1 Introduction

According to the most recent report from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the national prevalence rate of household food insecurity in the United States was 12.8% in 2022 [1]. This rate is an increase from 10.2% in 2021 [2], 10.5% in 2020 [3], and 10.5% in 2019 [4]. When the COVID-19 pandemic started in 2020, there was an exacerbation of pre-pandemic disparities in household food insecurity. From 2019 to 2020, there were statistically significant increases in the prevalence of food insecurity for households with children (13.6% in 2019 vs. 14.8% in 2020) and households with Black, non-Hispanic householders (19.1% in 2019 vs. 21.7% in 2020) [3]. At the same time, there were statistically significant decreases in the prevalence of food insecurity for households with White, non-Hispanic householders (7.9% in 2019 vs. 7.1% in 2020) [3], indicating increasing rates of disparities in underserved groups as compared with White Americans. While the disparities have decreased since the start of the pandemic in 2020, they remained higher in 2021 and 2022 compared to 2019, with higher rates of food insecurity among underserved groups compared to White Americans [1, 2, 4].

In New York City (NYC), food insecurity rates have also recently increased. According to the annual Food Metrics Reports published by the NYC Mayor’s Office of Food Policy, the food insecurity rate in NYC was 14.6% in 2022, 12.5% in 2021, 12.9% in 2020, and 13.8% in 2019, with the prevalence of food insecurity being higher among non-White populations [5,6,7,8].

To prevent food insecurity, the USDA administers child nutrition programs, which provide funding to serve meals to children. These programs include the school meal programs, which serve K-12 students. There are four school meal programs for breakfast and/or lunch. These programs are the National School Lunch Program (NSLP), the School Breakfast Program (SBP), the Summer Food Service Program (SFSP), and the Seamless Summer Option. Research has shown that participation in school meals is associated with improved food security [9], diet quality [10], and academic performance [11].

NYC public schools participate in the NSLP, SBP, and SFSP. During the summer, NYC public schools provide SFSP meals to children aged 18 years or younger and anyone with physical or mental disabilities aged 19 years or older. The SFSP meals include breakfast and lunch. Since these meals are provided through the SFSP, they are provided free of charge. These meals are served from schools and other public sites, including “Camps, Churches, Community Centers, Housing Projects, Libraries, Migrant Centers, Parks, Playgrounds, Pools, and Other public sites where children gather” [12].

Although school meals continue to be served during the summer-related school closures and emergency-related school closures through the SFSP and SSO, school closures are a barrier to participation in school meals. During the summer months, participation in school meals decreases, while food insecurity increases [13]. This is often referred to as “summer hunger” [14]. Likewise, during the pandemic, participation in school meals decreased [15,16,17], while food insecurity increased for households with children [3].

The literature suggests several barriers to participation in school meals when schools are closed, whether during the summer or during emergencies. The requirements of the SFSP and SSO may lead to barriers: the congregate feeding requirement requires meals to be served and consumed in a group setting; the meal time requirement requires that certain meal types (breakfast, lunch, supper) are served only at certain times; the parent/guardian meal pickup requirement requires that parents/guardians accompany their children to the meal sites to pick up meals, but the parents/guardians usually cannot obtain a meal at the site to eat with their children; and the area eligibility requirement requires that school meal sites are placed in areas “where 50 percent or more of the children qualify for free or reduced price school meals” [17,18,19,20,21,22]. The congregate feeding, meal time, and parent/guardian meal pickup requirements present barriers to parents/guardians, who must take their children to the sites at designated meal times during the summer for their children to consume each meal on site. The area eligibility requirement presents barriers to SFSP and SSO sponsors and parents/guardians. Sponsors are required to prove area eligibility, and parents whose children qualify for free or reduced-price meals may need to travel to other areas to pick up meals if they do not live in an eligible area. During the COVID-19 pandemic, these requirements were waived through the Non-Congregate Meal Service Waiver, the Meal Service Time Flexibility Waiver, the Parent/Guardian Meal Pickup Waiver, and the Area Eligibility Waiver. NYC public schools used these waivers to provide grab-and-go meals through the SFSP during summers 2020 and 2021. Grab-and-go meals are also known as “non-congregate feeding” as they are packaged meals served to-go for consumption off-site (like at home), whereas congregate feeding refers to school meals served for consumption in a group setting (like a school cafeteria).

