Wake County school meal prices are going up. Here’s what students will pay
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- Wake County approved a 25-cent school meal price hike for the 2025-26 school year.
- Rising food costs and falling participation strain the self-funded meal program.
- The Angel Fund holds just $55 after aiding students with unpaid meal balances.
For the fourth year in a row, Wake County school lunch prices will go up by another 25 cents to help keep the program financially afloat.
The Wake County school board voted June 24 to raise school lunch prices by 25 cents to $3.75 in elementary schools and $4 in middle schools and high schools.
Prices for school breakfasts will also go up by 25 cents to $2 in elementary schools and $2.25 in middle schools and high schools.
School administrators argued the price increase for the 2025-26 school year is needed due to rising costs for a program that is required by law to be financially self-supporting. The child nutrition program is down to one month’s surplus.
“No board member — including the ones that are not here this evening — want to increase meal prices,” said board member Lynn Edmonds. “It’s not because we want to. We feel like we’re trapped in a scenario where it is an enterprise system.”
Edmonds, referencing the state’s Opportunity Scholarship Program, complained that state lawmakers are providing money to help wealthy families pay private school tuition through vouchers, instead of subsidizing free meals for all public school students.
Rising costs, lower participation
School meal prices have been going up annually in Wake.
A decade ago, a full-price lunch cost Wake students $2 in elementary schools and $2.25 in middle and high schools. As prices have gone up, participation rates have gone down in Wake.
It’s at the point now where administrators said that school meal value perception is limited.
Wake serves 19,515 school breakfasts and 50,672 school lunches per day.
“We need to increase participation,” said board member Wing Ng. “Marketing is going to be key.”
The decrease in participation is occurring at the same time that food costs and salaries are going up. Wake now pays school cafeteria workers a minimum of $17.75 an hour compared to $11.58 an hour in 2016.
“We have to pay workers what they need to survive or we’ll lose them,” said board chair Chris Heagarty.
Angel Fund helps cover meal costs for students
The additional 25 cents per lunch could raise $554,612 to replenish the child nutrition department’s rainy day fund.
The meal increase won’t apply to the 37% of students who qualify for a free or reduced price school meal. Wake wants more families to apply for free and reduced price lunch status because the district gets reimbursed at a higher rate from the federal government for the meals served to those students.
The increase also won’t apply to the high-poverty schools that participate in a federal program that allows them to serve free meals to all students.
Wake operates a districtwide “Angel Fund” that provides money to help cover the costs for students who’ve run out of money in their meal accounts.
As of June 19, Wake had received $127,598 in donations for the Angel Fund. But only $55 is remaining.
Before the vote, Jeannette Hill, an assistant principal at Apex High School, urged the board not to raise prices. She suggested Wake consider alternatives such as partnering with local restaurants and grocery stores to cut costs.
“Please consider alternate ways to support child nutrition that do not have the potential to lower participation and increase food insecurity,” Hill said during public comments.
Go to wcpss.net/angelfund for more information on how to donate to the Angel Fund.
This story was originally published June 24, 2025 at 7:06 PM.
