When I was a student at Vista Middle School in Ferndale, Wash., the ultimate status snack was the big cookie. The size of a salad plate and soft in the center, this chocolate-chip marvel was shared to gain entrance at a lunch table with other tweens slightly above my social status and probably contributed to my inability to run a mile in less than 15 minutes. Eighth grade was a rough time.
That cookie no longer graces the menu at Vista—or at any of Ferndale School District’s snack carts, for that matter. “It’s a thing of the past,” laughs Bette Hunt, the district’s interim foodservice director. Smart Snack items sold a la carte fall under the guidelines of the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010, she says. Among other regulations, snack items cannot contain more than 200 calories—sorry, big cookie.
Hunt credits vendors with being prepared for the switch and evolving to meet requirements. “They’ve gotten really good at understanding what it is schools need now,” she says. “There’s a lot more product availability than there was even two, three years ago.”
Those needs are ever changing. Operators still are working toward meals that both fit federal regulations and are things kids want to eat (for ideas, read "The Inside Scoop"), and as of press time the Act’s reauthorization status was undecided.
But my visit to the School Nutrition Association’s Annual National Conference in July certainly confirmed Hunt’s assessment of the booming bounty of snack options. Popular ice cream bars have been shrunken and reduced in fat, a variety of nut butters avoid allergens and eggrolls are baked instead of fried. Have I mentioned that the wrappers for those eggrolls also contain primarily whole-wheat flour?
My 13-year-old self would have been disappointed, but 30-year-old me is excited to see Smart Snack affecting positive change in kids nationwide. I know the snack choices served in my hippie-dippie Washington home, like apples and cheese, were much healthier than those of friends who grew up in places like Ohio or Kansas. What if they’d been able to follow the Smart Snack model at school? Would they have gone home and asked their parents for more broccoli?
With the next generation of kids, maybe we’ll find out.