To the authors’ knowledge, there is no peer-reviewed quantitative analysis focused on comparing the number of SFSP meals served during both grab-and-go summers to the number served before these summers. There is one quantitative analysis of the number of meals served comparing summer 2019 and 2020; this study found an increase in the number of meals served during summer 2020 [23]. There are two geospatial analyses of meal sites comparing summers 2019 and 2020; both studies found increased accessibility of the sites during summer 2020 [21, 24]. There are two intervention studies prior to the pandemic that tested alternatives to the congregate feeding requirement of the SFSP: one provided meals to inpatients whether there were other children with them or not [25], and the other provided grab-and-go meals [26]. The first intervention resulted in an increase in intention to participate in the SFSP in the future, while the second intervention resulted in an actual increase in participation. These studies suggest that alternative models such as grab-and-go meals may increase participation in the SFSP. There is an important need to identify strategies that can increase participation in summer meal programs, which may decrease summer hunger, summer weight gain, and summer learning loss [27]. These outcomes disproportionately impact Black children, Hispanic children, and children from low-income households [28], who are also disproportionately impacted by food insecurity in the US.

To help fill the gaps in the literature, the purpose of this study is to compare the number of SFSP meals or “summer meals” served in the largest urban school district in the United States (NYC public schools) during the summers of grab-and-go meals (2020 and 2021) to prior summers of congregate feeding (2014–2019), for which data were readily available. In this study, SFSP meals or “summer meals” refer to breakfast and lunch meals served in July and August.

2 Methods

2.1 Design

This study is a secondary data analysis with an ecological design. Site-level meal count data were provided by the New York State Education Department (NYSED), which submitted these data to the USDA to obtain reimbursements for the number of SFSP meals served.

2.2 Sample

The sample consists of all NYC public school geographic districts (n = 32). From 2014 to 2021, the average enrollment in each district was 29,958 students, 5% of whom were pre-K students, 44% were elementary school students, 21% were middle school students, and 30% were high school students. Eighty-four percent of the students were non-White, and 73% qualified for free-or-reduced price lunch [29]. Each district contains several SFSP sites, from which SFSP breakfast and lunch meals are served. Using ArcMap 10.6.1 [30], site-level data were aggregated to the geographic district level to allow comparison across several years as sites drop in and out of the program from year to year, while geographic districts remain the same from year to year. For the aggregation, other secondary data sources were needed: a map of NYC public school geographic districts from NYC OpenData [31], and address information for 2020 sites from Hunger Solutions New York [32]. Only one site was excluded because it could not be geocoded. This site served 2800 meals in summer 2019 (0.04% of meals served in summer 2019). After aggregating, district-level enrollment data were added to the dataset from another secondary data source: the NYC Department of Education InfoHub [29]. All data used in this study are publicly available either through internet search or the United States Freedom of Information Act. The dataset is included under Supplementary Information as Online Resource 1.

Data were readily available from 2014 to 2019 to provide the trend in summer meal service in NYC before the waivers that allowed grab-and-go meals. During the prior summers of congregate feeding (2014–2019), the total meals served across all NYC public school geographic districts trended downwards from 8,038,298 meals in summer 2014 to 7,081,458 meals in summer 2019. During the first grab-and-go summer (2020), the total meals served increased to 11,119,495 meals. During the second grab-and-go summer (2021), the total meals served decreased to 7,064,010 meals, or slightly lower than the number served in summer 2019.

2.3 Independent variables

The independent (exposure) variables are time periods, i.e., each summer, 2014 to 2021. Summers 2020 and 2021 represent grab-and-go meals, while summers 2014–2019 represent congregate feeding. For NYC public schools, summer includes a few days in June, all days in July, and all days in August. During summer 2020, the number of meals served in June could not be separated into meals served during the school year and meals served during the summer. As a result, this study defined meals served during the summer as meals served during July plus meals served during August.

