Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack unveiled two new grant opportunities plus a training and technical assistance partnership to help schools invest in nutritious school meals. The availability of nutritious meals in schools across the country was declared a priority during the White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health in September 2022. The USDA celebrates National School Lunch Week alongside schools and communities across the United States.
"USDA is committed to giving students the nutrition they need to reach their full potential by empowering schools to continue serving delicious, health meals," Secretary Vilsack stated. We recognize the vital role that school meals play in a child's life, and there is no better moment to announce these new measures to support schools than during National School Lunch Week and Farm to School Month. The Biden-Harris administration will keep doing all it can to guarantee that American schoolchildren continue to get nutritious, delicious lunches.
The USDA is assisting school districts in purchasing nutritious, reasonably priced food through its partnership with Urban School Food Alliances, which offers relevant training and resources. Dr. Katie Wilson, executive director of the Urban School Food Alliance, has expressed gratitude for the chance to collaborate with the USDA in order to enhance the school food procurement process for all parties involved. "With procurement practices laying the foundation for obtaining fresh, healthy food served throughout our nation's schools, we look forward to developing and implementing new tools to push for a more efficient and sustainable food system that includes supporting local economies."
Founded in 2017, the Urban School Food Alliance is made up of 18 large school districts who have begun sharing their procurement data and best practices for procuring school foods. The Urban School Food Alliance and the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) have entered into a partnership agreement that will see the creation of new resources to educate school districts on best practices for purchasing school foods, the formation of an advisory group of school nutrition stakeholders to develop an action plan to address challenges with food procurement through the creation of targeted trainings and resources, and the creation of an interactive bid template to help standardize procurement processes in school nanc.
