School Meal Programs

The Campaign assists schools in establishing and expanding school breakfast and lunch programs, which provide a reliable source of nutrition for school age children. Only 17% of Vermont's schools served breakfast in 1993. Today, 97% of Vermont's schools serve nutritious meals to more than 94,000 students.
School Meals
- Improve nutritional health of all children
- Improve academic performance
- Reduce behavior problems
- Prevent obesity
- Allow families on limited budgets to improve the quality of food at home
Currently, out of 319 Vermont public schools:
- 10 schools have lunch, but no breakfast program
- 2 schools have breakfast, but not lunch
- 11 schools have neither a lunch or a breakfast program
Look up your school to see if it offers school meals (.pdf)
Why School Breakfast?
School breakfast has repeatedly been shown to improve diet quality, student behavior, academic performance, and health.
Ways schools can increase student participation in school meals:
- Provide breakfast at snack time in the classroom in elementary schools
- Allow older students to access breakfast after the first class
- Schedule lunch after recess
- Use computerized debit accounts so free/reduced students can be anonymous
- Provide free breakfast to all students, if possible
- Reduce sale of foods that compete with the more nutritious complete school meal
Enroll more students in free/reduced price meals:
- Remind parents that they can apply anytime during the school year
- Provide as much anonymity as possible for students
- Provide assistance to families to fill out the applications at open house functions and through follow-up calls.
School Meal Resources
For more information, please contact Sarah Robinson, Senior Nutrition Program & Policy Specialist, at
.