1. Training for School Food Service Staff
Meal Pattern Overview
Training for School Food Service Staff
This staff training is intended to be a general overview of the New Meal Patterns. Additional staff trainings on specific topics are/will be available.
Notes for speaker:
-Make a copy for each person of the OPSI Meal Pattern Chart
-Words in italics are meant to be spoken.
-Answers posed to the group are NOT in italics
-References to additional information and additional trainings are not in italics
-Optional discussion ideas are offered on slides 21 and 24

2. Examine the new USDA meal pattern requirements.
Objectives
Examine the new USDA meal pattern requirements.
The objective for this training is to take an overview look at the new Meal Pattern Requirements.
This training is meant to be an overview. We will have future trainings that look at some of these requirements in more detail.

3. Why are we here?
•School meal programs impact millions of children every day
•Obesity and food insecurity/hunger are dual threats to many of these children
•Rule informed by current nutrition science
New school meal requirements are part of the Healthy, Hunger-Free Act of 2010 that was passed into law into .
The new standards impact the 32 million students that participate in school meal programs every school day.
We have an important job and that job impacts our students daily. Students that are well fed, learn better.
Obesity and food insecurity hunger are dual threats to many children. While the incidence of childhood obesity is higher than ever before, for many children, school meals may be the only meals they eat in any given day.
USDA built the new meal requirements around recommendations from a panel of experts convened by the Institute of Medicine and the 2010 Dietary
Guidelines for Americans. The school meal requirements are based on current nutrition science.

4. “The Rule”
The new rule requires: -an increase in the availability of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and fat-free and low-fat fluid milk -reduce the levels of sodium, saturated fat and trans fat -meet the nutrition needs of school children within their calorie requirements.
Nutrition Standards are the foundation of Federal school nutrition programs. The release of the New Nutrition Standards, which take effect on July 1, 2012, will raise nutrition standards for the first time in more than fifteen years.
These nutrition standards put forth in the new rule, require Local Educational Agencies (LEA’s) to:
-increase the availability of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and fat-free and low-fat fluid milk in school meals;\
-reduce the levels of sodium, saturated fat and trans fat in meals; and
-meet the nutrition needs of school children within their calorie requirements.

5. Menu Planning Approach Food-based menu planning
A single food-based menu planning approach will be required for breakfast and lunch. The food-based menu planning approach focuses on food components, not nutrients. There are five required food components at lunch and three required components at breakfast.
Why do you think this approach was chosen?
-serves as a teaching tool to help children choose a balanced meal
-matches Dietary Guidelines / My Plate
-it also makes it easier for schools to communicate the meal improvements to parents and the community-at-large.
-simplifying program management, training and monitoring is also expected to result in program savings.
This rule becomes effective for lunch this coming school year, but not for breakfast until school year Therefore for this next year you could use food based menu planning for lunch and continue to use nutrient standard menu planning for breakfast.

6. What is the meal pattern?
OSPI’s Meal Pattern Chart
OSPI has developed a document that places the new meal pattern into a chart.
Distribute a copy of the OSPI Meal Pattern Chart to each person
Let’s take an overview look at this chart.
The chart is broken down into the grade groups requirements for each of the food components and dietary specifications .
The five food components are listed in the column on the left. Remember, a food component means one of the five food groups which comprise reimbursable meals at lunch. The five food components to be offered to all students at lunch are: Milk, Meat/Meat Alternates, Grains, Vegetables, and Fruits.
The left column also includes the dietary specifications; Calories, saturated fat, sodium and trans fat.

7. Same grade groups for NSLP and SBP:
Age / Grade Division
Same grade groups for NSLP and SBP:
K-5
6-8
9-12
The new meal pattern features new age/grade range groupings.
The age/grade groups are now narrower to provide age-appropriate meals.
The new meal pattern does not allow for schools with a grade configuration with one grade above or below the grade grouping to follow the predominant grade group requirements (as was previously allowable).
However, you will find some flexibility when noting the overlap for some components.
In grades K through 8 food quantity requirements overlap for all components and calories.
However, grade configurations that include the 6-8 grade and group requires separate menu plans as there is no overlap for some of the components (fruits / vegetables) and calories
The new Meal Pattern requirements do not apply to pre-school children. Requirements for pre-school children will be included in a future Child and Adult Care Food Programs (CACFP) update.
Preschool meal patterns have not been updated. You will continue to follow the same meal pattern you currently use for preschool students.

