about their options
- Early Childhood Coalition
- Schools
- Churches
- Non-profits
- Doctors/healthcare providers: educating parents on healthy diet
- Social media
- Texas A&M AgriLife programs
What Works
Research/Evidence-Based Practices:
- Expanding free breakfast and lunches to all students
- Food deserts: placing grocery stores in food deserts so people can access food
- Expanding transportation: so families can get to grocery stores and other non-profit resources
Low Cost/No Cost Solutions:
- Public Health Campagin: letting people know about SNAP and WIC and helping people get enrolled
- Grocery delivery: waiving additional delivery fees or providing gift cards to families to get rid of those
- Delivery to young families: similar to Meal and Wheels
Innovative/Out-the-Box Solutions:
- Community support: Allowing HEB/Grocers to sponsor families to provide food for weekends and breakfast
- Supporting job training for parents so they can be employed
- Provide ESL classes in schools to parents so they can ask questions and advocate for their families
- Summer meals site food truck to go out to different sites.
- Partnering with churches to offer community meals and information about local resources. Engage Pastors to come as spiritual support.
Additional Research:
- For districts who have given free lunch and breakfast to all students, what was their costs for that and how did they pay for those?
- How do other communities get grocery stores invested in providing food support to their students?
- How do we engage local food pantries and congregations?
Strategy
What Strategy | By Whom (Partners) | By When |
Expanding free breakfast and lunches for all | School districts | Fall 2021 |
Grocery delivery: waiving fees or providing gifts cards to offset costs | Grocery stores/Trusts/Schools | ASAP |
Supporting job training for families at schools | Non-profits/Schools | January 2021 |
Public Health Campaign: Letting people know about SNAP and WIC | Non-profits/schools | December 2020 |