School Nutrition Studies

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) administers two school meals programs—the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) and the School Breakfast Program (SBP). For more than 20 years, Mathematica has studied the nutritional quality of meals offered to students and the dietary intakes of program participants through a series of School Nutrition Dietary Assessment (SNDA) studies. Study findings, as well as developments in federal nutrition guidance, have had a dramatic influence on the nutrition standards used in planning school meals and in the nutritional quality of those meals. Mathematica is continuing its important work in this area through the School Nutrition and Meal Cost Studies (SNMCS I and II), which are providing evidence about the nutritional quality and cost of school meals after implementation of the most recent nutrition standards.

Hover your cursor over the dots to see actual values and over the dotted lines to see policy changes
in relation to changes in meal fat and saturated fat content.