2.4 Dependent variables

The primary dependent (outcome) variable is the number of total meals (breakfast + lunch and July + August) served per student enrolled in the district, including 3 K (starting in summer 2018) and pre-K through grade 12. Hypothetically, each enrolled student could receive approximately 42 breakfast meals and 42 lunch meals during a two-month summer vacation, as each month has an average of 20–22 weekdays. Per student, the secondary outcomes are (1) the number of breakfast meals served, (2) the number of lunch meals served, (3) the number of meals served in July, (4) the number of meals served in August, (5) the number of breakfast meals served in July, (6) the number of lunch meals served in July, (7) the number of breakfast meals served in August, and (8) the number of lunch meals served in August. Because this study has an ecological study design, the term “reach” is used in this article to represent the number of meals served per student vs. the term “participation,” although the literature often uses the term “participation” for data collected and analyzed at the group level.

2.5 Statistical analysis

The inferential statistical test is the repeated-measures analysis of variance (ANOVA). This test was used in another study to compare participation in school lunch during spring 2020 to participation during spring 2019 in Connecticut [17]. For significant omnibus tests in the repeated-measures ANOVA, the post-hoc analyses used the Bonferroni adjustment. The level of significance was p < 0.05. The software program used was SPSS version 28 [33].

3 Results

Table 1 shows the Average Meals Per Student Enrolled in NYC Public School Geographic School Districts, Congregate Feeding Summers and Grab-and-Go Summers, using the means and standard deviations for each dependent variable. The mean number of total meals served per student was highest in the first grab-and-go summer (2020) at 12.20 (± 4.54) meals served per student enrolled in a NYC public school geographic district. It was on a decreasing trajectory during the congregate feeding summers (2014–2019) but then substantially increased in the first grab-and-go summer (2020), followed by a substantial decrease in the second grab-and-go summer (2021). The same pattern was observed for all dependent variables with the exception of July meals, July breakfasts, and July lunches. Although the pattern shows a substantial decrease in the second grab-and-go summer, the mean number of meals served per student remained higher during this summer compared to each of the congregate feeding summers for the number of breakfast meals served per student, the number of meals served in August per student, and the number of breakfast meals served in August per student.

Table 1 Meals Per Student Enrolled in NYC Public School Geographic School Districts (n = 32), Congregate Feeding Summers (2014–2019) and Grab-and-Go Summers (2020, 2021)
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Notably, during the congregate feeding summers, there was a consistent gap between the number of breakfast meals served and the number of lunch meals served, with lunch meals being more accessible than breakfast meals. This gap became smaller during the grab-and-go summers. Likewise, during the congregate feeding summers, there was a consistent gap between the number of meals served in July and the number of meals served in August, with July meals being more accessible than August meals. This gap became smaller during the grab-and-go summers (Table 1).

Table 2 shows Differences in Meals Per Student Enrolled in NYC Public School Geographic School Districts, Grab-and-Go Summer 1 (2020) vs. Congregate Feeding Summers (2014–2019). These comparisons show significant increases in the reach of summer meals during the first grab-and-go summer. Per enrolled student, there were significant increases across all dependent variables, with the exception of lunch meals served in July, during the first grab-and-go summer compared to at least two congregate feeding summers. Compared to each congregate feeding summer, there were significant increases in the mean number of breakfast meals served, total meals served in August, breakfast meals served in August, and lunch meals served in August.

Table 2 Differences in Meals Per Student Enrolled in NYC Public School Geographic School Districts (n = 32), Grab-and-Go Summer 1 (2020) vs. Congregate Feeding Summers (2014–2019)
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Table 3 shows Differences in Meals Per Student Enrolled in NYC Public School Geographic School Districts (n = 32), Grab-and-Go Summer 2 (2021) vs. Congregate Feeding Summers (2014–2019) and Grab-and-Go Summer1 (2020). Per enrolled student, there were significant increases in breakfast meals served, total meals served in August, and breakfast meals served in August during the second grab-and-go summer compared to at least one congregate feeding summer. Compared to all congregate feeding summers, there was a significant increase in breakfast meals served in August. However, there were no changes in total meals served, breakfast meals served in July, and lunch meals served in August. Furthermore, there were decreases in lunch meals served, total meals served in July, and lunch meals served in July when comparing the second grab-and-go summer to at least three congregate feeding summers. For all dependent variables, there was a decrease in the reach of summer meals in the second grab-and-go summer (2021) compared to the first (2020).

