CNP Civil Rights FAQ

For more information pertaining to the nondiscrimination statement, please visit the CDE Civil Rights Compliance and Staff Responsibilities web page.

The NSD will investigate local educational agency (LEA) complaints regarding meal counting and claiming, reimbursable meals, eligibility of child or adult, or use of cafeteria funds and allowable expenses. All other program complaints will be referred back to the LEA for investigation through their Uniform Complaint Procedures (UCP). The NSD will investigate all non-LEA program complaints as well as complaints relating to health and safety matters.

All complaints alleging discrimination must be forwarded to the USDA for investigation.

The USDA Program Discrimination Complaint Form (PDF) or for more information please refer to CDE NSD Nondiscrimination Statement web page.

You may need to file a complaint through the uniform complaint procedures (UCP) with the local educational agency (LEA) (i.e. school district). For more information about the UCP, visit the LEA’s website. Additional information can be found on the CDE UCP web page.

For more information pertaining to complaints in the SNP, please refer to the CDE Civil Rights and Program Complaints web page.

No. UCP do not apply to civil rights complaints within the SNP and Summer Food Service Program (SFSP).

Yes. Nutrition program civil rights complaints procedures are different than normal complaint procedures or the UCP. Therefore, civil rights complaint procedures related to nutrition require separate written procedures.

For more information pertaining to nutrition program civil rights complaints procedures, please refer to the CDE Civil Rights Compliance and Staff Responsibilities web page.

At this time, the USDA has not provided hard copies of the new AJFA poster. It is available electronically on the USDA AJFA web page (PDF). Once the USDA releases the updated poster to state agencies, CDE will share, via an electronic communication, on how to order and receive the posters. If program operators elect to print their own posters, please be advised the reproduction of the AJFA poster must be 17 inches in height and 11 inches wide in size.

Yes. Sponsors may choose to continue to use the 2019 AJFA poster. If sponsors elect to print their own posters, they must ensure it meets the reproduction size requirement of 17 inches in height and 11 inches wide in size.

No. It is not feasible or cost-effective to require that each classroom in a school displays an AJFA poster. Instead, schools can display posters in prominent locations throughout the school, such as a bulletin board in the main building entrance, the school office, or another area frequently visited by parents and children. Schools may prefer to copy posters and put one in each classroom, but that is not required. When meals are served from mobile units, kiosks, or food carts, which are considered points of service delivery, the AJFA poster must be visibly displayed on or near the cart during meal service to comply with USDA program requirements.

For the SFSP, the AJFA poster must also be visible to participants during at least one meal service. In addition to the requirements for mobile units, kiosks, and food carts, the poster must be prominently displayed in several specific settings. These include windows or walls at congregate meal sites, on all vehicles used for door-to-door meal deliveries to homes, and at all pick-up facilities and locations providing non-congregate meal service in rural areas.

For more information pertaining to AJFA, please refer to the CDE Civil Rights Compliance and Staff Responsibilities web page.

Medical statements must:

• Describe the physical or mental impairment sufficiently in order for the school food authorities (SFAs) to understand how it restricts a child’s diet
• Explain what must be done to accommodate a child’s disability
• Identify food or foods to be omitted from a child’s diet
• Recommend food or choice of foods that must be substituted in a child’s meals

No. Sponsors should begin providing a reasonable modification to keep the child safe, and request the family provide a medical statement completed and signed by a Registered Dietician (RD) (effective July 1, 2025) or state-licensed healthcare professional to support the meal modification as soon as possible.

If the child’s IEP or 504 Plan includes the same information required in the medical statement, or if the required information is obtained by the school during the development or review of the IEP or 504 Plan, it is not necessary for the sponsor to obtain a separate medical statement.

No. If a request for a meal modification for a child’s disability can be made within the USDA’s meal pattern, for example by substituting one fruit or vegetable for another to avoid an allergy, a medical statement is optional and not necessary for reimbursement.

A disability that requires modifications outside the meal pattern is still reimbursable, provided that the request is supported by a medical statement or contained in the child’s IEP or 504 Plan. An Registered Dietician (RD) or state licensed healthcare professional will need to complete and sign the CDE Medical Statement to Request Special Meals and/or Accommodations form (CNP-925)(PDF).

Yes. A written medical statement that has a verified electronic signature by a state licensed healthcare professional or a Registered Dietician (RD) is considered acceptable.

No. Sponsors are required to provide all meal services in the most integrated setting appropriate to meet the needs of the child. In most cases, exclusion of any child from the environment is not considered an appropriate or reasonable modification. If you have any questions regarding this subject, please contact the School Nutrition Programs Unit by email at SNPInfo@cde.ca.gov.

For more information pertaining to meal accommodations, please refer to the CDE Civil Rights Compliance and Staff Responsibilities web page.

