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PantryPath Research · School Hunger Atlas

School hunger in South Dakota

34% certified free/reduced

Across 651 public schools serving 138,855 students, 33.6% of South Dakota students are certified free or reduced-price. 56 schools (10% of NSLP participants) operate under the Community Eligibility Provision, and 12.6% of students are directly certified through SNAP, TANF, or Medicaid linkage.

139K

Students enrolled

651

Public schools (CCD)

56

CEP / Provision 2 schools

66

Counties in atlas

South Dakota by county

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Toggle between the school-food-access composite, free/reduced eligibility, CEP share, direct-certification rate, and SAIPE school-age poverty. Hover a county to see schools, enrollment, and the underlying certification mix.

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Lower
Higher

South Dakota at a glance

Free/reduced

33.6%

Share of enrollment

CEP share

10%

Of NSLP schools

Direct cert

12.6%

SNAP/TANF/Medicaid

NSLP schools

88%

Serve NSLP meals

5–17 in poverty

12.6%

Census SAIPE 2023

Access score

0.37

Composite 0–1

The access score is a 0–1 composite weighted 50% eligibility, 30% CEP share, 20% NSLP share — a visualization and ranking aid, not a direct measurement. See methodology.

County-level hotspots

Top five counties across 66 in South Dakota.

Highest free/reduced share

Certified ≤185% FPL per enrollment

  1. 1 Bennett 100.0%
  2. 2 Corson 100.0%
  3. 3 Mellette 100.0%
  4. 4 Ziebach 100.0%
  5. 5 Oglala Lakota 99.8%

Highest CEP adoption

Of NSLP schools — min. 3 NSLP schools

  1. 1 Bennett 100%
  2. 2 Corson 100%
  3. 3 Mellette 100%
  4. 4 Oglala Lakota 100%
  5. 5 Todd 100%

Largest enrollment

Total students in CCD universe

  1. 1 Minnehaha 34K
  2. 2 Pennington 16K
  3. 3 Lincoln 10K
  4. 4 Brown 5K
  5. 5 Brookings 5K

Every county in South Dakota

All 66 counties with school counts, enrollment, certification mix, CEP adoption, and the SAIPE 5–17 poverty backdrop.

