Disclosure of children's free and reduced price meals and free milk eligibility information in the child nutrition programs. Final rule

This final rule establishes requirements for the disclosure of children's free and reduced price meals or free milk eligibility information under the Child Nutrition Programs. The Child Nutrition Programs include the National School Lunch Program, School Breakfast Program, Special Milk Program, Summer Food Service Program, and Child and Adult Care Food Program. Within certain limitations, children's free and reduced price meal or free milk eligibility information may be disclosed, without parental/guardian consent, to persons directly connected to certain education programs, health programs, means-tested nutrition programs, the Comptroller General of the United States, and some law enforcement officials. Additionally, officials also may disclose children's free and reduced price meal or free milk eligibility information to persons directly connected with State Medicaid (Medicaid) and the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) when parents/guardians do not decline to have their information disclosed. These regulations affect State agencies and local program operators that administer the Child Nutrition Programs and households which apply for and/or are approved for free and reduced price meals or free milk. The final rule reflects the disclosure provisions of the Healthy Meals for Healthy Americans Act of 1994 and comments received on the proposed rule published in anticipation of implementing those provisions. Additionally, this final rule includes the regulatory disclosure provisions implementing the Agricultural Risk Protection Act of 2000 and comments received on the interim rule issued to implement those provisions. This final rule also implements nondiscretionary provisions of the Child Nutrition and WIC Reauthorization Act of 2004, allowing certain third party contractors access to children's eligibility status and will allow school officials to communicate with Medicaid and SCHIP officials to verify that children are eligible for free and reduced price school meals or free milk. The disclosure provisions are intended to reduce paperwork for administrators of certain programs that target low-income households and for low-income households which may benefit from those programs by allowing some sharing of household's free and reduced price meal eligibility information. This rule also includes several technical amendments.     

Child and Adult Care Food Program: improved targeting of day care home reimbursements--Food and Consumer Service, USDA. Final rule

This final rule amends the Child and Adult Care Food Program regulations governing reimbursement for meals served in family day care homes by incorporating changes resulting from the Department's review of comments received on a January 7, 1997, interim rule. These changes and clarifications involve: The appropriate use of school and census data for making tier I day care home determinations; documentation requirements for tier I classifications; tier II day care home options for reimbursement, including use of child care vouchers; calculating claiming percentages/blended rates using attendance and enrollment lists; and procedures for verifying household applications of children enrolled in day care homes. This final rule also amends the National School Lunch Program regulations to facilitate tier I day care home determinations by requiring school food authorities to provide elementary school attendance area information to sponsoring organizations. These revisions implement in final form the provisions of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 to target higher CACFP reimbursements to low-income children and providers.     

Fluid milk substitutions in the school nutrition programs. Final rule

This final rule implements a legislative provision on milk substitutes that is consistent with current regulations on menu exceptions for students with disabilities and adds requirements for the optional substitution of nondairy beverage for fluid milk for children with medical or special dietary needs in the National School Lunch Program and the School Breakfast Program. Specifically, this final rule establishes nutrient standards for nondairy beverage alternatives to fluid milk, allows schools to accept a written substitution request from a parent or legal guardian, grants schools discretion to select the acceptable nondairy beverages, and continues to make school food authorities responsible for substitution expenses that exceed the Federal reimbursement. This rule ensures consistency of standards among milk substitutes offered in the school lunch and breakfast programs, and assures that students who consume nondairy beverage alternates receive important nutrients found in fluid milk.     

Cooperation in USDA studies and evaluations, and full use of federal funds in nutrition assistance programs nondiscretionary provisions of the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010, Public Law 111-296. Final Rule

This final rule incorporates into the regulations governing the Programs authorized under the Richard B. Russell National School Lunch Act (NSLA) and the Child Nutrition Act of 1966 (CNA) two nondiscretionary provisions of the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 (HHFK Act). The HHFK Act requires State and local cooperation in Department of Agriculture studies and evaluations related to Programs authorized under the NSLA and the CNA. The HHFK Act also amends the NSLA to stipulate that Federal funds must not be subject to State budget restrictions or limitations, including hiring freezes, work furloughs, and travel restrictions. This final rule amends regulations for the National School Lunch Program; the Special Milk Program for Children; the School Breakfast Program; the Summer Food Service Program; the Child and Adult Care Food Program; State Administrative Expense Funds ; the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children; and the WIC Farmers' Market Nutrition Program. These provisions will strengthen program integrity by ensuring that sufficient data is made available for studies and evaluations. Additionally, exempting Federal funds from State budgetary restrictions or limitations is intended to increase the ability of State agencies to administer USDA's nutrition assistance programs effectively.     

