Change on a Larger SCALE
Announcing the newest resource for K-12 school food programs: the Scratch Cooking Assessment & Learning Evaluation (SCALE)
June 02, 2022 | By Danielle Eliser
We’re excited to announce our newest resource for K-12 school programs: the Scratch Cooking Assessment & Learning Evaluation (SCALE). After 12+ years of school food operational support, we’ve built a free-access digital platform that offers the first comprehensive self-assessment focused on improving nutrition, enhancing school meal programs, and increasing scratch cooking. This platform works with any size of district or level of cooking, and provides a specialized report with custom recommendations and step-by-step guides.
Why We Need Change
American kids start their life-path in K-12 schools, where they learn the important skills necessary to thrive and meet their potential. The passing of the Healthy Hunger Free Kids Act in 2010 was a great first step in creating stronger nutrition standards for school food. With 31 million children eating school lunch every day (and health issues like obesity continuing to affect our nation’s youth), this is a national issue that needs to be addressed.
Why We Need Change
American kids start their life-path in K-12 schools, where they learn the important skills necessary to thrive and meet their potential. The passing of the Healthy Hunger Free Kids Act in 2010 was a great first step in creating stronger nutrition standards for school food. With 31 million children eating school lunch every day (and health issues like obesity continuing to affect our nation’s youth), this is a national issue that needs to be addressed.
Scratch cooking uses real food with real ingredients, and has the potential to catalyze multiple benefits across the school food system. Many school districts want to improve their meal programs, but don’t have the bandwidth to assess their current operations or determine where to start.
For over 12 years, the Chef Ann Foundation (CAF) has supported districts in implementing scratch cooking operations in schools across the country. We have worked closely with districts with on-the-ground assessments, trainings, and operational resources. However, our determination to reach every school district in the country was limited by internal capacity and we needed a technology solution.
For the last two years, we have been building software that allows districts to assess their own programs and increase scratch cooking. What used to only be available to districts through an on-site assessment is now widely available for all districts through this innovative platform. SCALE is the very first platform that processes data to generate a customized recommendation report, to give districts a clear direction on how to improve their programs.
SCALE will provide districts with recommendations and resources to help them expand scratch cooking in their school meal programs, ultimately making better quality food available for their students.
SCALE Explained
SCALE is available at no cost to school districts nationwide through The Lunch Box website. School food professionals can generate a customized assessment of their program, which includes linked resources, section scores, recommendations, and supporting research. Users take the assessment at their own pace and have immediate access to the generated report. As SCALE evolves, users will also receive recommendations of peer/mentor districts based on scores and proximity. SCALE is free to all school districts thanks to generous gifts from our donors including Whole Kids Foundation and Life Time Foundation.
The assessment is based on Chef Ann Foundation’s 5 Key Areas, plus a special focus on scratch cooking components:
Food - menu cycles, procurement, reporting
Scratch Cooking - ingredients, processed elements
Finances - budgets, revenue/deficit, labor cost
Facilities - equipment, production, storage
Human Resources - personnel, professional development
Marketing- communication channels, lunchroom education activities
The assessment is based on Chef Ann Foundation’s 5 Key Areas, plus a special focus on scratch cooking components:
Food - menu cycles, procurement, reporting
Scratch Cooking - ingredients, processed elements
Finances - budgets, revenue/deficit, labor cost
Facilities - equipment, production, storage
Human Resources - personnel, professional development
Marketing- communication channels, lunchroom education activities
SCALE-ing Results
Assessment reports provide a comprehensive, high-level review of all major food program elements and range from 10-15 pages. Districts can use reports to create strategic plans or guide program development. These reports can also help guide decisions around procurement, menuing, professional development, and hiring. Additionally, results can be shared with internal and external stakeholders to garner support for improvements in school nutrition programs. The assessment can be taken annually and will allow users to compare their program’s progress to previous years. Future assessments will focus on more specific categories, like salad bars or local procurement.
SCALE-ing Results
Assessment reports provide a comprehensive, high-level review of all major food program elements and range from 10-15 pages. Districts can use reports to create strategic plans or guide program development. These reports can also help guide decisions around procurement, menuing, professional development, and hiring. Additionally, results can be shared with internal and external stakeholders to garner support for improvements in school nutrition programs. The assessment can be taken annually and will allow users to compare their program’s progress to previous years. Future assessments will focus on more specific categories, like salad bars or local procurement.
SCALE allows food service directors to have tangible, data-driven strategies to enhance our programs, and to articulate our needs to district counterparts who want to support us in the healthy food effort.
If you or your school food service team wants to learn more about SCALE, visit The Lunch Box website or sign up for our 30-minute webinar on Wednesday June 8th at 9AM MT/11AM ET and 1PM MT/3PM ET HERE where our operations team will provide an overview of SCALE and answer questions on use.