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Child Nutrition and Student Participation: Changing School Lunch One Meal at a Time By Clint T. Duncan 9/16/17 Seeing a need for improved student participation within the school districts cafeteria, Mid-Del Child Nutrition Services Department decided to make a change. The issue facing the school cafeteria now is that more students than in years prior are skipping the meals provided to them. This could mean that the students are opting for less healthy and nutritious eating options or not eating at all. If a student is not following the daily dietary nutritional guidelines it can lead to decreased academic and athletic performance, reduce attention spans and lower test scores. The meals provided by a child’s school may be the only chance that child has to eat for the day. According to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) “In 2016, 6.5 million children lived in food-insecure households. These households were uncertain of having, or unable to acquire, enough food to meet the needs of all their members because they had insufficient money or other resources for food.” The importance of students eating well rounded meals throughout the day cannot be understated. A study done by Florence, Asbridge, & Veugelers found that fifth grade students with less nutritious diets performed worse on a standardized literary assessment (2008.) With such a great need and the importance of feeding our communities children already established, the ability of the Child Nutrition Department to feed more children by giving them options to not skip meals is vital for the students’ success. The change that the department decided would be best to implement was a new product line, which would be made available at the start of the school year. The intent of the new product line, deemed the “Fit & Fresh Express” is to encourage students to choose a healthy eating alternative option by revamping the display of the service area and shortening the time it takes for a student to get their lunch. The “Fit & Fresh Express” is made to look like a restaurant or product you would buy at a deli, which gives the students a new “cool” dining experience. My discussions and observations with the department began at the beginning of the school year and participation data was provided through September 2017. Throughout that time, I was able to see the new product line be implemented, the marketing techniques used to promote the change, and perhaps the start of a sustainable solution to an important issue. Arriving on campus to view the cafeteria at one of the school districts high-schools I was amazed at seeing and hearing about the vision the directors at the child nutrition service had as a solution for the upcoming school year. However, it was then that I realized it was not entirely possible to have a clear vision for this new product yet. At the time, there was not enough employee commitment and hardly any data yet to interpret where the vision would lead. Robert Shaw (1995) argues that organization structures and management processes may require fundamental change. Meaning that it may not be possible to develop vision until after the process has begun to unfold, because the relevant information may not be available in the current configuration (as cited in Buchanan, et al, 2017) This is what I noticed during my initial talks with management, that the change was still a work in process, very much in the early stages of implementation. Over the next couple of weeks and after separate discussions with the child nutrition coordinators I was told that much of the control and change implementation authority was given over to the managers at each school. I believe this was a good decision as it decentralized the decision making of the “Fit & Fresh Express” and left those closer to the action the ability to make small changes to fit their specific needs. John Kotter (2012) emphasizes the value of having many change agents in an organization, and not just the usual small elite team, arguing that vision and strategy should be communicated in a manner that creates buy-in and attracts a growing “volunteer army” (as cited in Buchanan, et al, 2017.) An important piece of the equation in implementing this change across a large department was the cost of such change. The child nutrition department does not have any excess reserves to pay for this new product. What money they do have must be carefully tracked and audited to make sure nothing goes to waste. Therefore, it is vital that the department continue to measure the progress of change, and note the need for any corrective actions. The coordinators at the department kept various documentation reports over how many students were now choosing the “Fit & Fresh Express” over the traditional lunch option. This practice indicated to me that the upper management realizes the importance of measuring progress to promote sustainability. The Mid-Del School district provides nearly 15,000 meals to students K-12 daily within the school district. Before this school year the Child Nutrition Department has watched the participation rate decline as students sought other eating options. To alleviate this problem, the department decided they needed to make a change. The “Fit & Fresh Express” at Mid-Del is an opportunity to combat these issues to ensure that our schools students are getting the nutrition they need to perform in the classroom and in their extracurricular activities. Throughout my observations and discussions, I think that not only will this change be successful at increasing student participation this year, but will be sustainable at changing school lunches one meal at a time for years to come. (WC – 924) References: Florence, M. D., Asbridge, M. and Veugelers, P. J. (2008), Diet Quality and Academic Performance*. Journal of School Health, 78: 209–215. doi:10.1111/j.1746-1561.2008.00288.x Key Statistics & Graphics. (n.d.). Retrieved September 12, 2017, from https://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/food-nutrition-assistance/food-security-in-the-us/key-statistics-graphics.aspx Palmer, I., Dunford, R., & Buchanan, D. A. (2017). Managing organizational change: a multiple perspectives approach. New York: McGraw-Hill Education.
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