8. Meal Pattern Components
Fruits and Vegetables are now separate components!
Daily and Weekly requirements
Minimum and Maximums
There are three major changes to menu planning .
The first is that fruits and vegetables are now separate components
Another change is that many of the requirements now have daily and weekly requirements that will need to be planned for. We will look at these as we work thru the meal pattern,
And a third change is that some of the meal components now have minimums and maximums.
Again we will look at this as we look at the individual components.

9. Milk Food Components Grade K - 5 Grade 6 – 8 Grade 9 - 12 Milk
5 cups/week
(1 cup daily)
Let’s start at the top of the meal pattern chart – with Milk
At least 1-cup of milk must be offered each day for lunch regardless of age/grade group. This is a minimum requirement.
These requirements are effective in lunch in school year

10. Milk Allowable milk options: Must offer at least two choices
-Fat-free (unflavored or flavored)
-Low-fat (unflavored only)
-Lactose-reduced or lactose-free low-fat or fat-free
Must offer at least two choices
Does not alter nutrition standards for milk substitutes
Milk provisions also apply to children ages 3-4
Schools must offer at least two choices within the types of milk listed: fat-free (unflavored or flavored) and unflavored low-fat milk.
Schools may offer a variety of milk options such as: fat-free (unflavored or flavored), low-fat (unflavored only), and fat-free or low-fat (lactose reduced or lactose-free). Note that if flavored lactose reduced or lactose-free milk is offered, it also must be fat-free. Schools are not allowed to offer 2% or whole milk.
There is no change to the requirements for the nutritional content of optional non-dairy beverages offered to students with special dietary needs.
Lastly, the milk fat and flavor restrictions established by this final rule also apply to meals for children in the 3-4 year-old age group. (reference SP )

11. Meat or Meat Alternate Food Components Grade K - 5 Grade 6 – 8
Meat or Meat Alternates
-Weekly minimum - maximum
8 – 10 oz equivalent/week
(1 oz daily minimum)
9 – 10 oz equivalent/week
oz equivalent/week
(2 oz daily minimum)
Let’s move on to the meat/meat alternate group.
Looking at the first column of our chart we see that this component has a daily minimum AND weekly minimum and maximum for the different age/grade groups.
For the grade K-5 students there is a 1 oz daily minimum and a 8-10 oz. minimum/maximum for the week.
For grade group 6–8 the daily minimum remains 1 oz, but the weekly minimum/ maximum is 9-10 oz
Grades 9–12 have a 2 oz daily minimum and a 10–12oz weekly minimum / maximum.
Let’s look closely at the minimum and maximums.
We will use the Grade for this example.
If you planned a 1 oz entrée daily – would you meet the weekly min / max? No
If you planned a 2oz entrée daily – would you meet the weekly min / max? Yes
If you planned a 3oz entrée daily – would you meet the weekly min / max? No
Do you have to have 2 oz every day for this group? No – just as long as you have a 1 oz DAILY minimum and meet the 8 – 10 oz for the week
These requirements go into effect for lunch in SY

12. Meat or Meat Alternate A variety of meat/meat alternates is encouraged
Tofu and soy yogurt will be allowable as meat alternates
Offering a meat/meat alternate daily as part of the school lunch supplies protein, B vitamins, vitamin E, iron, zinc, and magnesium to the diet of children, and also teaches them to recognize the components of a balanced meal.
USDA encourages schools to offer a variety of protein foods such as lean or extra lean meats, seafood, and poultry; beans and peas; fat-free and low-fat milk products such as cheese and yogurt; and unsalted nuts and seeds, to meet the meat/meat alternate requirement. However, there is no requirement to offer the protein subgroups as described in the 2010 Dietary Guidelines.
Allowing tofu and soy yogurt allows schools to diversify the sources of protein available to students and better meet the dietary needs of vegetarians and culturally diverse groups in schools.

13. Vegetables
There are some significant changes for the vegetable component!
First remember the vegetable component is separate from the fruit component
The requirements for the vegetables component are the same for the Grade K – 5 and grade 6 – 8 groups with a ¾ cup daily minimum and a 3 ½ cup weekly minimum. For the grade 9 – 12 groups there is a 1 cup daily minimum and a 5 cup minimum for the week.
In addition to the overall vegetable component requirements, we also have different sub groups of vegetables with weekly requirements for each sub group.
This means that over the course of the week, the required amount of each subgroup must be met, but that on any given day there are no specific subgroup requirements.
The vegetable sub groups are; dark green, red/orange, legumes, starchy, and other.
We will learn more about the vegetable sub groups in a separate training. (Reference Vegetable Subgroups Training)
Menu planners must pay careful attention to the minimum daily requirement for the vegetable component. To meet the minimum daily and weekly requirement for vegetables, you will need to plan additional vegetables beyond the vegetable subgroup requirement to meet the daily requirement for each age/grade division.

