The Maine DOE nutrition staff has provided training to all local northern Aroostook County directors and some local staff regarding the new meal pattern.
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Category: Nutrition
From garden to table at Mount Desert Elem.
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At Mount Desert Elementary School, students and staff took Maine’s annual Harvest Lunch Week very seriously by incorporating local ingredients into their lunch menu five days in a row, with some produce from as nearby as the school’s own backyard.
For this year’s Harvest Lunch Week, held September 24 through 28, Mount Desert celebrated a harvest-related theme each day.
Students in grades K-8 worked in the kitchen with school cook Linda Mailhot to learn more about Maine-made produce and the importance of using local ingredients. “It’s like the whole school’s in and out of here all the time,” Mailhot said. “Everybody gets into the meals—even the teachers.”
Continue reading “From garden to table at Mount Desert Elem.”
Houlton students harvest 400 ears of corn
Photo by Joseph Cyr
Thanks to the Houlton Pioneer Times for sharing the following article, written by staff writer Joseph Cyr.
HOULTON — Sometimes the best lessons are not taught in the classroom.
Such was the case for a group of Houlton Elementary School [students] in Lauren Fitzpatrick’s second-grade class Sept. 20, as the students journeyed to a field in Hodgdon to pick fresh corn for the school.
“(Dale) Flewelling and I have done some gardening projects with the kids in the past,” Fitzpatrick said. “We see a real excitement and ownership in the gardening project when kids have a direct connection. They get excited to put the seeds in the ground and watch them grow.”
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Harvest Lunch Week a trend at Brooklin School
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During Harvest Lunch Week, schools statewide are encouraged to incorporate Maine-made ingredients into their lunch menus. But at the Brooklin School in Hancock County, Harvest Lunch Week is nothing out of the ordinary – cook Lori Boyce serves local food every day of the year.
Instead of consuming instant mashed potatoes or from-the-box desserts, Brooklin students eat potatoes they dug up in the school’s garden and pumpkin bars baked with gourds they grew themselves.
Boyce makes nearly all her food from scratch, which is difficult yet feasible at a K-8 elementary with a 46-student enrollment for 2012-13.
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Submit student meal eligibility now
With the start of a new school year, districts are busy collecting school meal benefit information. There are three methods through which students may be approved for school meal benefits.
Seeking school nutrition professionals with 20+ years service
The Maine School Nutrition Association annually honors school nutrition professionals who have achieved 20, 25, 30, 35, 40, 45 and more years of service.
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New nutrition guidelines offer additional lunch reimbursement
There are many changes happening in school nutrition this year worth noting. School Food Authorities have the opportunity to receive an additional six cents per reimbursable lunch if they adhere to the new meal pattern and receive certification by the state. The additional reimbursement will become available to all certified SFAs Oct. 1, 2012.
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Students start culinary program to better school lunch
Teachers at The REAL School, a public alternative and special education school in Falmouth, started an agriculture and culinary arts program this past year, utilizing adventure- and project-based service learning practices to enhance the school lunch program with locally grown produce. This brief video by Wisconsin PBS documents the school’s approach and the inspirational results.
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Maine schools to implement new nutrition rule
The final rule, “Nutrition Standards in the National School Lunch and School Breakfast Programs” was published by the U.S. Department of Agriculture Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) on January 26, 2012. This final rule updates the meal patterns and nutrition standards for the National School Lunch and School Breakfast Programs to align them with the Dietary Guidelines for Americans. Continue reading “Maine schools to implement new nutrition rule”
Additional lunch reimbursements available
The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 (HHFKA) requires that an additional six-cents-per-lunch reimbursement be provided to School Food Authorities (SFAs) certified by the Maine Department of Education, in compliance with new meal pattern requirements. On October 1, 2012, this additional reimbursement becomes available to certified school food authorities. Certification procedures will require SFAs to submit documentation demonstrating compliance with the updated meal patterns consistent with the final meal pattern regulation.
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Maine DOE Newsroom 