The final ruling on the USDA school breakfast and lunch nutrition standards were released last week and while it seemed like a collective sigh could be heard, I believe that it was actually the sound of determination emanating from like-minded individuals coalescing around the common goal. For several years now, the spotlight has been trained on school nutrition, from reality television, radio talk shows and daily blogs alike, it has seemed like everyone has had an opinion about school nutrition.
Although some of the attention could be viewed as negative, most was positive, and frankly, I believe as Oscar Wilde did, “the only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about”, or as Marshall Matz puts it, “if you are not at the table, you are on the table”; thus the Healthy Hunger Free Kids Act signed by President Obama is now a reality. Perfection is not attainable, but the pursuit is, so it is with this mindset that we set out to continue our mission of ensuring that every child who wants breakfast, is able to receive breakfast, with particular attention paid to those that need breakfast.
On a different note, I traveled Tampa Florida last week to participate in a kick-off meeting with the Florida Power Buying Group, Tampa House, and after the meeting I received a text message from my office that the First Lady was in the area announcing a new partnership with Goya Foods and the USDA Mi Plato…I punched in the address into my GPS and made my way over to the event, mentally working on my “I am part of the solution” speech on the way over to somehow get in the doors of a closed to the public event…as it was, I was a little late to the party, so I didn’t get a chance to use my speech anyway.
However, I did get an opportunity to visit with the store management and dignitaries from Goya. During my visit we talked about nutrition, breakfast and the overall nutritional climate in the US today, and afterwards I walked away with a sense that there is a much larger nutrition narrative that is possible and that we should, ourselves, strive to achieve more through creative partnerships because honestly, positive change is not a top down discussion, it is an inside out movement.
HUAA,
Rich
