How Haven Schools upped breakfast and lunch participation through preordering

There’s no fast food in Haven, Kan., or even a grocery store. Haven is a town of 1,200 residents located a half-hour northwest of Wichita. These days, a dollar store and a convenience mart are its only commercial food offerings. That might sound helpful for lunch participation rates in schools. But the district’s small size means it hasn’t had the budget to offer as many choices as students might want. Enter Google Docs. That’s the innovative, free solution Food Service Director Sheree Jones and her team came up with to give students more options. Two years ago, students had two choices: that day’s hot entree or a PB&J. Jones and Head Cook McKyla Powers realized that if students could order ahead, the kitchen could offer more daily options without risking that they’d go to waste. “We love these kids to pieces,” Jones says. “We just want to give them as many options as we can and give them everything kids in the bigger districts have, only better, because we scratch-cook everything.” Read on to see how the district put its simple, yet effective system into place.Photograph courtesy of Haven Schools