Policy Brief from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation on Improving Child Nutrition Policy

In the United States, nearly one-third of children and teens are overweight or obese. Because children consume a significant portion of their daily calories at school, the nutritional quality of school meals and competitive foods, such as those offered in vending machines, a la carte lines and school stores, is under particular scrutiny. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) sets nutrition standards for its two major school meal programs but currently has limited authority to update existing nutrition standards for competitive foods. Some states and local school districts have developed their own competitive food policies, but the national requirements for foods outside of school meal programs are 30 years old and no longer reflect current nutrition science, dietary patterns and public health concerns.

The USDA programs provide meals to children in about 95 percent of public schools and many private schools across the country. On an average day in 2007, 30.5 million children participated in the National School Lunch Program, and about 10 million participated in the School Breakfast Program.1,2 Most of these meals—59 percent and 80 percent, respectively—were served free or at a reduced price to children from low-income families. The USDA also provides commodity foods for the school meal programs. Nutrition standards for the school meal programs were developed as part of the 1995 School Meals Initiative for Healthy Children (SMI).3 The USDA and an Institute of Medicine expert panel are working to update the SMI standards to incorporate the Dietary Guidelines for Americans 20054 and the Dietary Reference Intakes standards.5 The third School Nutrition Dietary Assessment Study (SNDA-III), which was sponsored by the USDA’s Food and Nutrition Service, provides the most comprehensive and up-to-date information on the overall food environment in public elementary, middle and high schools. SNDA-III includes data from the 2004–2005 school year on the food and nutrient content of meals offered to and selected by children, children’s dietary behaviors at school and outside of school, and the availability and consumption of competitive foods. Like the previous SNDA studies, which have been influential in shaping school nutrition policy, SNDA-III is an important resource for policy-makers who are interested in supporting healthy changes to the school food environment as a way of improving children’s diets and overall health.

Reviewed and Approved