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Paid Lunch Equity Guidance for School Year 2025–26

On May 14, 2025, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food and Nutrition Service released Policy Memo SP 12-2025 Paid Lunch Equity (PLE): Guidance for School Year (SY) 2025–2026 and released the corrected PLE Tool for SY 2025–26 on June 12, 2025.

School Food Authorities (SFA) that do not charge students for paid lunches at all sites are considered non-pricing sites and are exempt from PLE requirements in accordance with USDA Policy SP 39-2011-Revised. Therefore, if an SFA operates all sites on the California Universal Meals Program or a Federal Provision, such as Provision 2 or the Community Eligibility Provision, PLE requirements do not apply.

For pricing SFAs, the USDA SY 2025–26 PLE Tool is available in the Download Forms section of the Child Nutrition Information and Payment System Form ID-USDA 2025-26 PLE Tool.

For more information on PLE, please refer to USDA Policy Memo SP 12-2025 Paid Lunch Equity: Guidance for SY 2025–26 External link opens in new window or tab., the California Department of Education (CDE) Cafeteria Fund Guidance web page PLE tab, and CDE Management Bulletin SNP-02-2021: PLE Exemption Guidance.

Contact Information

If you have questions regarding this subject, please contact the Resource Management Unit by email at snpcafefundquestions@cde.ca.gov.

Questions:   Nutrition Services Division | 800-952-5609
Last Reviewed: Thursday, June 19, 2025
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