Management of donated foods in child nutrition programs, the Nutrition Services Incentive Program, and charitable institutions. Final rule

This final rule revises and clarifies requirements for the management, distribution, and use of donated foods in the National School Lunch Program and other child nutrition programs, in the Nutrition Services Incentive Program, and by charitable institutions. In response to an audit by the USDA Office of Inspector General, the rule establishes specific requirements to ensure that recipient agencies in child nutrition programs receive the benefit and value of all donated foods received and provided to food service management companies to conduct the food service. The rule also incorporates legislative changes affecting the distribution of donated foods in the Nutrition Services Incentive Program, and reduces reporting and administrative requirements for donated foods provided to charitable institutions. Lastly, the rule restructures and revises regulatory provisions in a plain language format to make them easier to read and understand.     

Green Criminology and the Reconceptualization of School Violence: Comparing Green School Violence and Traditional Forms of School Violence for School Children

School crime and violence continue to be important topics of criminological inquiry. Forms of violence that have received much attention from criminologists include school gun violence, assaults, and bullying. What appears missing from criminological studies are analyses of different forms of violent victimization imposed on school children related to environmental injustice, pollution, and exposure to toxins. In this article, we argue for the interpretation of these harms as violent victimizations. To facilitate this, we draw upon definitions of violent victimization developed in green criminology, conceptualizing exposure to environmental toxins as violent assault, and introduce the term green school violence (GSV). Next, we draw upon the medical, environmental, and public health literature to offer a series of examples of GSV in the United States, discuss numerous environmental hazards present in American schools, and describe their scope and severity. A conservative estimate of the frequency of GSV suggests that far more school children are victimized by GSV than forms of interpersonal acts of violence.     

Controlling School Crime: An Examination of Interorganizational Relations of School and Juvenile Justice Professionals

Abstract Crime in and around schools creates a climate of fear among students and teachers, and disrupts the learning environment. Effective control of school crime demands the cooperative efforts of school and juvenile justice officials. This paper examines the interorganizational relations between school principals, teachers, and juvenile probation officers by comparing survey results from three cities. Findings reveal significant differences onmethods for controlling school crime; and on due process and sharing of school and court records. School and court officials do cooperate in working with students who are under probation supervision; but the extent of their interaction is characterized by a low level of interorganizational relations.     

Policing Schools: Examining the Impact of Place Management Activities on School Violence

The present study examines whether the presence of school resource officers (SROs) and their level of involvement in place management activities are associated with higher or lower rates of school-based serious violence. This study uses data from the 2010 School Survey on Crime and Safety (SSOCS) conducted by National Center for Educational Statistics. Propensity score matching is used to create a quasi-experimental design and isolate the influence of SROs and their level of involvement in place management activities on school-based serious violence. The analysis reveals that schools with a school resource officer are associated with higher rates of reported serious violence and those schools with SROs that participate in more place manager duties are also associated with higher rates of reported serious violence. These findings do not support the notion that SROs are acting as effective place managers and through this place management, reducing reported serious violence. Rather, it appears that the presences of a SRO and their execution of place manager duties is associated with an increase in the reporting of serious violence. Policy implications and limitations of the current research are also discussed.     

Predicting Lawyer Effectiveness: Broadening the Basis for Law School Admission Decisions

Law school admission decisions are heavily influenced by a student's undergraduate grade point average (UGPA) and Law School Admission Test (LSAT) score. These measures, although predictive of first‐year law school grades, make no effort to predict professional competence and, for the most part, they do not. These measures also create adverse impact on applicants from underrepresented racial/ethnic groups. This article describes the rationale for and process by which we explored new tests to predict lawyer effectiveness rather than law school grades and reports results of a multiyear empirical study involving over 3,000 graduates from Berkeley Law School and Hastings College of the Law. Tests measuring personality constructs, interests, values, and judgment predicted lawyering competency but had little or no adverse impact on underrepresented minority applicants. Combined with the LSAT and UGPA, these broader tests could assess law applicants on the basis both of projected professional effectiveness and academic indicators.     

