NC Launches SUN Bucks To Help Feed School Kids And Families During The Summer

The USDA has launched a new, permanent program to provide food assistance to children and families during the summer. The SUN Bucks program will officially launch in the summer of 2024! 

What is SUN Bucks?

SUN Bucks is the newest addition to North Carolina’s Summer Nutrition Programs and aims to provide a convenient way for students to access nutritious food during the summer. SUN Bucks is designed to work hand-in-hand with other programs, such as summer meals for children (group meal service and meals to-go), Food and Nutrition Services (FNS), and Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), to help provide children with consistent access to nutrition critical to their development.

SUN Bucks, also known as Summer EBT (S-EBT), helps families by giving them money to buy groceries during the summer when children are not in school. Starting in the summer of 2024, families that qualify for this program will get $120 for each child that’s part of the program. This money will be on a card that works like a debit card (called an EBT card). You can use this card to buy healthy food at places like grocery stores, farmers’ markets, and some online retailers.

Who Will Qualify to Receive SUN Bucks?

Some families will have to apply for the SUN Bucks program, but many students will automatically qualify for the program. Children will automatically qualify if they already participate in any of the following programs:

• Free or Reduced-Price (FRP) meals at school because they have an approved FRP application at school, or
• Food and Nutrition Services (FNS, food stamps), or
• Work First (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), cash assistance), or
• Medicaid with household income below 185% of the federal poverty level, or
• Foster care.

Families who have a child (or children) who attend a school that participates in the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) will be notified with an invitation to apply for SUN Bucks through either text and/or email. Instructions on how to apply will be included.

Please use the SUN Bucks 2024 School Search Tool to check if your child’s school participates in the NSLP or is a CEP school. 

Children in foster care will have their SUN Bucks cards sent to their local DSS office. Their case worker will help ensure the card reaches the child.

Children who automatically qualify for SUN Bucks and are experiencing homelessness or who are migrants will receive the card at the last known address on file with their school or benefits caseworker or to their local DSS office for pickup if no address is known. To check if your child is automatically eligible, please see the SUN Bucks flyer below.

 

If you are submitting a SUN Bucks application and are homeless or migrant, you can either write in the best address you have or say that you don’t have a stable address. If you don’t have a stable address, you can write in the county of the DSS office that you’d like the card to be sent to, and it will be mailed to that DSS office for you to pick up.

Any child who meets the eligibility requirements mentioned in “Does my child qualify for SUN Bucks?” can get SUN Bucks benefits for the summer, no matter their legal or immigration status. Getting SUN Bucks doesn’t affect your immigration status, and it won’t have an impact on any future immigration application you might submit.

The 2024 SUN Bucks application is now available. Households are encouraged to complete an online application, although a paper application option is also available. The paper application will include instructions on where and how to submit a completed application.

More information about the SUN Bucks application can be found on the SUN Bucks application webpage at www.ncdhhs.gov/sunbucksapplication.

Visit NCDPI’s Summer Meals webpage for more information! You may also text FOOD or COMIDA to 304-304 and provide your full address, zip code, or city to find the meal sites nearest to you.  

Information about the SUN Bucks program will be regularly shared on this webpage and the NCDHHS social media accounts. These accounts are on Facebook, Instagram, and X (previously Twitter).

Assistance programs are also available year-round, including Food and Nutrition Services (FNS) and the Special Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC). The SUN Bucks FAQs section provides more information on these programs.

Feature photo credit: CDC