All staff who are involved in the nutrition programs or have contact with participants in the nutrition programs are required to complete annual civil rights trainings (FNS Instruction 113-1, page 16[XI]).

Sponsors may choose which civil rights training to provide for their staff; however, we recommend that your agency uses the approved CDE Civil Rights Training module as it guarantees coverage of all the required topics. The training can be found through the NSD Course Catalog.

If an agency chooses to provide civil rights trainings other than CDE’s, the training must cover the following topics:

• Collection and use of data
• Effective public notification systems
• Complaint procedures
• Compliance review techniques
• Resolution of noncompliance
• Requirements for reasonable accommodation of persons with disabilities
• Requirements for language assistance
• Conflict resolution
• Customer service

For more information pertaining to civil rights training, please refer to the CDE Civil Rights Compliance and Staff Responsibilities web page.

Under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, agencies must ensure that LEP households have access to the same information as non-LEP households in a manner in which the household can easily understand. You should have a process in place to determine whether the language needs of LEP households are met.

School food authorities (SFA)s are responsible for identifying the primary languages spoken by parents and guardians in their community to ensure meaningful access to school meal information for households with LEP. To determine the primary language of each household or the broader community, sponsors can:

• Conduct a survey during student enrollment

• Check with local organizations that work with LEP households (i.e., migrant agencies) to determine the primary language of households with whom they work within the community.

Sponsors can develop their own eligibility materials in the languages applicable to their communities.

Sponsors that choose to translate the USDA School Meals Model Application must modify the document to comply with California Education Code (EC) as follows:

• Add EC Section 49557(a): “Applications for free and reduced-price meals may be submitted at any time during a school day. Children participating in the federal National School Lunch Program will not be overtly identified by the use of special tokens, special tickets, special serving lines, separate entrances, separate dining areas, or by any other means.” This EC section requires that the statement above be in at least 8-point boldface type and be placed on the application itself.

• Change all references from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program to CalFresh.

• Change all references from Temporary Assistance for Needy Families to California Work Opportunity and Responsibility to Kids.

• Exclude the page Sharing Information with Medicaid/SCHIP found within the USDA family friendly application package. Sponsors must adhere to provisions of EC Section 49557.2, which specifies how sponsors can share students’ school meal information with Medi-Cal.

For more information pertaining to LEP, please refer to the CDE Civil Rights Compliance and Staff Responsibilities web page.

Yes. Sponsors must collect racial and ethnic data on an annual basis through a mechanism of the sponsor’s choosing.

To satisfy federal requirements, a two-part question must be used to collect data about race and ethnicity.

• The first part should consist of a question about the respondent’s ethnicity:
• Hispanic or Latino
• Not Hispanic or Latino
  
  
• The second part asks respondents to select one or more races from the following categories:
• American Indian or Alaska Native
• Asian*
• Black or African American
• Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander*
• White
  
  

*Note: In addition, California Government Code (GC) Section 8310.5 requires the detailed collection of Asian and Pacific Islander sub-populations.

Yes. The first part of the question must ask the respondent about his or her ethnicity (Hispanic or Latino) and must come first. The second part of the question must ask the respondent to identify one or more races, and it must follow the ethnicity part of the question. All respondents must answer both parts of the question. One of the main reasons for these changes is consistency in data collection, and uniformity in how the question is asked helps to achieve this.

For more information, refer to the CDE FAQs – Race and Ethnicity Collection and Reporting web page and the CDE Description of Racial and Ethnic Categories web page.

No. Visual observation and identification are not allowable practices to use during the collection of racial or ethnic data.

For more information pertaining to racial and ethnic data collection, please refer to the CDE Civil Rights Compliance and Staff Responsibilities web page.

No. RCCIs do not need to publish a public media release (PMR) at the beginning of every school year.

Private schools do not need to publish a PMR unless they include food service fees in their tuition.

No. The sponsor must sign, date, and send the PMR to the local media requesting that the release be published at no charge as a public service to the community. If the community does not have local media sources (i.e., newspaper, television, radio, podcast, etc.), post the PMR in several community areas (i.e., post office, community centers). A sponsor is not required to incur costs to have the PMR published, and the local media is not required to publish it.

No. RCCIs without day students do not have to inform households of the availability of the School Breakfast Program (SBP).

Yes. Private schools are required to inform families about the availability of breakfast for students. At the beginning of each school year, when free and reduced-price meal applications are sent to households, you must notify families of the availability of the SBP. In addition, schools should send reminders regarding the availability of the SBP multiple times throughout the school year (Title 7 Code of Federal Regulations, Section 210.12[d][1]).

No. RCCIs without day students do not have to conduct SFSP outreach.

Yes. Private schools must cooperate with SFSP sponsors to distribute materials to inform families of the availability and location of free SFSP meals for students when school is not in session.

For more information pertaining to public notification for sponsors, please refer to the CDE Civil Rights Compliance and Staff Responsibilities web page.