EDC Connect

Children in families that are enrolled in special assistance Programs are automatically eligible for free school meals. The EDC Connect process identifies these children. By leveraging an electronic match between student data and (DHS) caseload files, the goal is families will not have to complete any paperwork or applications or identify themselves in anyway while providing nutritional meals to students in the household and reimbursing schools at the free rate for each DC meal served.        

To support this process we have developed both a secured Electronic Meal Benefit Application (eMBA) but also a robust secured Student Search service, a public facing Income Eligibility Determination service but more recently secured Import/Export component to help facilitate the collection and identification of students annually.

eMBA

The Electronic Meal Benefit Application (eMBA) is a new web-based plug-in framework of the Child Nutrition Program’s CNP Connect system which will streamline the current student meal benefit eligibility process by: 

• Enabling school staff to enter household information from
• Completed paper applications, or
• In-person interviews with an adult household member.  
• Determining income eligibility with 100% accuracy.  
• Performing data validation checks to ensure all required fields contain information.
• Generating a report of all the “error prone” applications for the Verification process.
• Maintaining a database of the data and results of the application process.

 

 

eMBA has the following features:

• Easy to Use Page by Page workflow management wizard;
• Electronic Signature
• Family member(s) eRIDE  Search (Student)
• Electronic Income Formula Eligibility Determination
• Automatically System Generated Form Notification letters/documents, e.g.,
• Notice to Households of Approval/denial of Benefits
• Sharing Information with Other Programs/Agencies
• SNAP Referral Letter
• Sharing Information with Medicaid/SCHIP
• Notice of Direct Certification