School Breakfast Gets a Boost

ONALASKA, Wis.—When Kerry Johnson was the supervisor at Onalaska High School, breakfast participation was poor. In a school with approximately 900 students, only between seven and 12 students were eating breakfast in the cafeteria each day.

“I really wanted to change the perception of school breakfast, which was that it was for poor students or students with low income,” Johnson said. “The students also had complaints that there wasn’t a good variety of foods.”

Johnson decided to take action to increase breakfast participation. “At the time, I was entering for the Louise Sublette Award, which is through the School Nutrition Association,” she said. “For the award, you have to choose a project with a measurable outcome.”

Johnson’s plan was to show the students their negative perceptions were wrong with a Taste of School Breakfast food show. Johnson invited vendors who handed out breakfast samples to students, local legislators and business members and parents to the event, which was held in the cafeteria between 7 and 9:30 a.m. Students could attend the event before school started, and many classes made the event a part of that day’s curriculum.

“A marketing teacher made it part of her lesson plan for the kids to pick out the different marketing tools that were being used by the vendors and myself,” Johnson said. “I had a math class and they took data about our participation previous to the Taste of Breakfast and following the event and graphed it. We really incorporated the entire school during the Taste of Breakfast.”

Following the Taste of School Breakfast, participation for breakfast increased to an average of 80 to 90 students each day.

“We showed the students that we were actually offering more options than they thought,” Johnson said about the success of the event. “With only seven to 12 students participating, they really didn’t know what was offered. It really changed their perception of breakfast. We didn’t necessarily change too much on the menu. We did offer some grab-and-go items by emphasizing that they are quick to get. The yogurt parfaits were a big hit. A breakfast burrito was also quite popular.”

Another change that Johnson said helped increase participation was serving the meal from the hot meal line instead of the à la carte line where it had previously been served. She said the move put breakfast in the forefront of the commons, which helped increase visibility of the program.

Johnson, who is now the school nutrition director for the district following Katie Wilson’s departure to the National Food Service Management Institute at the University of Mississippi in Oxford, received the regional Louise Sublette Award for
her efforts.