Kansas, like many states, uses the number of students receiving free lunches to determine at-risk state funding for each district, but an audit just found that taxpayers likely spent between $38 million and $53 million for students who likely were not eligible. Auditors also say the 2023-24 free lunch count in Kansas was more than double the estimated number of students the U.S. Census Bureau indicated should be eligible for a free lunch.
Most students are “directly eligible” for the program because their household receives government benefits such as Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or Medicaid. Students can also qualify for a free lunch by completing a household economic survey or a National School Lunch Program application.
In 2024, districts received about $2,500 for every student who met that criteria, and in that year, the state paid about $563 million to districts in at-risk funding and high-density at-risk funding.
However, a new audit from the Kansas Department of Legislative Post Audit has determined that somewhere between 54% and 72% of Kansas students “who qualified for free lunches because they submitted a National School Lunch Program application were likely ineligible in the 2023-24 school year,” and that Kansas overpaid in at-risk funding by $38 to $53 million in the 2023-24 school year. Auditors also estimate that the federal government was overcharged by at least $10 million.
LPA’s methods included reviewing the rules the United States Department of Agriculture requires of school districts that participate in the National School Lunch Program. LPA also reviewed guidance and audit documents provided by KSDE. For each student, LPA requested supporting documentation from the student’s district. For students who submitted income information to their school district, LPA used financial data from the Kansas Department of Revenue and the Kansas Department of Labor to determine whether the household’s income qualified them for a free lunch in the 2023-24 school year. For other students, LPA reviewed documentation to determine whether the district appropriately approved the student for a free lunch.
Out of the 769 students reviewed, 122 had submitted the national program application. Of those 68 did not appear to meet the income eligibility requirements; 45 of the ineligible applicants had incomes at least 50% above the 130% of the federal poverty-level threshold.
Some families with incomes above $100,000 got free lunch
LPA’s Heidi Zimmerman told legislators at a Post-Audit Committee meeting Monday that nearly half of the applicants were significantly over the limit.
“For about half of them, they had incomes greater than $100,000 in the year their student received free lunches,” Zimmerman said. “Two applicants had incomes greater than $200,000.”
She said the sample sizes were sufficient to accurately predict for the state as a whole.
“We projected the results from the sample to the whole population of students who qualified for a free lunch by submitting an application,” Zimmerman said. “Based on that, we estimate that between 54% to 72% of all applicants were likely ineligible for a free lunch. That’s about 18,000 to 25,000 students.”
Moreover, because the majority of students are directly eligible because their families receive SNAP, TANF or Medicaid, Zimmerman said LPA cannot tell if they’ve been enrolled in the program properly or not.
“So, for 80% of the students who receive free lunch in 2024, we don’t know if they were approved accurately or not,” she said.
Kansas has tied at-risk funding to the free-lunch count, because poverty is often a good indicator of students who may be academically at-risk. But LPA concluded the state has tied at-risk funding to a student count that may no longer accurately reflect the number of students who are at risk of academic failure. LPA also noted districts now consider more factors than poverty when determining which students need at-risk services.
Dave Trabert, CEO of the Kansas Policy Institute — which owns the Sentinel — said a more accurate and effective way of distributing at-risk funding would be to base it on the number of students scoring Level 1 on state assessments.
“The statutory purpose of at-risk funding is to provide services that are ‘above and beyond’ general classroom instruction to students who are academically at risk of failing. Students scoring in Level 1 on the state assessment have limited reading and math abilities, so it is easy to identify who qualifies without any additional effort. Also, qualifying for free lunch doesn’t mean the student is academically failing. At-risk funding is there to help students who need it the most, and both the Legislature and the State Board of Education are shirking their responsibility in that regard.”
As the Sentinel reported in 2019 and again in 2023, LPA discovered funds designated for at-risk students went toward teacher salaries as well as programs that did not appear to — as required by state law — specifically address students
The audit additionally found that at-risk programs in many of the 20 districts audited lacked strong research findings to document program effectiveness.
Still, nothing has changed; more than 150,000 students have limited abilities to read and do math, and the number continues to rise.
