School officials ‘dumpster dive’

To determine what kids really eat at school, cafeteria workers here have come up with a modified version of dumpster diving.

They already knew what students ask for, what gets put on the tray, said Karen Hallford, Gwinnett CountySchools coordinator of nutrition support and procurement. Last school year, Hallford and her staff decided to look at the leftovers to get to the root of the school nutrition problem.

"We randomly select trays as kids are finished with their meals, put them off to the side and then analyze," she said.

Hallford said her staff found some surprising results in the trash:

• Whole fruit is a popular choice, but students do not eat it. Now workers are giving wedges or slices of fresh fruit to see if what's served will be consumed.

• Cheese-stuffed pizza crusts ended up in the garbage, too, so schools here got rid of it and saved money.

Her results echo a study from researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, who watched 274 kindergarteners, first-graders and second-graders in 10 New York City public school cafeterias and noted their food selection and eating habits. While all the children took a milk and a whole grain on their trays, 59% chose a vegetable and 58% took fruit, only a quarter of the kids actually ate at least one bite of their veggies.

Johns Hopkins researchers also found that children were more likely to finish their food if a teacher ate in the cafeteria with them, when the noise level was low, if food was cut into smaller pieces and when lunchtime was longer.