FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 12, 2025
The cafeteria lunch is as closely associated with K-12 schools as reading and writing. But until 1946, it wasn’t unusual for students to go hungry during the day.
That’s the year President Harry Truman signed the National School Lunch Act into law. The program, which provides free and discounted lunches to students, was created to “safeguard the health and well-being of the nation’s children,” the bill stated. And with more than 40% of World War II military recruits rejected in large part because of poor nutrition due to the Great Depression, feeding growing children a balanced diet was considered a matter of national security.
“The school lunch program started as a response to food shortages during World War II and the desire to ensure kids receive proper nutrition to support their education and health so they could be ready to be better students and to eventually serve their country,” Amy Maclosky, school nutrition director at Arlington County Public Schools in Virginia.
Today, the National School Lunch Program serves 29.7 million students each day, according to the United States Department of Agriculture Food and Nutrition Service. Studies show that school lunch programs improve academic performance and help prevent childhood obesity. When paired with regular physical activity, healthy eating can help children and adults stay fit and ward off chronic diseases throughout life, the SNA says.
New federal guidelines placed limits on added sugars in school breakfast and lunch programs, specifically targeting breakfast cereals, yogurt, and flavored milk made available to children starting this school year, as part of ongoing efforts to increase the nutritional value of school-based meals.
Access to nutritious food remains a War Department priority. Military OneSource provides a number of resources to help service members and their families stay fit and healthy, including the Nutrition and Fitness MilLife Guide, health and wellness coaching for adults and teenagers 13 and older, and a guide to food security resources and support programs.
“The department provides resources to strengthen warfighter and family readiness – this is a strategic imperative to national security,” said Stephen Simmons, deputy assistant secretary of war for Military Community and Family Policy. “The support we provide to their families is part of our commitment; it’s us living up to our social contract to assist military families in improving their quality of life experiences. That’s why we invest in their resiliency, and the health and wellness of service members and their families.”
The Department of Defense Education Activity’s School Meal Program serves more than seven million nutritionally sound meals annually to students in the U.S. and overseas. A key partner in this effort is the Army and Air Force Exchange Service, which provides school lunches to K–12 students on Army and Air Force installations across seven countries overseas, including support for all Marine installations in Okinawa and one in Iwakuni. In school year 2023–2024 alone, AAFES served an average of 19,600 meals per day—totaling more than 3.4 million meals—across 73 school cafeterias throughout Europe and the Pacific. As with the National School Lunch Program, DoDEA’s meal program not only ensures more than 65,000 military-connected school-age children and youth have access to reliable, nutritious and affordable food, it also eases stress on busy families.
“School lunches are convenient. They’re well-balanced meals. You don’t have to worry when you send kids to school,” Maclosky said. “You can feel really safe in participating and knowing the kids are getting a well-balanced meal, they’re not hungry during the day and they’re ready to learn,”
About Military Community and Family Policy
Military Community and Family Policy is responsible for establishing and overseeing quality of life policies and programs that help our service members, their families and survivors be well and mission ready. Military OneSource is the gateway to programs and services that support the everyday needs of more than 4.4 million service members and immediate family members of the military community. Access these services 24/7/365 around the world.
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