Nutrition Program Bulletin – Week of August 10, 2020
Each section contains updates relevant to those nutrition programs. You can jump to the section you're interested in by clicking the link.
Onsite Monitoring Waiver Extensions
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) recently released the extension of four nationwide waivers. For more information, please review the full text of these waivers:
New MDE Website Features
Expandable Drawers
Page sub-headers have been converted to expandable drawers. Click on the blue header bar to expand or collapse the content in each section.
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Search Filter
You can now select a Food and Nutrition filter when using the MDE search feature. Enter a key word or phrase and click Search.
 This initial search will go through the entire MDE website. To filter results and show only content posted on Food and Nutrition webpages, select the radio button next to program area, select Food and Nutrition from the drop down menu, and click the magnifying glass icon.
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Onsite Monitoring Waiver for CACFP Sponsors
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) recently released a waiver allowing CACFP sponsors to utilize offsite visits to count toward monitoring requirements. This waiver is effective immediately and can be utilized through September 30, 2021. For more information, please review the Nationwide Waiver of Onsite Monitoring Requirements for Sponsors in the Child and Adult Care Food Program.
Basic Training Webinars in October
The CACFP Basic Training Webinars Part 1 and 2 are for child care centers, adult care centers, emergency shelters and outside school hours care centers. This webinar series targets new staff, such as center directors, food production staff and staff with CACFP responsibilities. Each session requires 30 minutes of prework that is emailed two weeks prior to the webinar.
Topics: Viability, Capability, and Accountability (VCA); Household Income Statement (HIS) forms; ABC Categories on the HIS; Meal Patterns; Meal Service and Meal Counts; Crediting; Menus
Topics: Food Production Records; Portion Menus; Farm to Early Childhood Education (ECE); Special Diets; Recordkeeping; Training; Procurement
USDA CACFP Operational Resources & Education (CORE)
The CORE Mobile App is available in the Google Play and Apple App stores free of charge. It includes micro learning lessons that are short, self-directed and focus on small chunks of information. Topics include monitoring and oversight, corrective action, recordkeeping and claims, and budgets.
CORE Online Training Modules are animated, self-paced, interactive, and informative. Topics include financial viability for all sponsors, monitoring and oversight for multi-site sponsors, and serious deficiency for sponsors of family child care home providers.
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Community Eligibility Provision Reminder
The Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) allows eligible districts and/or schools in low-income areas to provide school lunches and breakfasts at no charge to all students, using simplified meal counting and claiming procedures.
- To be eligible, School Food Authorities (SFAs) and/or schools must have a minimum Identified Student Percentage (ISP) of 40 percent on any single day between April 1 and June 30, 2020. For more information on how the ISP is calculated, visit the MDE CEP webpage.
- The CEP Application Instructions for SY 2020-21 are available on the CEP webpage.
- If you are wondering if CEP is a good fit for your school, please review the CEP Decision Tree.
Applications for the Community Eligibility Provision are due no later than August 31, 2020 for the upcoming school year.
Equipment Solutions for Alternative School Feeding Scenarios resource
The National Dairy Council compiled Equipment Solutions for Alternative School Feeding Scenarios for school nutrition professionals to provide an overview of equipment options associated with different serving scenarios. This resource also includes information about an equipment grant opportunity from Dairy Council state and regional organizations, together with GenYOUTH. They are offering grants of up to $3,000 per school to supply resources for meal distribution and delivery efforts to get food to students during COVID-19.
Tuesdays @ 2 Webinars
Join school nutrition staff for a training webinar every Tuesday at 2 p.m. Read session descriptions and register for Tuesdays @ 2 webinars.
- Uploading Enrollment for Direct Certification (August 18, 2020)
- Approving Case Number and Foster Applications (August 25, 2020)
- Food Production Records: Plan, Communicate, Prepare (September 1, 2020)
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