Nutrition Program Bulletin – Week of July 12, 2021
Each section contains updates relevant to those nutrition programs. You can jump to the section by clicking the link.
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Monthly Webinar Series
Join Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) staff for upcoming trainings. Come and learn tips and tricks to easily be complaint in each of these areas! These monthly webinars will be provided the second Wednesday of the month and begin at 1 p.m. Read session descriptions and register for each topic in the CACFP Monthly Webinar Series.
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Budget Planning for CACFP Independent Centers (July 21, 2021)
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Out with Servings and In with Ounce Equivalents (August 11, 2021)
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School Year 2021-22 Adult Meal Prices
The Minnesota Department of Education (MDE) will not be calculating a minimum adult breakfast and lunch meal price for the 2021-22 school year (SY). For SY 2021-22, School Food Authorities (SFA) may determine the price charged for breakfast and lunch meals to adults at the local level. Per FNS Instruction 782-5 REV. 1, breakfasts and lunches served to teachers, administrators, custodians and other adults must be priced so that the adult payment is sufficient to cover the overall cost of the meal. This includes the value of any U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Foods used to prepare the meal.
Typically, MDE announces the minimum adult meal price each summer. This price is calculated from federal and state National School Lunch Program (NSLP)/School Breakfast Program (SBP) reimbursement, plus the national average per meal USDA Foods rate, rounded up to the nearest five cents. Because schools operating the Seamless Summer Option in SY 2021-22 will receive the higher Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) rates of reimbursement, an MDE calculated adult meal price could result in a price higher than necessary to cover the full cost of the meal.
The minimum adult meal prices for SY 2020-21 were $1.90 for Breakfast and $3.85 for lunch. Minnesota SFAs have indicated that the total cost of providing a meal this past school year has increased by 3-10 percent. We encourage SFAs to determine the actual cost of the meals (including labor, food, milk, supplies and other costs) when setting adult meal prices. However, it would be acceptable to estimate a percentage increase from last year’s adult prices, and adjust the SY 2021-22 adult meal price accordingly.
Sponsors contracting with a vended meal provider should consider the contracted adult meal fixed price as well as other contributing expenses when determining the SY 2021-22 adult meal price.
School Year 2021-22 Paid Lunch Equity Guidance
Only SFAs operating the National School Lunch Program in school year 2021-22 are required to follow the PLE requirements. When completing the PLE Tool for SY 2021-22, if SFAs do not have pricing/meal counts from October 2020, they can use October 2019 pricing/meal counts. As previously announced, an exemption from the PLE requirements for SY 2021-22 was extended for any SFA with a positive or zero balance in its nonprofit school food service account as of December 31, 2020.
Farm to Summer Week July 26-30, 2021
Farm to Summer Week is approaching! Farm to summer brings the core elements of farm to school into the USDA Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) and Seamless Summer Option (SSO) to ensure that youth receive nutritious meals when school is out of session. Read the Farm to Summer Factsheet.
This year, SFSP and SSO sponsors can take part in the Summer Crunch by purchasing and providing locally grown cucumbers, carrots, radishes or other fresh vegetables during Minnesota Farm to Summer Week, July 26-30. Register your site now for the Summer Crunch. Sites that participate in the Summer Crunch are encouraged to take photos and share them on social media using the hashtag #MNFarmtoSummer. MDE will be watching for posts and sharing them out to followers to promote Farm to Summer Week.
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New Feature Alert for USDA’s Professional Standards Training Tracker Tool
A new feature is now available on the Professional Standards Training Tracker Tool (PSTTT). Users can select a training title from a list of training titles available on the PSTTT and information related to the training, such as the length of the training, training provider, key area(s), training topic(s), and learning objective(s) will auto-populate. If users do not find the training they completed on the PSTTT training list, they may manually add the new training title and information to the list. With the latest update, users will now be able to easily upload multiple new training titles at one time.
5 Ways to Add Veggies to School Menus
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Team Nutrition recently released a new resource on innovative ways to add vegetables into school menus. View the new document 5 Ways to Add Veggies to Your Back-to-School Menus to learn quick tips to improve your meal service.
Tuesdays @ 2 Webinars
Join school nutrition staff for a training webinar Tuesdays at 2 p.m. Read session descriptions and register for Tuesdays @ 2 webinars.
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Approving Free and Reduced-Price Meal Applications and Afterschool Meal/Snack Options in SY 2021-22 (July 20, 2021)
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Seamless Summer Option (SSO) Operations—for Vendors and School Food Authorities (SFAs) Contracting with Food Service Management (FSMC)/Catering Companies and their Vendors (July 27, 2021)
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