Senate Agriculture chairman Pat Roberts said his lunch of teriyaki bits, brown rice and green beans at a high school in Shawnee, Kan, was an example of food at a model school. “We have a lot of other schools in rural areas that have a tough time meeting the standards,” said Roberts in a story by public broadcaster KCUR. “”So many times when you have a federal program and you have federal mandates and federal regulations, they run into reality in the school district and may or may not work.”
The lunch session at Mill Valley High School was the first of a series planned by Roberts to see how schools are handling federal requirements to serve more nutritious meals. KCUR says schools have to prepare meals that stay within calorie limits, contain all the food groups and stay within budget. Congress is due to reauthorize the $21 billion-a-year web of child nutrition programs this year. School lunch accounts for slightly more than half of the expenditures.
On his Facebook page, Roberts said, “Mill Valley is an example of a school with a strong food service director with lots of resources, and even they have challenges in complying with the current rules. Imagine the challenges facing our rural schools, which have fewer resources. We need a policy that allows all schools to provide nutritious and fulfilling meals to our kids in an effective and efficient way.”