Glossary

Glossary: Alphabet Soup of Terms

• Universal Breakfast in the Classroom: Encourages school breakfast participation and eliminates the barriers that prevent students from receiving school breakfast in a traditional cafeteria-based model. All students eat breakfast at no charge in their classroom, either at the beginning of the school day or early during the day. A wide body of research proves that this model is the single best way to increase participation and achieve the widespread gains in academic success linked to school breakfast consumption.

• Key Components of Universal Breakfast in the Classroom:

1. Students receive a breakfast at no charge, regardless of their free or reduced-price meal status.
2. Students eat breakfast after the start of the official school day.
3. Students eat with their classmates in a relaxed environment.
4. Classroom breakfast typically takes about ten minutes, and is usually part of instructional time. For example, teachers and educational support staff can incorporate morning activities (i.e. attendance, morning announcements), reading out loud or lesson plans into the allotted classroom breakfast time.

• Universal Breakfast in the Classroom Service Models:
  • Grab and Go: Food is served from carts in the hallways or from the cafeteria by food service staff.
  • Direct to Classroom: Breakfasts are delivered to classrooms by food service staff or students.

• Breakfast in the Classroom project: A joint initiative of four leading hunger, nutrition and education nonprofit organizations to increase breakfast consumption among schoolchildren and spark the academic and nutritional gains associated with the morning meal.

• Food Research and Action Center: The leading national nonprofit organization working to improve public policies and public-private partnerships to eradicate hunger and undernutrition in the United States. FRAC works with hundreds of national, state and local nonprofit organizations, public agencies, corporations and labor organizations to address hunger, food insecurity, and their root cause, poverty.
• National Association of Elementary School Principals Foundation: Operated as the tax-exempt, charitable arm of the National Association of Elementary School Principals—a professional association serving more than 25,000 administrators and other educators in the United States and overseas since 1921. The NAESP Foundation advances excellence, innovation, and equity in schools by endowing leadership and learning for principals for the benefit of all children.
• National Education Association Health Information Network: NEA HIN’s mission is to improve the health and safety of the school community by developing and disseminating information and programs that educate and empower school professionals and positively impact the lives of students.
• School Nutrition Foundation: A 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to financial aid, education, professional development, and research in school food service – resources that equip School Nutrition Association members to efficiently serve nutritious meals to millions of school children each year.
• Walmart Foundation: The Walmart Foundation strives to provide opportunities that improve the lives of individuals in communities through financial contributions, in-kind donations and volunteerism. Walmart and the Walmart Foundation made a $2 billion commitment through 2015 to hunger relief efforts in the U.S. in order
  to support the record 1 in 6 Americans who do not know where their next meal is coming from.

• Food and Nutrition Service (FNS): The Food and Nutrition Service (FNS), formerly known as the Food and Consumer Service, administers the nutrition assistance programs of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The mission of FNS is to provide children and needy families better access to food and a more healthful diet through its food assistance programs and comprehensive nutrition education efforts.
• National School Lunch Program (NSLP): The National School Lunch Program (NSLP) is a federally assisted meal program operating in public and nonprofit private schools and residential child care institutions. It provides nutritionally balanced, low-cost or free lunches to children each school day. The program was established under the National School Lunch Act, signed by President Harry Truman in 1946.
• School Breakfast Program (SBP): The School Breakfast Program (SBP) provides cash assistance to States to operate nonprofit breakfast programs in schools and residential childcare institutions. The program is administered at the Federal level by FNS. State education agencies administer the SBP at the State level, and local school food authorities operate it in schools.
• United States Department of Agriculture (USDA): Click here to view a collection of links that describe the USDA and its mission.

Glossary: School Food and Nutrition Terms

• Body Mass Index (BMI)
• Deliverables
• Food Insecurity
• Malnutrition
• Obese
• Overweight
• Poverty