“Go Places with School
Breakfast”
What can your district do to improve student
success?
Use
National School Breakfast Week (NSBW) as a time to promote your school
breakfast program. Studies show that students, who ate breakfast before
starting school, had a general increase in math grades and reading scores,
increased attention levels, reduced school nurse visits and improved behavior. Planning menus and participating in
National School Breakfast Week (NSBW) can help you increase student
participation and help students in your district make strides in those areas
too. NSBW is being celebrated March
6-10, 2006. This year’s theme is “Go Places with School Breakfast.” Some ideas to help you contemplate ways to
promote your breakfast program during National School Breakfast Week follow.
Target your audience using materials already
created
School
Nutrition Association (SNA), a national non-profit professional organization
devoted to enhancing children’s health and well being through school meals and
sound nutrition education, has developed materials to promote good nutrition
and specifically breakfast promotional materials. These can be found at
http://docs.schoolnutrition.org/meetingsandevents/nsbw/index.asp or by going to SNA’s web site at
http://www.schoolnutrition.org. Then click on “Meetings & Events” on the
left menu bar and scroll down to “National School Breakfast Week” when it
appears. This will take you to the same
link listed above, but provides you with the total site for additional
nutritional information.
Among
many other NSBW resources from the School Nutrition Association, they offer a
planning timeline, as well as ideas for activities and art projects. Menus planned for the week are written with
the goal of getting students to think of all the places they can go by
celebrating with this year’s theme, “Go Places with School Breakfast!” The following abbreviated menus are
suggested by SNA for breakfast during NSBW 06 and are all linked to that
theme. The menu items are linked to the recipes on their web site. Menus
on the web site have additional detailed numbers about serving sizes and
nutritional information.
Continued on Page 2
Inside this issue:
Go Places with School Breakfast
“got breakfast?”
Special Diet Requests for
Non-medical Reasons
The “411” on Cleaning
Tidbits from Julia
Ask “IT”
RCCIs Wellness Policies
For Sale
Gas Convention
Oven
SFSP Update
Commodity News
Check Out the Library
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Space Odyssey |
Hit the Road |
Make Waves |
Time Bandits |
I’ll Fly Away |
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Fuel-up Syrup |
Cruise Juice (Apple) |
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Motor Milk |
Main Sail Milk |
Pilot Milk |
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All
menus and recipes are suggestions provided by SNA but have not been tested in a
kitchen. School nutrition professionals
are encouraged to choose menus that best fit the needs of their staff and
preferences of the students. For
questions about menus or recipes, contact the SNA Service Center at servicecenter@schoolnutrition.org
(800) 877–8822.
Include parents and educators in the campaign
What parent or teacher doesn’t want their children to perform at their
best at school? Help parents in your district find that school breakfast is a great
solution to hectic mornings and children who are too groggy in the morning to
eat before school. Promotional materials are available from SNA on the web site
also.
Get your school
district to proclaim National School Breakfast Week. Last year’s National proclamation can be
found on the following site, http://www.fns.usda.gov/cnd/breakfast/. Use it as an example for a local
proclamation.
Promote Breakfast
advantages to students
Provide parents,
students, and educators with the My Pyramid sites where they can monitor their
food intake and activity levels and see where including a nutritious breakfast
can be important to insure they get all the essential nutrients they need. The two links are as follows the first being
for the older students and adults and the second for the elementary children 6
to 11 years of age: http://mypyramid.gov/ and http://www.fns.usda.gov/tn/kids-pyramid.html. Teach the students the importance of
monitoring their own nutrition in conjunction with their own activity
levels.
Finally,
encourage secondary students to consider eating breakfast to decrease
their lunchtime calorie intake. A new
British study that appears in the November issue of Pediatrics concluded that
children who start the day with a bowl of bran cereal, cereals high in nuts and
seeds, or hot cereal made from rolled oats feel fuller and eat less at
lunchtime than kids who down corn flakes or white bread for breakfast. While further studies are needed, the
researchers say the results add to mounting evidence that so-called
low-glycemic index (GI) foods can play an important role in controlling
weight. GI is a measure of how quickly
a carbohydrate raises a person's blood sugar level. High-GI foods, such as
croissants and corn flakes, are the kind of breakfast fare that can cause a
spike in blood sugar. Typically, these are foods that are highly
processed. Low-GI foods, by contrast,
break down more slowly in the body and tend to be higher in fiber,
such as whole-grain cereals and nutty breads.
In the new study, children who ate a low-GI meal in the morning consumed
significantly fewer calories at lunch than kids on a high-GI breakfast. The
study is the first to observe such an effect in a group of normal and
overweight children, the researchers say. So plan your menus accordingly.
If
you need more ideas for maintaining your breakfast participation once NSBW is
over, don’t forget the Discover School Breakfast Toolkit available on line http://www.fns.usda.gov/cnd/breakfast/.
Editor’s Note:
SNA’s website has been experiencing serious and extensive technical
difficulties and has been disabled while the issues are being addressed. SNA hopes the site is up and running as soon
as possible in 2006.
