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Healthy
School
Meals for
Minnesota
Kids

Great Trays can help schools provide nutritious meals by sharing information, tools and resources that are based on the USDA’s proposed rule for National School Lunch Program nutrition standards (PDF: 127KB/2 pages). The proposed rule:

  • Increases the availability of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and fat-free and low-fat fluid milk in school meals.
  • Reduces the levels of sodium and saturated fat in meals.

The Great Trays Partnership provides active training for food service staff and encourages participation in a statewide cooperative to purchase healthy food at great prices.

Facts and Figures about Children’s Health and School Lunch

Overweight and obesity are among the most urgent health challenges facing our country today. Excess weight contributes to many of the leading causes of death in the United States, including heart disease, stroke, diabetes, and some types of cancer. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention:

  • Seventeen percent of children in the U.S. are obese. From 1980 to 2000, obesity rates for adults doubled and rates for children tripled.
  • Costs of obesity are increasing. Adjusted for inflation, adult obesity costs increased from $75 billion per year in 1998 to $147 billion per year in 2006.
  • A number of changes have led to the obesity epidemic: relative prices of healthful foods have increased faster than prices for less healthful foods, increased portion sizes, increased consumption of processed foods typically higher in sodium and increased schools vending and a la carte foods.

A U.S. Department of Agriculture report found that foods from the school cafeteria contribute a mean of 19 percent of the daily food energy intake of all children on school days. School Breakfast and School Lunch Program participants obtain about half of their food energy intake for the day from school cafeteria foods.


Updated Wednesday, 26-Oct-2011 10:42:37 CDT