On the Policy Front
Terri Hollarn and the staff from the Oklahoma Department of Career and Technical Education summarized the specific recommendations from the 2010 Dietary Guidelines for Americans released in June 2010. Click here to access the report.
The guidelines include specific recommendations to:
* Improve Americans' knowledge of nutrition, and increase cooking, food safety, and food storage skills
* Improve the overall health and nutrition education in schools across the U.S.
* Improve the accessibility and affordability of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, seafood, lean meats, and other healthy foods, especially for lower income families
* Increase environmentally sustainable production of vegetables, fruits, and fiber-rich whole grains
* Develop safe, effective, and sustainable practices to increase seafood availability, and help Americans understand the benefits and risks of their seafood choices
* Encourage restaurants and the food manufacturers to offer choices that have less sodium, added sugars, saturated fats, and smaller portions
* Promote nationwide efforts to increase physical activity
From Pearl Hart of the Utah State Office of Education, we have congressional information pulled from her email:
House Education and Labor Committee Passes New Nutrition Bill:
On July 15, the House Education and Labor Committee passed the Improving Nutrition for America's Children Act (H.R. 5504) with a bipartisan vote of 32-13. This legislation seeks to support children's health and to reduce childhood hunger by improving federal child nutrition programs. Major reforms include:
* increasing the reimbursement rate for schools
* expanding national afterschool meals programs
* improving nutrition education
* enhancing food safety and food quality
In addition, the bill gives the Secretary of Agriculture the authority, for the first time ever, to establish national nutrition standards for food sold outside the cafeteria, which could impact CTE-related school-based businesses that sell food. This provision would permit the exemption of some school-sponsored fundraisers, depending on the time of day, frequency of events and other factors.
The Senate version of this bill, the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 (S. 3307 ), was approved in committee in May. Both the House and Senate versions of the bill still need to be passed by their respective chambers and reconciled before the president could sign this legislation.
ACTE has been in contact with staff of the Senate Agriculture Committee and the House Education and Labor Committee, and we are working to ensure the bill's language provides the most flexibility possible for CTE programs related to nutrition standards, which we recognize could have a particular impact on culinary arts programs. We have also reached out to other advocacy groups, such as the Center for Science in the Public Interest, to increase awareness of the bill's impact on CTE programs. It is also important to note that the national nutrition standards have yet to be established, and there will be many opportunities to influence the standards during the development process.
Thank you to everyone who responded to our original message on this issue by providing us information about your culinary arts programs. Based on the current legislation, if you think your program will be negatively impacted by this legislation, it is also appropriate at this time to contact your Members of Congress to express concern.