Everybody
knows that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. What most people
don’t know is that more than half of kids in need don’t get breakfast at school
each morning. To address this growing problem, two
one-time presidential nominees, former Senators Bob Dole (R-KS) and George
McGovern (D-SD) joined forces recently with key leaders in the Federal
government, non-profit and private sectors to launch the “got breakfast?”
campaign to promote the adoption of healthy breakfast and milk programs in our
nation’s school systems.
“got breakfast?”
is a program brought to you
by Share Our Strength, the Alliance to End Hunger, the National Dairy Council
and Breakfast Breaks to ensure that ALL school kids start the day off right.
Announcing
the “got breakfast?” Essay Contest
Senators Dole and McGovern, who spearheaded
the issue of school nutrition in Congress, also announced a “got breakfast?”
essay contest. Children across the country will be asked to submit a short
essay on why breakfast is the most important meal of the day and why getting
breakfast at school is important.
Pictures of the four winners and portions
of their essays will be on new “got breakfast?” posters distributed to schools
nationwide. In addition, each winner will receive a new laptop, and everyone in
their school will get Breakfast Breaks for a week.
Go to the web site www.GotBreakfast.org. for posters to promote the contest. Help a student in IOWA - in your
district win.
Special Diet Requests
for
Non-medical Reasons
Is Iowa’s
growing diversity increasing your level of confusion? Imagine yourself as a director of a school district experiencing
numerous requests for meal modifications. You have three students with
diabetes, another with PKU, two students who are allergic to dairy, additional
students want a diet plate and others want a larger entrée. You have been asked why you can’t serve tofu
for lunch (because tofu does not meet the requirement that “Alternate Protein
Products” contain at least 18% protein by weight when fully hydrated or
formulated). Now you hear that parents
of a new student are requesting meals that comply with their religious food
practices. What are the actual policies
that deal with meal requests that are not due to medical or dietary needs?
Requests for
most religious and ethnic preferences, low calorie plates and larger entrees
can be handled through a la carte sales, carefully planned menu choices or the
“offer vs. serve” option and require no special exemption from the State
agency.
What about the many religious dietary
restrictions? Some students can’t have
pork. Other students can’t have
beef. You may have requests for
lacto-ovo-vegetarian meals (vegetarian meals that include milk, eggs,
vegetables, fruits, grains, and nuts).
In addition, some religions have special dietary laws observed at
certain times of the year or on holidays.
How can you be expected to keep everything straight?
You are not required to offer vegetarian
meals, meals without pork, or any other variation of a menu. But, most of these modifications can be
handled by offering alternate entrées depending on the need in the specific
district. Although this is at the
school’s discretion, keep in mind that we want to encourage all students to eat
in the school cafeteria. Offering to
provide a reasonable alternate meal is a way of marketing to students and
increasing our breakfast and lunch participation.
There are provisions in regulations that
allow for variation in meal requirements for religious reasons in Jewish
schools and Seventh-day Adventist schools.
These provisions do not pertain to public or private schools that are
not recognized as Jewish or Seventh-day
Adventist schools.
The Jewish and Seventh-day Adventist schools provisions can be found on the USDA
webpage:
http://schoolmeals.nal.usda.gov/Resource/specialdiets-veg_relig.htm.
THE “411” on Cleaning
Do you ever find
yourself wondering…..If one cup of cleaning solution is good ….2 cups must be
even better……or I could save time and effort if I combine the five step process
or the three sink method for warewashing into two steps or just use two sinks?
Stop the presses…hold the phone! These are just a few of the misconceptions
that can lead to inadequate cleaning, ineffective sanitation, and equipment
damage. The following information is
designed to explain the “methods of madness” for cleaning and sanitizing
process.
Cleaning is the
process of removing food residue, grease, and soil from any surface, or in
short removing what you can see.
Sanitizing takes place after cleaning and reduces pathogenic and
spoilage organisms to level considered safe for human health, in short, it
removes or kills the organisms you cannot see.
Although the two are linked they are separate processes. Surfaces must be cleaned before sanitizing
can be carried out because soil and other matter (such as grease) can obstruct
the effectiveness of the sanitizer.
For
clarification purposes the term disinfect and sanitize are not the same
either. Disinfection is a higher level
of microbial kill than sanitizing and is not necessary for food contact kitchen
equipment.
There are two
steps to having a clean and sanitary kitchen.
The first step, “cleaning”, will be discussed in this
article. The second step, “sanitizing”,
will be discussed in the March issue of the Lunchline.
The cleaning
process involves washing all surfaces with warm, soapy water; rinsing the
surface with warm water to remove the soap residue and remaining dirt. Soap
isn’t designed to kill bacteria, but instead it acts as a surfactant to lift
dirt and germs off a surface so that they can be rinsed away.
Most surfaces
that have been soiled or contaminated may be cleaned with the proper use of
cleaning agents. Detergents are materials that have the ability to remove
contamination and soil. When detergent
is combined with action, a cleaner surface is produced.
The process used
in manual cleaning operations involves 5 steps.
