The numbers in Minnesota are even more telling if you go back a few years. There are 10,000 fewer students in Minnesota schools than there were in 2002, yet there are 65,000 more students on free and reduced lunch.

The data also show that increased poverty is universal. Edina, widely considered one of the state’s most affluent communities, has one of the lowest rates of poverty in Minnesota. Fewer than 8 percent of students in Edina are on free and reduced lunch. But even that rate is 20 percent higher than last year’s.

MPR