Gooding School District
School meal participation in Gooding, a small, rural district in Idaho is roughly 80% for elementary students and 50% for high school students, even with an open campus. Though the nutrition team is known for having a strong program, Director Anji Branch felt they could do even more to cater to students’ interests and attract the particularly challenging middle school customer. She and the staff at Gooding worked together to create a strategic plan, outlining where they would like to be in the future and developing core values to support their efforts.
As this plan has taken shape, Branch and her team have relied on input from an active student nutrition advisory council (S.N.A.C). It includes twenty middle and high school students that meet monthly to taste test and discuss new options the nutrition team is considering. Students apply to be on the board by writing a 500-word essay on food and nutrition or a 1-2 minute video explaining why they want to be on the council and what makes them the best person for the job. Students are invited to taste test new recipes, products, and/or ingredients. They provide honest feedback and help determine whether or not they want to see it on school menus. Once the SNAC team approves a recipe or a product, depending on what we are looking for, it may move on to a “cafeteria-wide “pop up” tasting event before hitting menus. The SNAC team also provides input on recipe development for speed scratch products, cross merchandised recipes, and suggest various ways a product or item can be menu’d or used in a recipe One such conversation resulted in a chicken alfredo wrap which has been a big hit with the kids. “They come up with ideas we would never have considered,” says Branch. Another conversation yielded the vision for school food outlined at the end of this section.
The team wanted to overhaul the cafeterias but the cost was prohibitive, so they figured out how to be resourceful with the infrastructure they had. They are expanding their footprint in Fall 2024 by converting a storage closet into a serving location for reimbursable meals at breakfast and lunch and a la carte for the rest of the day. They brought in open air merchandisers and the high school janitor suggested different ways to set up hot and cold breakfast stations. New cold breakfast grab and go serve stations were added in all secondary schools.
They purchased a food truck specifically for the high school, as an alternative option for students, that serves food outside that is distinct from what is offered within school to lend novelty to the experience. The food truck will also be used to expand summer feeding mobile feeding. Finally it is used for all outdoor concessions during all home football games, with 100% of revenue going to the child nutrition program.
Branch recognizes the importance of pairing the introduction of more scratch cooked options with culinary skills training. In these trainings, Gooding kitchen teams learn not only knife skills and the other prerequisites for more scratch cooking, but also self-care and wellness. Moving forward as part of annual back to school training, staff will attend a 3 day bootcamp focused on meal presentation, merchandising, plate-scaping and food photography, basic and intermediate culinary skills, scratch recipe development and flavor profiles. Branch also invested in new uniforms for the staff as well as a laundry service to go along with them. All of this translates to better customer service for the students. “They are essential to the student experience,” says Branch and, “we really want to retain them!”
*The program is embarking on rebranding the child nutrition program, expanding local food access for school meals by partnering with growers in our community. We are also collaborating with local growers, industry partners, and other key stakeholders within our community to host local food education events, outside the school day.