County Schools Enrollment Free/reduced CEP Direct cert 5–17 poverty Access
27011 1 0 — — — — 0.00
Aurora 7 540 32.2% 0% 2.2% 15.2% 0.36
Beadle 14 3,390 60.4% 0% 26.6% 20.1% 0.43
Bennett 3 471 100.0% 100% 0.0% 32.3% 1.00
Bon Homme 14 1,084 28.0% 0% 9.8% 10.1% 0.31
Brookings 18 4,818 19.7% 0% 8.9% 6.9% 0.25
Brown 19 5,382 28.8% 0% 15.5% 9.3% 0.33
Brule 9 1,254 41.9% 0% 20.6% 13.9% 0.39
Butte 7 1,504 36.6% 0% 15.2% 15.1% 0.38
Campbell 3 147 32.6% 0% 0.0% 15.2% 0.36
Charles Mix 13 1,710 75.0% 70% 8.4% 23.3% 0.74
Clark 11 813 26.8% 0% 5.7% 13.6% 0.28
Clay 5 1,593 32.4% 0% 18.3% 12.9% 0.36
Codington 17 4,468 29.0% 0% 13.1% 9.2% 0.31
Corson 9 739 100.0% 100% 2.0% 39.2% 1.00
Custer 6 851 20.9% 0% 10.0% 13.9% 0.24
Davison 13 3,251 31.3% 0% 15.4% 11.0% 0.36
Day 6 720 29.9% 0% 17.5% 15.7% 0.35
Deuel 4 757 17.4% 0% 6.5% 8.5% 0.29
Dewey 6 474 51.3% 50% 16.5% 28.7% 0.61
Douglas 6 358 26.0% 0% 5.9% 12.0% 0.30
Edmunds 13 672 22.3% 0% 7.7% 12.8% 0.25
Fall River 8 982 35.9% 38% 8.3% 17.6% 0.49
Faulk 7 393 14.2% 0% 5.1% 18.6% 0.16
Grant 7 1,104 30.9% 0% 11.0% 11.3% 0.30
Gregory 8 740 42.4% 0% 10.1% 16.7% 0.39
Haakon 5 327 13.8% 0% 4.0% 12.6% 0.23
Hamlin 10 1,494 25.9% 0% 5.5% 8.5% 0.31
Hand 4 472 19.9% 0% 6.8% 8.3% 0.25
Hanson 10 606 22.4% 0% 6.9% 11.9% 0.21
Harding 3 221 28.1% 0% 4.1% 14.6% 0.34
Hughes 6 2,702 23.6% 0% 16.4% 10.0% 0.32
Hutchinson 18 1,364 33.6% 0% 9.9% 13.8% 0.31
Hyde 3 244 17.6% 0% 1.2% 14.1% 0.29
Jackson 5 298 46.0% 0% 17.8% 35.7% 0.43
Jerauld 7 429 19.8% 0% 7.5% 19.0% 0.18
Jones 3 183 50.3% 0% 12.0% 23.4% 0.45
Kingsbury 13 1,054 29.6% 0% 11.3% 13.0% 0.33
Lake 9 1,659 18.6% 0% 9.4% 9.0% 0.23
Lawrence 9 3,107 18.4% 0% 10.6% 10.2% 0.29
Lincoln 23 9,935 12.7% 0% 3.8% 3.4% 0.26
Lyman 3 360 36.1% 0% 22.8% 25.4% 0.38
Marshall 10 727 27.7% 0% 5.1% 15.1% 0.34
McCook 12 1,208 24.3% 0% 9.3% 9.2% 0.29
McPherson 10 379 37.5% 0% 9.5% 18.8% 0.35
Meade 15 3,437 26.5% 0% 9.3% 8.3% 0.32
Mellette 4 416 100.0% 100% 1.4% 31.9% 1.00
Miner 4 328 18.0% 0% 1.8% 10.1% 0.24
Minnehaha 61 34,405 34.7% 3% 16.0% 9.7% 0.38
Moody 7 999 31.1% 17% 13.0% 11.2% 0.38
Oglala Lakota 5 1,429 99.8% 100% 0.4% 39.9% 0.96
Pennington 37 15,830 34.8% 17% 16.3% 14.8% 0.41
Perkins 6 429 31.5% 0% 6.5% 17.7% 0.36
Potter 6 332 22.0% 0% 3.6% 10.0% 0.31
Roberts 12 1,616 53.0% 0% 26.6% 19.6% 0.46
Sanborn 6 493 30.2% 0% 4.1% 13.9% 0.32
Spink 19 1,142 23.1% 0% 5.9% 12.6% 0.26
Stanley 4 418 21.3% 0% 9.8% 8.9% 0.26
Sully 3 215 19.1% 0% 6.0% 7.0% 0.30
Todd 10 1,990 99.7% 100% 0.3% 32.3% 1.00
Tripp 6 981 38.4% 0% 22.3% 21.5% 0.39
Turner 15 1,496 24.0% 0% 6.4% 8.1% 0.31
Union 13 3,078 18.7% 0% 7.5% 5.0% 0.29
Walworth 7 774 34.6% 0% 17.1% 18.8% 0.37
Yankton 10 3,392 33.1% 0% 13.2% 11.3% 0.35
Ziebach 4 671 100.0% 100% 4.5% 54.4% 1.00

South Dakota school meals guide

How free and reduced-price school lunch eligibility works, application steps, and what to do if your child's school is not in CEP.

School meals guide

Summer meals

When the school year ends, NSLP and CEP stop. The Summer Food Service Program and Summer EBT fill the gap for the 46,681 children who rely on school meals in South Dakota.

Summer meals guide

Families with children

SNAP, WIC, Head Start, and the full federal-program stack for households with kids — the assistance ecosystem around the school cafeteria.

Families guide

South Dakota child poverty

The sibling atlas — county-level child poverty across South Dakota. Free/reduced eligibility and child poverty track each other closely but not perfectly.

South Dakota child poverty atlas

South Dakota pantries

Verified food pantries, food banks, and meal programs across South Dakota — open weeknights, weekends, and through the summer gap.

South Dakota pantry directory

Methodology

How we aggregated NCES Common Core of Data school-level records to counties, proxied CEP from lunch_program == 2, and layered SAIPE school-age poverty — plus the access-score formula.

Full methodology