1. Rinse, scrape, or soak all items before
washing.
2. Record the date, meal sanitizer water
temperature or test strip results and initial entry on the Manual Warewashing
Monitoring Form.
3. Wash items in the first sink in the
detergent solution. Water temperature should be at least 110°F. Use a brush, cloth, or scrubber to
loosen soil. Replace detergent solution when suds are gone or water is dirty.
4. Immerse or spray-rinse items in second
sink. Water temperature should be at least 110°F. Remove all traces of food and detergent. If using
immersion method, replace water when it becomes cloudy, dirty or suds appear.
5. Immerse items in third sink filled with
hot water or a chemical-sanitizing solution. If hot water immersion is used,
the water temperature must be at least 171°F. Items must be immersed for 30 seconds. If chemical
sanitizing is used, the sanitizer must be mixed at the proper concentration.
(Check at regular intervals with a test kits). Water must be correct temperature
for the sanitizer used. Air-dry all
items on a drain board. Do not use
towels to dry items.
The last step in
the cleaning process is sanitation. This process will be discussed in detail in
the March issue of the Lunchline.
The manager and employees share responsibilities for knowing and using standard procedures for a clean and sanitary food service. Food safety is everyone’s business. To have a safe environment every person in foodservice must be committed to high standards of cleaning and sanitation.
Best
Practices Awards
The USDA
Mountain Plains Regional “Best Practices Awards” in the National School Lunch
and School Breakfast Program have just been announced. The three categories for awards this year
include:
The purpose of
the awards is to encourage and reward outstanding practices in school food
service.
Individual
School Food Authorities and schools are encouraged to nominate themselves or
may nominate others for an award. The application process is relatively simple
and consists primarily of a description of what you did (250-300 words
maximum), including a brief history and impact statement, i.e. dollars saved or
increased participation. Photos or newspaper articles should be included to
help document what you did and if any materials or resources were developed,
copies should also be included. Posted on the Bureau web site, in the awards
section, you will find a complete copy of the guidance memo, nomination form,
as well as examples of the types of things that might be done under each
category, and the judging criteria.
Food
Safety Inspection Requirement
As a reminder
the Reauthorization of the USDA Child Nutrition Programs in 2004 included a
requirement that schools receive two health inspections beginning with the
2005-2006 school year. Now is an appropriate time for SFAs to review the
inspections status of each of the sites participating in the School Meal
Programs. If each site has not yet had two inspections, it is important that
the SFA request from the local inspection authority that two inspections be
completed prior to the end of the school year. The SFA cannot control whether
or not the two inspections are completed, but can and must document that the
SFA has attempted to get the two required inspections. A copy of a letter or a
note placed in a file, indicating a call was made to this person on this date
requesting the inspections would be considered documentation. Copies of either
the inspections or the documentation must be on file for the State Agency to
review.
SFA’s will be
required to report to the State Agency early next school year the number of
inspections by school for this past year. This reporting will be done via a
modification that will be made to the web based application and claiming
system.
As part of this
legislation schools are also required to have posted in a publicly visibly
location a copy of the most recent inspection.
Food Safety Program Based
on the Process Approach to HACCP Principles Requirement
As mentioned in
previous communications, SFAs are required to have a Food Safety Program in
place by the beginning of next school year. The Bureau has been offering training
to assist school districts with this new requirement. Parts 1 and 2 were
offered live over the ICN last November and are being rebroadcast this winter
and spring. If you have not already gotten started with this new requirement,
please go to the Bureau website for information http://www.state.ia.us/educate/ecese/fn/training/haccp.html.
In addition to links regarding the requirement you will find the information
about attending one of the repeats on Parts 1 and 2.
Information
regarding registering for the Part 3 Food Safety Program training, which will
be offered in person regionally and include more opportunities for interaction,
will be posted soon to this site.
The USDA
prohibits discrimination in its programs and activities on the basis of race,
color, national origin, gender, age or disability. Persons with disabilities
who require alternate means for communication of program information (Braille,
large print, audiotape, etc.) should contact the USDA’s TARGET Center at (202)
720-2600 (voice and TDD).
To file a
complaint of discrimination, write USDA, Director, Office of Civil Rights, Room
326-W, Whitten Building, 14th and Independence Avenue, SW,
Washington, D.C. 20250-9410 or call (202) 720-5964 (voice and TDD).
USDA is an equal opportunity provider and employer.
It
is the policy of the Iowa Department of Education not to discriminate on the
basis of race, color, national origin, gender, disability, religion, creed, age
or marital status in its programs or employment practices. If you have questions or grievances related
to this policy, please contact the Legal Consultant, Department of Education,
Grimes State Office Building, Des Moines, Iowa 50319-0146, 515/281-5295.
Using
AutoComplete for Passwords in Internet Explorer
Most schools
enter claims using Microsoft’s Internet Explorer (IE). Your IE is set up to recognize new usernames
(or login ids) and passwords and then store them to memory. The following is Part
1 in a 3 part series on Internet Explorer AutoComplete for passwords.