Sep. 12—EDITOR’S NOTE — The following is part of a Grand Forks Herald series about food insecurity in the region.
GRAND FORKS — The number of students participating in the free and reduced meal program has increased in the Grand Forks School District, as has student lunch debt. A rise in food insecurity across the region is contributing to the numbers, some district and community leaders believe.
By the end of last school year, student lunch debt in the Grand Forks School District exceeded $83,000, while 35% of students were on the free and reduced meal program.
According to district and community leaders, the rise in both student debt and the percentage of students on the free and reduced program is linked to several factors: changes to state policy, higher food and living costs, lingering impacts of COVID-19 and federal cuts to SNAP benefits and other assistance programs.
“I do think food insecurity has become more of a problem, especially here in Grand Forks, North Dakota,” said Wendy Mankie, the school district’s director of child nutrition. “I think it is right here in our backyard.”
In 2021, 22% of students were on the free and reduced meals program. In 2022 and 2023, that number jumped up to 33% and last year, 35% of students were registered for free and reduced meals. According to Mankie, the district did not keep track of students’ negative balance information prior to last year, when student lunch debt hit $83,626. She said “it really was not a problem” in past years.
One change that Mankie and School Board President David Berger said influenced the higher percentage of students on the free and reduced meal program was a shift in North Dakota policy that raised the income threshold for families to qualify. In 2025,
the Legislature increased the eligibility
to families whose incomes fall below the 225% poverty level. For a household of four,
families earning less than $72,338
a year are eligible for free and reduced meals.
“While the state did not support a universal school-lunch-for-all program … they did increase the threshold so more families could qualify, which is good news,” Berger said. “… Now it’s just a matter of letting families know to apply and to apply every year.”
While the increase in the income threshold affected the number of students on the program, Berger said food insecurity in general has increased rapidly in recent years.
“You talk to anyone who serves at a food bank, and they’ll say, one year ago, this family was bringing donations, and now they request and require our services,” he said. “So things are harder for everyone.”
Heather Novak, executive director of United Way of Grand Forks, East Grand Forks and Area, a nonprofit that focuses on homelessness and food insecurity in the region, said high costs of living and funding cuts to federal assistance programs have increased food insecurity.
“With the cost of living in general, especially in the Grand Forks community, we have high costs for apartments and very low vacancy,” she said. “And then the increase of food costs and electrical costs and all of those things. … And then with a lot of federal cuts in different places … it all kind of is a trickle-down situation, unfortunately.”
As reported by CNBC in August, under the Trump Administration’s “big beautiful” bill, approximately $186 billion will be cut from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. SNAP offers low-income families food benefits, supplementing costs so they can afford nutritious food necessary for adequate health.
According to the North Dakota Department of Health and Human Services, in fiscal year 2022, the latest data available,
6,755 residents in Grand Forks County were recipients of SNAP
. This is 9% of the total recipients in the state.
In the Grand Forks school district, students whose families are eligible for SNAP benefits are automatically enrolled in the free and reduced meals program. Cuts to SNAP will not only make it harder for families to have access to nutritious food outside of school, but according to Mankie, create more work for families to get their students on the free and reduced meals program.
“I do think that it will have some impact,” she said. “It will lead to more paperwork on both sides, that’s for sure. (Families on SNAP) are automatically enrolled, and that would probably be cut. So that means those families will have to actually apply. Are they going to forget? Are they not going to know? They haven’t paid before. So (the struggle) might be how to maintain the access to school meals for these students.”
The corresponding increase in free lunch recipients and student lunch debt appear to share many influencing factors, including high costs of living, state policy changes and federal funding cuts. Additionally, Mankie said policy during COVID-19 has had lingering effects on student lunch debt.
“I’m going to blame COVID,” she said. “Because in those two years, nobody paid. So now you go back to a regular school year and you expect everybody to pay.”
As
reported by the Herald in 2020
, free meals were available to all Grand Forks students during the COVID-19 pandemic through waivers offered by the United State Department of Agriculture. Mankie said families may have gotten used to not paying, increasing the amount of student lunch debt when the meals were no longer free. She said the district will always give the students food regardless of their debt balance, so there is not an incentive to pay based on the idea that the student will not get food.
“We don’t stamp your hand. We don’t make a note,” she said. “Nobody would know.”
Despite high student debt, district leaders agree that all students will be fed, whether or not they have money in their account. Berger said students should not feel like they cannot come to school because they are unsure of what will happen in the lunchroom.
“If attendance is important, we don’t want a student not coming to school because the lunchroom is one more stressor, one more source of anxiety, one source of shame,” he said. “Again, these are students who are in circumstances we don’t necessarily understand.”
In February, two separate bills that would have provided K-12 students free school meals through different funding sources
failed to pass
in the North Dakota House. In a January interview with the Herald, Rep. Zac Ista, D-Grand Forks, spoke in support of free school meals across the state and said providing free meals for students would help to alleviate costs for families.
“The top issue heading into the 2025 legislative session is lowering the cost of living. Across North Dakota, families continue to feel the pinch of high costs for essentials like food, child care and housing. As state policymakers, we must continue to make strategic investments and policy choices to bring down these costs,” Ista said. “To tackle food costs, one solution is to provide no-cost school meals for all K-12 students in the state, providing a substantial cost savings for families with schoolchildren and also leading to better educational and behavioral outcomes in classrooms.”
Despite Ista’s support, both bills failed, 54-39 and 75-14.
Minnesota has taken a different approach to tackling student food insecurity. Starting in the 2023-2024 school year, Gov. Tim Walz signed the Free Meals for Kids bill, which offers free school meals to every student, regardless of income. Kevin Grover, superintendent of East Grand Forks Public Schools District, said the bill removes stigma for families who need assistance and creates the conditions for students to focus on learning.
“Kids are ready to learn when they’re not hungry,” he said. “If their basic needs are not met, it’s hard for the next step to occur, which is for the most part what we’re here for — the learning. To me, that is a benefit.”
However, he said he has mixed opinions about the unintended consequences of the bill. According to Grover, schools receive some funding based on the percentage of families who fill out benefit forms. Because all families now get free meals, fewer families are filling out forms that show they require assistance. The result is the district is not getting funding from sources on which it previously relied.
“Now that it’s free for all, there is less incentive for some of the families to fill those out,” Grover said. “So it’s kind of a double-edged sword. … Unless the state can figure out a different way to fund some things, that’s going to be a challenge for many districts.”
There is a proposed bill in the
Minnesota Legislature that would reinstate income caps
for families to qualify for free and reduced meals. Grover said when the district is struggling to receive funding for other programs, he wonders if income caps for free meals could redirect state funding to areas that would be more useful for students.
“Where I struggle is in overall financing,” he said. “Could that sum of money from the state go to some other program that I think would have been more beneficial?”
District and community leaders in North Dakota and Minnesota all seem to agree that policy targeting food insecurity can be complex, but is necessary for a healthy student body.
“If you have a kiddo who has food insecurities, my guess is they’re not getting enough sleep at night because they’re hungry,” Novak said. “They’re probably having behavioral problems, they’re not wanting to focus at school. So then that leads to educational holdbacks.”
Berger said ensuring students are fed as they attend public schools is a priority of the district and that students cannot achieve to the best of their ability if they do not have access to the proper nutrition.
“Public education is the great equalizer,” he said. “When we talk about public education, all means all. Every student who comes through our doors receives an education regardless of background, regardless of circumstance, regardless of building. And so we know that fed is best. … Students can’t achieve academically if they’re not fed.”