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Podcast: Cascade CounterPoint
Episode: QP: The Siren Song of Free School Meals
Description: Thirty years ago, an iconic goal of liberal activists was to offer a free breakfast for all public school students, regardless of family income.
In response, Congress authorized a three-year pilot program to test the effects of universal free meals for students.
In 2004 the USDA Economic Research Service published the results of what it called the “definitive data on the impact of universal-free breakfast participation.” The study compared gains in standardized test scores for reading and math for universal-free breakfast participants and nonparticipants, and found “no significant differences.”
Nonetheless, today more than 90% of Oregon pu...