14. Vegetables Variety of preparation methods available
Fresh, frozen, and canned products
Minimum creditable serving = ⅛c
Changes in crediting of leafy greens
-1 cup leafy greens = ½ cup vegetables serving
Foods from the beans/peas subgroup may be credited as a vegetable OR a meat alternate
Schools may select from a variety of vegetable preparation methods to meet these new requirements. Fresh, frozen and canned products are all allowable.
As is currently practiced, 1/8 of a cup of vegetables is the minimum creditable amount. For example if you plan for a menu for a K-5 student that includes an 1/8 cup of carrot sticks and 1/8 cup of celery sticks and ½ cup of steamed broccoli you would be meeting the daily required ¾ cup of vegetables.
However, the crediting of leafy greens has changed. Uncooked, leafy greens will credit as half of volume as served. Therefore, one cup of romaine lettuce is creditable as one half of a cup of vegetables.
Additionally, local menu planners can decide how to incorporate beans and peas (legumes) into the school meal. These foods may count toward either the requirement for vegetables or the meat/meat alternate component. However, schools may not offer one serving of beans and peas and count it toward both food components during the same meal.

15. Fruit Now let’s look at the fruit component for lunch.
You can see that the minimum weekly requirement at lunch for fruit is 2.5 cups for Grades K-5 as well as Grades 6-8, and a minimum of 5 cups per week for Grades Grades K-5 and Grades 6-8 have minimum daily requirements of ½ cup (as shown in parentheses) and Grades 9-12 must be offered a minimum of 1 cup of fruit per day.

16. Fruit
Fresh, frozen without added sugar, canned in juice/light syrup, or dried fruit options
Exception: frozen fruit with added sugar SY (details in SP )
No more than half of fruit offerings may be in the form of juice
100% juice only
¼ cup of dried fruit = ½ cup of fruit
Refer to Food Buying Guide for crediting
Fruit may be offered in several different forms.
These forms include: fresh, frozen without added sugar, canned in juice or light syrup, and dried.
To accommodate existing inventory and to give industry time to reformulate for SY schools may continue to serve frozen fruit with added sugar. (Reference SP )
No more than half of fruit offerings may be in the form of juice, and only 100%, full strength, juice can be served.
The juice requirement that allows juice to be offered for ½ of the fruits offered is a weekly requirement. Therefore, schools could serve ½ cup fruit pieces and ½ cup fruit juice on one or more days as long as the total weekly juice offering does not exceed ½ of the total fruit offerings for the entire week.
Why do you think that there is this limit for juice?
Juice is a more concentrated source of calories and doesn’t contain the fiber that whole fruit has.
For crediting purposes, dried fruit is credited as twice the volume as served. Therefore, ¼ of a cup of dried fruit is creditable as ½ of a cup of fruit.
Menu planners must continue to use the Food Buying Guide for Child Nutrition Programs to determine how to credit whole fruit. USDA will update the Food Buying Guide as soon as possible, and will also develop other technical assistance resources as needed.

17. Whole Grain requirements Minimum and Maximum servings
Grains / Breads
Whole Grain requirements
Minimum and Maximum servings
There are two major changes in the grain / breads components:
First there is a whole grain requirement which requires half of all grains to be whole grain for SY and Then starting School Year all grains are required to be whole grain.
We will learn more about whole grains in another training. (Reference Whole Grains Training)
There are now minimum and maximum servings for grains.
Grades K – 5 have a 1 oz equivalent daily minimum and a 8 – 9 oz weekly minimum – maximum.
Grade group 6 – 8 also has a 1 oz daily minimum but their weekly minimum – maximum is 8–10 oz.
For grades 9 – 12 the daily minimum is 2 oz, with a weekly minimum – maximum of 10 – 12 oz.
The concept of having a weekly maximum grain servings is a new for us. We will need to use careful menu planning especially when we have multiple entrée choices.
This requirement requires us to offer a weekly menu such that the sum of all daily minimum offerings meets at least the weekly grains minimum and the sum of all daily maximum offerings does not exceed the weekly grain\ maximums.
For example, we have to imagine that if a student was to select the entrée with the heaviest grain component every day, at the end of the week the total oz equivalents of those choices could not exceed the weekly maximum oz equivalent.
We will also need to be aware of any product changes or substitutions – always noting the oz equivalent size.

