It's nearing the end of the school day at Whitebead Public Schools, a small, pre-K through eighth-grade district in Pauls Valley. The day's menu includes a choice of cheese, beef jerky, raisins, sunflower seeds and Smucker's Uncrustables peanut butter and jelly sandwiches — a popular choice with the pre-K students.
"I love this one!" a girl said as her teacher opened a grape jelly sandwich packet.
Child Nutrition Director Cathy Alley recorded students as they walked by in the meal line. She said they prepare 200 meals a day for the estimated 65% of the students who take them.
In addition to breakfast and lunch, students at Whitebead are served an extra meal at the end of the day. It's part of the Expanded Learning Time option funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture under the Child and Adult Care Food Program.
But at the end of this month, it's going away.
Principal and superintendent Jason Midkiff said the district lengthened its school day in the 2024-25 school year to serve "third meal," as it's called.
"Our district, where we sit at 70% free and reduced, then we know that there's a good chance that 70% of our families — we don't know if there's food at home," Midkiff said.
He said his district could have adjusted had the Oklahoma State Department of Education announced the program's discontinuation earlier. But word came Aug. 18.
"Almost everybody approves a calendar and approves the school day, gets that out to parents. They make adjustments they need to do to get their kids to and from school, whether that's here or on the bus," Midkiff said. "And so, to have it done once the school year started was pretty disappointing."
Now, the district will have to shorten the school day and change the bus schedule — instead opting to serve the meal as part of an afterschool program.
According to OSDE, 47 districts are currently enrolled in the Expanded Learning Time option.
Alleged program 'abuse'
The state's decision followed an April 8 email StateImpact obtained through an Open Records Request. In it, a USDA official recommended discontinuing the Expanded Learning Time program, "based on the abuse of the option the agency is seeing."
That email was addressed to Jennifer Weber, the program director for Child Nutrition Programs at OSDE.
Weber told StateImpact the program operates on a federal fiscal year ending Sept. 30. She said that influenced OSDE's timeline on the announcement. She could not speak to why OSDE did not inform districts earlier.
She said "several people" make those decisions. Schools and a sponsoring organization were having compliance issues she's not at liberty to discuss, she added.
In an OSDE email to StateImpact, media relations manager Brenna Long said some schools serving a meal through the Expanded Learning Time option did not extend their school day to do so.
"The requirements for [Expanded Learning Time] included increasing the length of the school day, offering some type of enrichment activity, and having students finish the meal at school," Long said. "This was not the case for every school that was found deficient, but in some instances, schools were not meeting those requirements."
One sponsor, McAlester-based Feed the Kids, has been in a public battle with the department for alleged fraud. Superintendent Lindel Fields called for an investigation in May, claiming $344,939 in overpayment.
"My concerns regarding Feed the Kids, Inc. are deeply troubling," Fields wrote in his investigation request. "Evidence suggests that the company has engaged in fraudulently inflating both operating costs and reported meal numbers in order to secure excessive reimbursement from federal funds."
Feed the Kids, founded in 2023, is a nonprofit that handles administrative tasks for schools participating in the meal programs.
The organization filed two suits against OSDE after it received a notice of serious deficiency in January, demanding repayment. Feed the Kids alleges the state department erred in its appeal process.
Whitebead contracts with Feed the Kids for its program. Midkiff said OSDE was taking too long to approve districts, so Feed the Kids became a mediator between schools and the agency. As for the allegations, he said his district has had no issues.
At its July meeting, the Oklahoma State Board of Education denied Feed the Kids' continuation application.
Weber said the Expanded Learning Time option has been a problem for several years. She said the department has worked to enforce better accountability measures with schools, but it hasn't helped.
"When we find problems, they're required to do corrective action with us that fully and permanently corrects the noncompliances," Weber said. "And in some instances, we find that that isn't working. What they submit to us is not what they do."
A USDA spokesperson said in an email the federal agency did not mandate the end of the Expanded Learning Time option.
"OSDE exercised state authority, and USDA supported the integrity rationale, consistent with federal guidance on program oversight," the spokesperson said. "We owe it to the American taxpayers to protect federal programs from fraud, waste and abuse, which is why this work remains a core priority of the Trump Administration."
Decision garners pushback
Lawmakers and advocates have spoken out on the state department's call to pull the program.
The day after OSDE's announcement, Sen. David Bullard, R-Durant, penned a letter to Fields condemning the decision. He wrote that it raised serious questions about the agency's jurisdiction.
"If OSDE believes a change is necessary for a future school year, the department should establish that it has the legal authority to make the change, follow the proper process, give districts adequate notice, and allow schools to plan accordingly," Bullard wrote.
Bullard said the department's decision will mean more hungry children in Oklahoma.
"Whatever administrative objective OSDE believes it is accomplishing must be weighed against that reality," Bullard wrote. "A decision made in an office in Oklahoma City has very different consequences when it reaches a child in rural Oklahoma who may not have food waiting at home."
According to hunger relief organization Feeding America, one in four Oklahoma children face hunger.
Schools can keep serving a meal if they switch to an after-school program. OSDE is requiring those programs to last at least 30 minutes and include structured, supervised education and enrichment activities.
Bullard requested OSDE immediately suspend the changes for the next school year and give the Legislature the specific authority to discontinue the Expanded Learning Time option and the new 30-minute requirement.
Fifty bipartisan representatives and senators signed Bullard's letter. OSDE did not respond to whether it had supplied the information Bullard requested.
Chris Bernard, president and CEO of the nonprofit Hunger Free Oklahoma, said the department is punishing the many for the acts of the few.
"The state department could have said, 'Well, we're going to work with schools and make sure they're following the rules now because we haven't been enforcing them properly or communicating them well, or schools were not operating within the confines they were supposed to,'" Bernard said. "And instead, what they did was just say, 'We're ending the option altogether.'"
The organization released a statement shortly after the department's decision, noting 56,000 fewer Oklahoma children can access SNAP benefits since the passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
Bernard said the decision will disproportionately impact children in rural areas because lower-income students rely on buses which leave at the end of the scheduled school day.
"Some of the rural districts, that's really what they were saying: 'This is how we reach kids who the only way they can get home is by the bus,'" Bernard said. "So if you don't serve a meal till after your buses have left, they are going to have to ride the bus and skip the meal."
Whitebead Superintendent Jason Midkiff said it's important to his community to find a way to keep offering the third meal. The district is now considering tutoring or other activities to meet the requirements of an after-school meal program.
"If a kid's hungry, they're not going to learn as well. We have free breakfast, we have a free lunch, then we have this free third meal. None of our students pay a dime to eat those meals," Midkiff said. "That's what's important to us: is making sure those kids have those calories and nutrients that they need throughout the day to be able to learn."
He said the department's decision is not what's best for kids.
"I don't ever understand leaving money when you're talking about feeding somebody that needs it. That just makes no sense to me," Midkiff said. "Then you have a different priority than kids, and that's who we're all supposed to be here for."
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