School crime policy changes: The impact of recent highly-publicized school crimes

Highly-publicized school shootings have heightened concern over school safety. This study examines the impact of school crimes on campus policy. The administrators of 336 Texas middle and high schools were surveyed. Policy changes were related to parental complaints about school crime policies and administrator perceptions that students felt less safe. School administrators should base safety policies on strategies that have been evaluated for their effectiveness in reducing school crime and fear. The authors wish to thank the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.     

School Shootings and Security Lock-downs: Myths,Positive School Climates,and Safer Campuses

School shooting tragedies and the juvenile justice system’s movement toward a retributive and punitive framework gravely impacted how primary and secondary school students, disproportionately urban districts, used security measures to lock down campuses and build “fortress-like” schools. This iteration of control on school campuses emerged in tandem with the most recent generation’s zero tolerance approach to student violence and problems; a policy widely regarded as ineffective in urban, suburban, and rural districts. As school shootings continue to impact state legislative action and public reactions to school management, this paper takes a critical approach to school security policies and reviews the evidence on the risk for school violence and how to move away from student control approaches that do not improve school safety. Instead, the incorporation of prosocial education and school engagement efforts finds that school and student safety is improved. These, and related approaches to student body management, decreases campus violence and may also minimize the risk of some school shootings - as rare as these tragic incidents are across the nation’s schools. The interplay of schools, students, and the juvenile and family courts is ongoing. Knowing how school districts can best approach their campus environments, safety, and learning is important for school social workers and court personnel because of how often these systems work, or do not work, together.     

School Resource Officers and the School to Prison Pipeline: Discovering Trends of Expulsions in Public Schools

Public school systems in America have come under scrutiny due to the harsh treatment of students by School Resource Officers (SROs). Incidents of armed, uniformed police in schools affecting physical arrests in American classrooms seem to be ever more frequent in news cycles, likely due to the ease of capturing these events on video via cell phones of bystanders. Of particular note, visceral reports of “heavy-handed” SROs reinforce a consistent narrative from some media outlets suggesting that the simple presence of these officers inside schools leads to student arrests for behaviors that can arguably be dealt with by the school administration in a reintegrative manner. The apparent lack of school discretion and the presence of strict zero tolerance policies are at the root of an issue that has been termed the “School to Prison Pipeline” by mass media. SROs are often the exclusive focus of this issue, typically as a symbol of a school’s dedication to strict enforcement of rigid rules.     

Afterschool snacks in the Child and Adult Care Food Program. Final rule

This final rule incorporates into the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) regulations the provisions of the William F. Goodling Child Nutrition Reauthorization Act of 1998, which authorized afterschool care centers meeting certain criteria to be reimbursed for snacks served to at-risk children 18 years of age and younger. This rule establishes the eligibility of at-risk afterschool care centers to serve free snacks to children who participate in afterschool programs. The centers, which must be located in low-income areas, are reimbursed at the free rate for snacks. The intended effect of this rule is to support afterschool care programs through the provision of snacks that meet CACFP meal pattern requirements. The additional benefits provided by the 1998 reauthorization act and codified by this final rule were extended to institutions and children immediately after enactment. These changes were originally proposed by the Department in a rulemaking published on October 11, 2000.     

Testing the Influence of Community Characteristics on School Misconduct

This study examines the effect of dynamic and structural community characteristics on school misconduct. Data include over 45,000 students in the eighth, tenth, or twelfth grade in 237 schools. Hierarchical linear models tested the direct and interactive effects of community measures, while accounting for student and school characteristics. Community substance abuse norms as well as perceptions of community crime and disorder mediated the influence of concentrated disadvantage on school misconduct. Interaction effects demonstrated that community substance abuse norms were more influential for students enrolled in schools that had a less positive school climate although individual and school characteristics remained robust predictors of school misconduct. School misconduct is influenced by the characteristics of the surrounding community and school context, as well as the interaction between those contexts. Research relying on census data measures of community characteristics may underestimate community influence on school misconduct, and omit proximal community influences on school misconduct.     