18. Dietary Specifications Four Dietary Specifications
Calories
Sodium
Saturated Fat
Trans Fat
There are now four USDA dietary specifications. These specifications are intended to improve consistency with the Dietary Guidelines and the Dietary Reference Intakes.
These specifications are calories, sodium, saturated fat, and trans fat.
The standards for calories, sodium, and saturated fat are to be met on average over the school week. This means that the levels of any of these in any ONE MEAL COULD EXCEED THE STANDARD AS LONG AS THE AVERAGE NUMBER FOR THE WEEK MEETS THE STANDARD.
However, with regard to trans fat, food products and ingredients used daily will have to contain zero grams of trans fat per serving.

19. Dietary Specifications – Calories Minimum and Maximum calorie levels
Weekly average
The first dietary specification is calorie ranges. These calorie ranges are to be met ON AVERAGE over the school week.
These requirements are effective SY for lunch.
The calorie ranges are based on evidence about children’s intakes at meals and snacks.
The intent is not to reduce the amount of food but to avoid excessive calories. The meal patterns provide more fruits, vegetables and whole grains than current school meals and should result in nutrient-dense meals. The required maximum calorie levels are expected to drive menu planners to select nutrient dense foods and ingredients to prepare meals, and avoid products that are high in fats and added sugars.

20. Dietary Specifications – Sodium
Weekly Average
Target 1: School Year
Target 2: School Year
Final Target: School Year
The final rule requires schools to make a gradual reduction in the sodium content of the meals, as recommended by the Institute of Medicine.
The initial target is what is featured on the Lunch Meal Chart.
Like calories, sodium is a weekly average
Target 1 will be required beginning SY for both breakfast and lunch. This reflects sodium reductions that menu planners can achieve through menu changes and recipe modifications.
Target 2 will be required beginning SY for both breakfast and lunch. . This is based on sodium reductions that can be feasibly achieved with product reformulations by food industry, using currently available technology.
Final Target will be required beginning SY for both breakfast and lunch. Meeting the Final Target will require new technology and/or food products and, therefore, we are allowing a 10-year period to meet the new requirement.
Prior to the implementation of Target 2 and the Final sodium targets contained in this rule, USDA will evaluate relevant data on sodium intake and human health, as required by Section 743 of the Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act of 2012.
If available, you may want to share what your current sodium average is for your schools for comparison purposes.

21. Dietary Specifications – Saturated Fat
Weekly Average
The next dietary specification is saturated fat.
This rule continues to emphasize saturated fat reduction, and the standard – less than 10% of calories -- is the same as the one in the current regulations.
Like calories and sodium, the saturated fat requirement is a weekly average.
Offering fat-free and low-fat milk will help schools reduce the saturated fat content of the meals.
Note that this rule does not require schools to meet a total fat standard, a change from existing requirements.

22. Dietary Specifications – Trans Fat
Nutrition label or manufacturer’s specifications must specify zero grams of trans fat per serving
(less than 0.5 gram per serving)
Naturally-occurring trans fat excluded
e.g. beef, lamb, dairy products
The fourth dietary specification is trans fat.
Beginning in SY for lunch, schools will have to make sure that the nutrition label or manufacturer specifications for food products, or ingredients used to prepare meals, indicate zero grams of trans fat per serving.
It will be important for menu planners to develop food procurement specifications and recipes to meet the trans fat specification.
However, naturally occurring trans fat found in products such as beef and lamb is excluded from the requirement.
Products potentially including both natural and added trans fat – must specify the amounts of each.

23. Identify Reimbursable Meal
“ Schools must identify near or at the beginning of the serving line(s) the food items that constitute the unit priced reimbursable meal”
Schools have discretion on how to identify these foods
A new requirement is that schools are required to identify the foods that are part of the reimbursable meal near or at the beginning of the serving line.
What do you think is the purpose or reason for this requirement?
We want students to learn that a complete and healthy meal includes all the food components. For example a piece of pizza can be a healthy lunch when it is combined with a green salad, fresh veggies sticks, fruit and milk. Additionally this rule ensures that students understand the components of the reimbursable meal and do not make unintentional purchases of a la carte foods.
It’s up to us to decide exactly how we are going to do this.
Take time to brainstorm ideas with your staff or discuss what you have planned to accomplish this.

24. “Kids need nurturing, and they get a lot of it through the lunch line…Kids get the message that regardless of their circumstances, someone cares for and feeds them.”
~ Tom Vilsack, Secretary of Agriculture
This is going to be a year of change and learning. But I know that by working together toward the goal of healthy meals for our students, we can and will be successful!