Table 3 Differences in Meals Per Student Enrolled in NYC Public School Geographic School Districts (n = 32), Grab-and-Go Summer 2 (2021) vs. Congregate Feeding Summers (2014–2019) and Grab-and-Go Summer 1 (2020)
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The only consistent finding across both comparisons is the increase in the number of breakfast meals served in August during the grab-and-go summers compared to each congregate feeding summer. However, this increase is small in magnitude: from an average of 1.11 breakfast meals served per student in August during the congregate feeding summers to an average of 2.02 breakfast meals served per student in August during the grab-and-go summers. Hypothetically, 21 breakfast meals could be served per student in August if a student ate breakfast every Monday through Friday.

4 Discussion

4.1 Overall findings

Compared to each of the four most recent congregate feeding summers (2016–2019), this study found significant increases in the number of SFSP meals served per student enrolled in a NYC public school geographic district during the first grab-and-go summer (2020), a high (~ 12 out of the 42 eligible meals were picked up). However, during the second grab-and-go summer (2021), numbers essentially returned to prior participation levels (~ 8 meals per 42 eligible were picked up). These findings show a potential positive association between grab-and-go meals and the reach of the SFSP, likely a reflection of the impact of the waivers in effect, but only during the first grab-and-go summer. However, during both grab-and-go summers, this study found significant increases in the number of breakfast meals served in August per student compared to each of the six prior summers of congregate feeding included in this study (2014–2019), suggesting a potential positive relationship between grab-and-go meals and the reach of breakfast meals served in August.

This study highlights that summer meals are generally underutilized, and summer breakfast meals and August meals are especially underutilized. Breakfast meals usually have a lower reach compared to lunch meals [34], and this is true for NYC public schools. Also, summer meals usually have a lower reach when there is less summer programming or summer activities [35,36,37,38], such as in August compared to July for NYC public schools. There were significant increases in the number of breakfast meals served in August during the grab-and-go years, although the average increase was small in magnitude (from an average of 1.11 breakfast meals to an average of 2.02 breakfast meals). Nonetheless, the increase represents close to a doubling in reach. In NYC, this translates to ~ 840,000 more meals served.

Several factors may partly explain the significant increase in SFSP reach during the first grab-and-go summer (2020) but not the second (2021). First, there may have been a greater need for food assistance during summer 2020 compared to summer 2021 since, in the spring of 2020, NYC experienced a stay-at-home order due to the pandemic, which had a severe impact on employment and increased food worries [39, 40]. Second, Pandemic Electronic Benefits Transfer (P-EBT) coverage and other federal assistance programs may have been better administered during summer 2021 compared to its first roll-out in summer 2020. P-EBT assistance may be a competitor to school meals because P-EBT benefits offer families more choices about what and where to eat compared to school meals [19]. Families can use P-EBT benefits to purchase any of the eligible items in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) at any SNAP-authorized retailer [41], allowing a greater variety of food options and likely more convenient locations compared to meals from SFSP sites. Third, there may have been a novelty effect in summer 2020 compared to summer 2021. After trying the program in summer 2020, participants may have dropped out because it was no longer new to them or because they had negative experiences with the program. There is some evidence of inadequate communications, perception of limited meal variety and negative experiences with the school meals served in NYC [42, 43], and these aspects of the SFSP need to be improved to increase participation in the program. Also, use of external community resources may have made parents less reliant on summer meals [42].

