September 29, 2022 - Several revised Administrator's Reference Manual (ARM) sections for the National School Lunch Program have been posted and released.
TDA is requesting a statewide waiver from USDA to implement a five-year review cycle for the National School Lunch and School Breakfast Programs. By extending the review cycle to five years, TDA staff will be able to direct additional resources to provide technical assistance, reduce the time needed to conduct the total number of reviews, and allocate additional resources to identify and support the needs of high-risk SFAs.
September 1, 2022 - Verification begins October 3rd. All CEs must submit the Verification Report, including CEP and P2 CEs.
August 18, 2022 - Requests for increases in compensation must be reasonable, allocable, and necessary. TDA will consider the following salary increases using SFSP federal funding: 5% for routine annual or merit-based increases and 10% for promotional increases. Job description reviews may occur with promotional increases to ensure that the proposed change aligns with additional duties.
August 18, 2022 - Important Reminders. Do you meet the SFSP Applicant criteria? Need help navigating TX-UNPS?
August 18, 2022 - Application Packet Processing Timelines, Amendments, Documentation Submission, Budget Detail Review, Meal Time Overlap Error Message, Withdraw From SFSP, Site Application Naming Conventions.
August 18, 2022 - The program year for NSLP is now set to default to PY23. Please take note of the program year in which you are updating the application packet to ensure that the correct program year is being updated.
August 1, 2022 - The USDA’s Team Nutrition initiative is proud to announce the availability of several new resources for the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP), including the CACFP Trainer's Tool: Milk Aide, Milk in the CACFP Web Quiz in Spanish, and multiple printed CACFP Meal Pattern Training Worksheets.
August 1, 2022 - TDA has revised multiple forms on the CACFP Administration/Forms page on SquareMeals.org.
August 1, 2022 - The enrollment period to sponsor new sites is currently open.
August 1, 2022 - If you wish to participate in the CACFP for PY 2023 you MUST SUBMIT AN APPLICATION (only complete applications that have no errors will be approved for renewal) FOR RENEWAL via TX-UNPS NO LATER THAN SEPTEMBER 30, 2022.
August 1, 2022 - Get ready for the upcoming year by training with USDA resources!
August 1, 2022 - TDA has developed a new resource to collect racial/ethnic data of Program participants at open sites. This new resource aligns with the best practices and guidance provided by USDA in recent guidance and provided in TDA's Frequently Asked Questions documents.
August 1, 2022 - On Wednesday, August 17, USDA’s Team Nutrition initiative will present a Meal Talk webinar on Local School Wellness Policies. This webinar will be held from 2 to 3 pm Central Time.
August 1, 2022 - This handy reference for Program operators across all Child Nutrition Programs (CNPs) is a simple and easy-to-use resource that highlights the basics of crediting for the meats/meat alternates component.
August 1, 2022 - WBSCM training begins October 2022 for Recipient Agencies (aka CEs) in the pilot group. To prepare, TDA is collecting account access information and hosting a series of short WBSCM demos in August and September.
August 1, 2022 - The Keep Kids Fed Act passed on June 27, 2022, will allow higher reimbursements for meals, meal service flexibilities, and meal pattern flexibilities in the event of COVID-19-related supply chain issues.
August 1, 2022 - Spanish versions of School Nutrition Program (SNP)-related forms have been revised with the updated Nondiscrimination Statement (NDS) as implemented by USDA.
August 1, 2022 - As schools return to normal operations, CEs that operated SSO during school year (SY) 2020-2021 may not have the data needed to determine eligibility for severe need breakfast and lunch reimbursements in SY 2022-2023. These CEs may use the most beneficial claims data going back to SY 2019-2020 to qualify for severe need, as outlined in this article.
August 1, 2022 - USDA’s Team Nutrition is excited to announce the release of new Fueling My Healthy Life nutrition education for 7th and 8th grade students. This standards-aligned and inquiry-based collection of educational resources is designed to engage middle school students using a variety of learning styles.
August 1, 2022 - Three Team Nutrition brochures have been updated and are now available online, including the Food Buying Guide for Child Nutrition Programs (FBG) brochure, the Professional Standards for School Nutrition Professionals brochure, and the Professional Standards Training Tracker Tool (PSTTT) brochure.
August 1, 2022 - Update Guide sections located at the beginning of each ARM section provide more information about the topics addressed in each release.
TDA has posted Spanish versions of the School Nutrition Program household applications, household letters, and media release prototypes so that districts can immediately begin reaching out to their Spanish-speaking families. These versions include the updated Nondiscrimination Statement (NDS).
Updated July 1, 2022; Originally Posted June 17, 2022 - The U.S. Department of Agriculture Food and Nutrition Service has provided information for Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) operators concerned about access to formula and their options for safely feeding infants in their care. These questions and answers support CACFP operators and the families they serve during the ongoing infant formula shortage due to supply chain issues, which worsened due to a major formula recall in February.
July 1, 2022 - Per the recently passed Keep Kids Fed Act (KKFA), TDA can now use its approved statewide waivers to allow all SFSP and SSO sites to resume non-congregate service, no child/parent pickup, and offsite monitoring flexibilities without those waivers being related to a specific COVID-19 event. Other flexibilities will be available soon as well.
July 1, 2022 - The Keep Kids Fed Act passed on June 27, 2022, will allow higher reimbursements for meals and waive area eligibility requirements for Tier II Day Care Home Providers.
July 1, 2022 - Team Nutrition is excited to announce that training videos on navigating the Food Buying Guide (FBG) Mobile App are now available. These short videos are broken into four chapters to provide users with step-by-step instructions on using the Mobile App and its different components.
July 1, 2022 - The Keep Kids Fed Act passed on June 27, 2022, will allow higher reimbursements for meals, meal pattern flexibilities in the event of COVID-19-related supply chain issues, and other flexibilities still to be determined in School Year 2022-2023.
July 1, 2022 - This Fall, ‘Back to School’ will also mean ‘Back to Student Meal Rates’ for nutritious school meals. TDA has created resources to assist with notifying parents about this shift.
July 1, 2022 - The ordering functions in the TX-UNPS FDP module for NSLP and SFSP will transition to USDA's Web-Based Supply Chain Management (WBSCM) system.