Wanda McCown, the newly appointed executive director of school nutrition for the Knox County School System, has a full plate of responsibilities, from menu planning, food purchasing and distribution to overseeing the quality of kids' meals.
There's not one aspect of her job that has her concerned.
McCown has worked in the area of school nutrition for 32 years and been met with a number of changes throughout the years, including the 2010 Healthy Hunger-free Kids Act signed by President Obama and strongly supported by first lady Michelle Obama.
"It has given us stricter guidelines to incorporate more whole grains, fruits and vegetables and put limits on our sugar, sodium, calorie and fat count. The first couple of years were difficult but as the food manufacturers have worked hard to produce items that meet these guidelines we are seeing a great improvement in the acceptability of the product,"she said.
She said the school system had already implemented some healthy changes on its own before the bill was passed, such as introducing whole grain breads to the children's meals.
"We knew that these regulations were coming down the road so we tried to get a head start. We had already changed to low-fat milk, introduced whole grain breads and were giving extra fresh fruit and more vegetables to the students," she said.
There are 86 Knox County schools that meals are served at daily. Ten of those are considered "production centers," in that they prepare foods for "site schools" that don't have their own cafeteria. Two of those site schools are Central High and West High.
"We have large trucks that deliver them in warming boxes and cold boxes and are delivered within an hour or an hour and a half (of lunch time)," she said.
While other school systems have been known to offer "community tables" so leftover fruits or prepackaged foods can be shared with others, the Knox County School System does not provide that service because of health department concerns.