The waivers that allowed grab-and-go meals may partly explain the significant increase in the number of breakfast meals served in August during both grab-and-go summers compared to each congregate feeding summer. A potential hypothesis from these study results, which would require further examination, is that the Non-Congregate Feeding Waiver and the Meal Service Time Flexibility Waiver may improve the reach of SFSP breakfast meals when there is no summer programming. Prior to the pandemic, a study found that parents felt morning meal pickup hours were a barrier to SFSP breakfast participation [38]. Waiving the meal service time requirement and allowing meals to be consumed off-site allows parents/guardians to pick up breakfast meals later in the day for their children to consume the next morning. This potential facilitator to participation has been reported in a qualitative study, in which parents reported that having the ability to pick up multiple meals to serve their children at home was a facilitator to participation in school meals [42]. This facilitator is an example of improving the “accommodation” dimension of food access; “accommodation” refers to “how well local food sources accept and adapt to local residents’ needs” [44]. This accommodation may be especially useful when students are not on-site for summer programs, like in August for NYC public schools.

However, the peer-reviewed quantitative research shows mixed findings on whether these types of waivers are helpful for increasing the reach of summer meals. One study evaluated the association between strategies allowed by the COVID-19 waivers and weekly meal counts in Connecticut. That study found a significant positive association between sites serving multiple meals per visit and meals served per week in summer 2021 [45]. Another study evaluated the impact of the 2019 recission of six, non-COVID-19, USDA summer meal waivers in Maryland, including one waiver like the Meal Service Time Flexibility Waiver. That study found no significant association between the use of the waivers and the percentage change in the number of meals served from summer 2018 to summer 2019 [22]. Notably, this study did not involve a waiver like the Non-Congregate Feeding Waiver. Another study evaluated the effects of a grab-and-go, mobile summer meal program in Illinois. Although not involving waivers, the study found an increase in the number of SFSP meals served in the grab-and-go program [26]. The grab-and-go program resembles the grab-and-go meals permitted by the Non-Congregate Feeding Waiver. A more recent study evaluated parent perceptions of grab-and-go meals in summer 2021 in Connecticut. Using a Likert scale to ask about the importance of grab-and-go meals to parents, the researchers reported that availability of grab-and-go meals was perceived by parents as an important facilitator for future participation in summer meals [46]. Overall, there is little quantitative literature on the waivers’ impact on the SFSP, suggesting a need for a pilot study or controlled study to evaluate the impact of these types of waivers.

The peer-reviewed qualitative research may help explain the findings in the present study. The qualitative literature supports the hypothesis that the waivers that allowed grab-and-go meals may be beneficial for SFSP reach. One study interviewed a food service director and vendor (n = 2) for one sponsor and a food service director (n = 1) for another sponsor to “explore and compare the factors that enabled [these] SFSP sponsors in Maryland to dramatically increase meals distribution during the pandemic.” Both sponsors cited the Non-Congregate Feeding Waiver and the Meal Service Time Flexibility Waiver as helpful [47]. Another study interviewed food service directors (n = 16) in Connecticut to “identify practices designed to increase program participation during the summer of 2021” [43]. The food service directors reported increased participation due to practices allowed by the waivers, including grab-and-go meals and extended meal pickup times.

However, there are several potential confounders in the potential relationship between the waivers and SFSP reach observed in this study. First, during the grab-and-go summers, SFSP sites in NYC provided meals to adults, which may have increased the number of SFSP meals served independent of the waivers as parents may have been encouraged to go to the SFSP sites to obtain meals for themselves and their children (notably, meals served to parents are not through the SFSP; as a result, the meal counts for the SFSP used in this study include meals served to children only). A pre-pandemic study found that providing free meals to parents was a motivator for SFSP participation [38]. Second, the pandemic may have increased SFSP participation due to a pandemic-related increased need for food assistance [3]. Third, the reach of school meals may have increased partly due to increased attention and appreciation for school meals and school food service workers, described as “essential workers,” during the pandemic. Finally, students were all learning remotely at the end of spring 2020, so parents may have had greater awareness of continuing meal availability during the summer of 2020, than they did during the summer of 2021, after many children had returned to in-person learning.