Reaffirming the significance of context: The Charlotte School Safety Program

This study reexamined the Charlotte School Safety Program, a school resource officer-delivered fear of crime reduction initiative. Initial evaluation of the program (Kenney & Watson, 1998) found increased perceptions of safety and reduced fear of crime for school youth, although structural properties of the study setting were not considered. Reanalysis of the data with a multivariate model generated qualifying findings that suggested the program may be less effective than previously determined. Minimal attention to environmental factors and the social setting reaffirmed the importance of addressing context in the criminological enterprise and the related issue of delivering empirically sound policy recommendations.     

Digital Uses,Victimization and Online Aggression: A Comparative Study Between Primary School and Lower Secondary School Students in France

With the growing use of electronic communication among children and adolescents, the Internet has become an important tool for their socialization and has opened up new perspectives for network and community building opportunities. However, the Internet and electronic communication tools can be used either positively or negatively and the spread of its use in these recent years has led to online risky behaviours and harm. This questionnaire survey was completed in five primary schools and seven lower secondary schools in the South of France. It sets out to assess the digital uses, risk taking and negative experiences online among primary and secondary school students in France (N?=?4200). Findings show that primary school students are pretty well involved in digital communication since they spend an average of 150 min per day online vs. 190 for secondary school participants. Social networking is also part of their lives with 17 % of primary school children and 50 % secondary school students who use Facebook. In terms of risk taking, only 49 % of primary students and 39 % of secondary school students report they personally know all their online friends. Cyberbullying figures show that quite a few respondents have been affected with negative experiences among which some were repeatedly victimized (14 % in primary schools and 5 % in secondary schools). These findings highlight the necessity to take the issue of educating towards a positive and safe use of the Internet seriously and that primary school children also need to be provided with proper guidance towards a safer Internet.     

Children's Rights and the Politics of Food: Big Food Versus Little People

This article traces the battle in the United States during the Obama administration, continuing into the Trump administration, to protect children's rights to food. It explores barriers to development of sound, science‐based food policies, including the refusal to recognize food as a human right, anti‐science denialism, hostility toward government regulation, and relative powerlessness of children. It points to the role of a “Big Food Pyramid” composed of powerful food industry and large scale distribution and marketing interests in blocking sound policies in prenatal and infant nutrition, school lunches, SNAP and WIC, the marketing to children of high fat and fructose‐laden products, and campaigns to increase youth fitness. While predicting a continuing assault at the federal level on children's rights to safe and healthy foods, the article highlights the positive role of consumer demand in shaping marketing, labeling and production of food and opportunities for leaders in the food industry and in government at local, municipal and state levels to continue the battle for sound food policies.     

Splintering School Districts: Understanding the Link between Segregation and Fragmentation

This article examines the process of fragmentation to understand how the process of establishing new school districts results in high metropolitan‐area segregation. Using educational and census data, the article examines how the political process of creating new school districts in Jefferson County, Alabama, changed the nature of segregation. School segregation remained high from 1960 to 2005, but while in the late 1960s segregation of students was predominantly within districts, by 2005 segregation was primarily between districts. Over time, school district boundary lines gained meaning in terms of the characteristics of the district residents. In creating separate districts, local control has the same effect as earlier de jure laws of maintaining racial segregation in the Birmingham area, with few prospects for overcoming boundaries that divide students and opportunities along racial lines. Local control within the current judicial context will define separate populations and maintain or increase metropolitan segregation.     

论“校局合作”的历史、现状、制约因素及发展思路——校局合作的责任、情感和利益

加强"校局合作"是提高公安院校办学水平的重要环节。"校局合作"在公安院校的发展历程中,因不同的办学模式而呈现不同的状态。基于事业单位性质的公安院校的"校局合作"存在经费保障不足,合作办班积极性不高;学生实习、见习多了利益,少了责任;校局学术科研合作因种种原因不尽如人意等问题。制约"校局合作"的主要因素既有体制问题,也有利益问题。领导重视,进行体制改革,注重合作的互利互惠,实现利益双赢是"校局合作"长盛不衰的根本。