| Tip 1: Although lunch program
participation data is not optimal, it has its uses. |
- Participation data is available nationwide and is used by the SLD's Program
Integrity Assurance program. Applicants reporting higher eligibility should be
prepared to carefully document the differences.
-
Libraries, unable to get better data from their local schools, may be forced to
rely on publicly available data.
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Two internet sources for the data are shown below. The first source provides
national data but only for free lunches. The second is for NYS schools only and
provides both free and reduced lunch statistics.
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Tip 2: Improve eligibility data with new surveys
and sibling searches.
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Schools often conduct surveys at the beginning of the school year to determine
planned lunch program participation These surveys should be rewritten to stress
that income data is needed even if the students do not plan to participate in
the lunch (or milk) programs.
-
Sample E-Rate Survey Letter
- Sample E-Rate Survey Letter - Spanish version
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When large discrepancies are found between elementary and secondary school
eligibility, school records can be searched by name and address to find upper
school siblings of eligible lower school students. Improved eligibility data
for a single district school can payoff in terms of an increased aggregate
discount rate for the entire district. More importantly, because of the FCC's
priority funding rules, a higher rate for an individual school could mean the
difference between a significant site-specific discount for internal connection
expenses versus no discount at all.
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| Tip 3: Consider alternatives to
Federal free and reduced lunch statistics. |
-
The actual rules and regulations summarizing the use of alternative poverty
level indicators are provided at the end of this section.
-
The eligibility criteria for the Federal free milk program coincides with the
same family income levels as the reduced price lunch program and is therefore
interchangeable.
-
E-Rate Central has had excellent success using Medicaid data (although care
must be taken to preserve the confidentiality of the data).
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| Tip 4: Aggregate discount rates
are calculated differently for schools and libraries. |
- A school district uses a student-weighted average of the individual school discounts; a library uses a discount based on the total student eligibility of the school district in which it is located. Block 4 of the current version of the Form 471 accommodates discount calculations for both if data is entered in the appropriate fields.
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