Building a welcoming and inclusive cafeteria

Offering choices at meal times, including culturally relevant foods for every child +

Engaging children in the food that they eat, by offering sufficient variety of choices and offering foods that reflect the cultural diversity of your student body, creates a welcoming environment for every child and makes kids more likely to eat meals.

School is a great setting for kids to try new foods they may not get at home and offering new foods can help kids learn to make healthier choices. Taste tests can be an effective way to try new menu items and introduce kids to new fruits and vegetables.

Many children eat specific foods or have dietary restrictions because of their religious or cultural traditions. When we expand our meal programs to offer foods that are culturally appropriate to all the children we serve, we give every child the opportunity to eat food that is nutritious and engaging, we provide opportunities for kids to learn about other cultures and from each other, and we demonstrate that we value every child’s personal identity.

Successfully offering culturally relevant foods takes a little time and research, but by embracing diverse cultural traditions we can effectively nourish all of the children in our meal programs. Here are some steps to help you get started:

• Talk to the children that participate--and those who don’t yet participate--in your meal program. What are their favorite family meals? What foods do they identify with?
• Ask families via the school newsletter to send in their favorite family recipes and then work with staff to incorporate those recipes into your menu when possible.
• Offer taste tests of new foods alongside regular menu items to allow your students time to get used to them.
• Offer students who observe religious holidays with important dietary restrictions relevant choices so they can observe their religious practices AND eat a nutritious school meal

There are many resources available to help you integrate culturally relevant foods into your program. Here are a couple you might find helpful:

Serving Up Tradition: A Guide for School Food in Culturally Diverse Communities, Massachusetts Farm to School

Designing accessible and attractive eating environments +

Accessible cafeterias are essential to ensure that all children have the same opportunities to engage with their peers, learn about foods and healthy eating habits, and eat nutritious meals. There are multiple ways you can make your meal program more accessible for kids.

• ACCESSIBLE SPACES. When setting up your cafeteria, consider the accessibility of all your service lines, any additional choices you offer (like a salad bar, for example), and the table set up in your eating space(s).
  

  • Provide ample room for people using wheelchairs or crutches to maneuver through service lines, and make sure that food is reachable while seated.
    
  • Keep your service and eating spaces well lit, post clearly legible signs throughout the space, and have clear labels for food items.
  • Offer a clean, welcoming, and attractive space to help all kids feel comfortable during mealtimes.
    

• ACCESSIBLE MEALTIMES. In order for kids to get all the benefits of school meals, it is imperative that they have enough time to eat and are offered meals appropriately spaced throughout the day.

  • The CDC recommends that students have at least 20 minutes to eat their meals--not including time spent getting to the cafeteria or waiting in line. Allowing 30 minutes or more for lunch periods can ensure that kids are given enough time to finish their meals and are ready and attentive for the rest of the school day. Offer multiple service lines to ensure kids are spending as little of their lunch period as possible waiting in line for their meal.
  • Access to food should never be used as punishment for children. Students should never be forced to throw away uneaten food because they were unable to finish their meal in time.
  • Meals need to be offered at appropriate times with enough space in between.
    • Offer breakfast after the school day starts to ensure that every child has access to the ‘most important meal of the day.’ For many kids, eating breakfast at home before school is too early, and they may not have time to eat when they get to school if breakfast is before the bell.
    • Make sure to provide enough space between breakfast and lunch. If lunch is served too early in the day, kids may not be hungry yet, and if it is too late, they may have been unable to focus in class before lunch.

• ACCESSIBLE MENUS. Healthy school meals are about more than offering students healthy choices; kids have to want to eat the options they are given.
  • Offering attractive and culturally relevant foods for kids is critical to ensuring kids are actually eating the healthy meals offered in schools and childcare programs every day. See the resources above about offering culturally relevant foods.
  • Operating a 3-5 week cycle menu ensures kids have access to a variety of meals, which increases interest and participation in your meal program.
  • Engage students directly in your meal program. Getting feedback from kids helps them feel like they are invested in your meal offerings. Offering taste tests for new items and of fruits and vegetables can expand palettes and increase excitement around your meal program. Highlight local producers and foods grown in your school garden-- kids are so much more excited to eat things they had a hand in!

Marketing your meal program and healthy foods engages families and children in school meals. Regular contact with your community builds buy-in and appreciation for your meal program.

• Maintain your webpage with important information about your meal program like menus, policies, meal applications, and events. You can also show off your list of local producers and other community connections.
• Posting regularly on social media--with pictures of meal offerings, your staff preparing meals, or kids eating in the cafeteria--is engaging for parents and community members. You can make posts about special menu offerings, program changes, events, and appeals for families to submit their meal applications, among other things! Your social media posts can help shape the public perception of your meal program and the professionalism and quality of school nutrition programs broadly.
• Menus should be clear, colorful, and engaging. This is a great opportunity to highlight local producers and seasonal foods. Make sure your menus are accessible by using clear and consistent fonts and sufficient font size. Menus should be available in a variety of spaces, and should be distributed in a timely fashion so that families aren’t waiting on you to do their weekly planning. Have your menu available on your webpage, distributed through school newsletters, and have hard copies available in high-trafficked areas like the cafeteria, the school office, and pick-up/drop-off locations.
• Decorations and signs are a fun way to engage the kids you serve. Make sure that there are posters and signs throughout the eating environment that encourage healthy eating habits, on service lines to spotlight local foods and where they came from, and throughout the school promoting school meals. Having signs that describe culturally significant foods is a great way to engage the entire student body, promote learning, and be inclusive. Clear signage can also increase accessibility for students who are hard of hearing.
• Share details about program changes, your summer meals sites, free meals for kids, meal applications, or similar things though your local newspaper. You can write a letter to the editor to provide details to the community or consider buying ad space.