The findings in the present study are supported by some findings but also conflict with other findings in the literature. One descriptive study found a 22% increase in the number of meals served in July 2020 compared to July 2019 and a 146% increase in the number of meals served in August 2020 compared to August 2019 in NYC [23], suggesting that the waivers may have been especially helpful for increasing the reach of summer meals in August, like the findings from the present study. The descriptive study also suggested that there are potential differences in the impact of the waivers by urbanicity: rural schools in New York saw the highest increase in the number of meals served during the first summer of the waivers, while NYC showed the lowest increase [23]. National data from a 2023 report from the Food Research and Action Center revealed a “dramatic increase in the number of meals served in July 2020 and July 2021, compared to July 2019” [48]. These findings differ from those in the present study, which shows a significant decrease in the number of meals served in July per student in 2021 compared to 2019. Notably, the cited literature determined percentage change in the number of meals served, while the present study determined mean differences per enrolled student.

4.2 Strengths and limitations

This study has several strengths. First, this study used reimbursement data, which contains no missing data and must be as accurate as possible for legal purposes. Second, this study includes data across several years: six years of congregate feeding and two years during grab-and-go meals. Third, this study could detect a potential novelty effect because it included two years of data during the waivers. Fourth, this study includes data representing the largest school district in the nation, serving nearly one million students. This enables greater reliability in interpreting the significance of the data.

However, this study also has several limitations. First, this study has an ecological design; it does not test the impact of the waivers on individuals, and it cannot show causation. Future studies should consider collecting individual-level data and a controlled trial design. Second, this study includes only two years of data during the waivers vs. six years of data pre-waivers. This prevented an interrupted time-series analysis, a quasi-experimental design, which is stronger than the design used in the present study. Third, this study used administrative areas (NYC public school geographic districts) but did not account for boundary effects or edge effects, i.e., the ability of an enrolled student to access sites across the boundary or edge between two districts. This could alter the denominators used to calculate the number of meals served per enrolled student. Fourth, this study was not able to determine reach at the site-level because these data were not available. Also, this study did not have data on site hours and operations, including menu options. Future studies may consider collecting these site-level data to increase granularity. Fifth, this study is on one sponsor of the SFSP and the set of waivers they used, which limits the generalizability of the findings.

4.3 Policy implications

The waivers are policy changes to the way the SFSP operates. There is a need for more research on the waivers during the summer months, including a cost–benefit analysis, a comparison with summer electronic benefits transfer (summer EBT), an analysis of food and plastic waste from grab-and-go meals, a comparison of the meal quality of grab-and-go meals vs. congregate meals, and an evaluation of child and parent/guardian perceptions of grab-and-go meals vs. congregate meals. The present study adds to a small but growing body of literature that suggests that the waivers should become permanent options for SFSP sponsors [18, 21, 43, 45, 47, 49]. The present study suggests that the waivers may increase the reach of breakfast meals in the SFSP when there is no summer programming and in a population that is predominately non-White and qualifies for free-or-reduced price lunch. Although the present study could not establish a causal relationship between the waivers and SFSP breakfast meal reach, policymakers may consider making the Meal Service Time Flexibility Waiver and the Non-Congregate Feeding Waiver permanent flexibilities for the SFSP. Future research should consider a cluster randomized trial to test the effects of these two waivers, especially given the potential impact of the SFSP on summer hunger, summer weight gain, and summer learning loss [27], which disproportionately impact Black children, Hispanic children, and children from low-income households [28].

5 Conclusion

In conclusion, among NYC public school geographic districts, the waivers that allowed grab-and-go meals may increase the reach of SFSP breakfast meals when there is no summer programming. Although more research is needed to establish causal relationships, the present study provides support for investing in this research. There is also a need for testing other strategies in addition to the waivers, as the present study demonstrated only a small increase in the number of SFSP meals served per student for one meal type (breakfast meals) in one summer month (August). Nonetheless, this study found a change in the positive direction for a program with historically low reach compared to the National School Lunch Program, adding to a small but growing body of literature supporting the continuation of the waivers.