Setting up aesthetically pleasing and attractive spaces makes for a more welcoming eating environment.

• Set up your tables in a way that fosters easy, positive social interaction. Making it easy for kids to eat with small groups of their peers makes social interaction easier while kids are eating and reduces environmental noise.
• Decorate your cafeteria with colorful and engaging nutrition education and healthy food posters. Featuring pictures of student accomplishments-- like your school garden or Junior Iron Chef team--is a great way to decorate your space!

• Painting your cafeteria or eating spaces with lots of color can make the space feel more pleasant and lead to more students eating meals. Here are some great ideas from Vermont schools:

  • Murals of fruits and vegetables help make new foods identifiable and familiar.
  • ‘Eat the rainbow’ can be used to visually demonstrate why eating a variety of fruits and vegetables is so important. List different fruits and vegetables that fall under each color in the rainbow and talk about how eating the whole rainbow (fruits and vegetables of every color) contributes to healthy growing bodies!
  • MyPlate posters and inspired decorations help students recognize and adopt healthy eating habits.
  • Involve children in planning cafeteria murals with themes like Farm to School and forming healthy eating habits.

• Consider ways that you can theme your cafeteria. Kids might enjoy themes like a “cafe theme” or “farmers market” theme in your service lines and their eating environment. You could also design a theme based around your school mascot.

Engaging children directly in your meal program +

Student buy-in is essential to growing your meal program, and there are many ways you can engage the children you serve. Consider these strategies for student engagement:

NUTRITION EDUCATION is not only imperative to helping children create healthy lifelong habits and address the environmental impact of our food system, it can also be really exciting and engaging for students of all ages! There are many opportunities to participate in nutrition education both in the cafeteria or eating environment and in the classroom.

• Hang a variety of posters and other materials around the cafeteria to provide visual cues for nutrition learning.
• Your school could schedule times for nutrition professionals to give age appropriate nutrition lessons throughout the school year. Connecting fun and engaging nutrition education opportunities to the food service program is a great way to garner interest in participation in your program.
• Visit our Nutrition Education Hub to find helpful resources and curricula. You can also check out these child nutrition resource libraries at the Institute of Child Nutrition and USDA’s Team Nutrition web. Contact the Hunger Free Vermont team with any questions about how to find other age appropriate nutrition education posters, curriculum, and other resources!

TASTE TESTS are an effective way to introduce the children you serve to new foods! Consider nutritious foods that you might want to add to your cycle menu. There is no better way to gauge children’s interest in new foods than a taste test!

• Taste tests can save you a lot of time and money by purchasing a small amount of a new food and then hosting a taste test event. Host “Taste Test Tuesdays” monthly or bi-monthly so you can gauge which new items will be successful on your menu. You can do taste tests of new menu entrees or of fresh fruits and vegetables to get kids more accustomed to them!
• Encourage students to provide you with feedback about how much they enjoyed or didn’t enjoy the new food. Give students the option to cast their votes into categories: Loved, Liked, or Maybe Next Time. You can make a chart out of the results to present in the cafeteria the next day, and show students that you’re listening to them! With student approval, you can feel confident that new foods can be added to your menu cycle with success.
• If you are unsure where to start, utilize the Vermont Harvest of the Month tool to identify what local products are in season and utilize accompanying resources such as beautiful graphics and newsletters.

STUDENT FEEDBACK is essential to any successful meal program. We must listen to the children we are serving if we want to ensure high rates of participation and consumption of meals and decrease food waste.

• Getting to know your students through taste tests makes them feel more comfortable sharing their food preferences with you. When children feel their voices are heard, they are empowered as individuals and are more likely to become engaged.
• Be present on the service lines when possible or ask your staff to share with you the casual daily feedback from students. Students will often engage with whoever is serving their food and will let them know what items they enjoy and what items they are not as excited about.
• Ask students and families to share their favorite recipes with you! You can work with your school’s art teacher to make a recipe book where students can submit some of their favorite family recipes. Use this experience as an opportunity for family engagement and as a way to add delicious and culturally relevant foods to your menu.

Best practices in early childhood with Go NAP SACC +

Building a welcoming and inclusive space for children to eat is extremely important to early childhood education. The space young children eat their meals and snacks in while at childcare is critical to nutrition education.

Hunger Free Vermont works with early childhood programs around Vermont to build out and expand upon meal programs that are equitable and encourage the development of healthy eating behaviors during the most important period of development for children. Through the intervention program called Go NAP SACC, we set up action plans with early childhood educators based on nutrition and physical activity best practices published by the NAP SACC Program Center for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention.

This list of best practices is designed to support early childhood educators as they expand their meal programs. This resource has two focuses: best practices in nutrition and physical activity. The nutrition section has 9 key areas: from fruits and vegetables to nutrition policy, and the physical activity section has 5 key areas: including play environment and physical activity education. Each key area includes an expanded list of best practices. You can use this resource to assess your current early childhood meal program and see if there are areas in which you can apply some new best practices to enrich your program and eating environment.