Engage school staff and parents in school wellness using these ready-to-go communication tools. Sharing news about your Local School Wellness Policy is easy with these flyers, presentations, newsletter articles, and social media posts. Your school can personalize them to make them specific to your Local School Wellness Policy activities.

USDA recently revised the CACFP meal patterns to ensure children and adults have access to healthy, balanced meals throughout the day. The changes to the infant meal pattern support breastfeeding and the consumption of vegetables and fruit without added sugars. These changes are based on the scientific recommendations from the National Academy of Medicine, the American Academy of Pediatrics and stakeholder input. CACFP centers and day care homes must comply with the new meal patterns by October 1, 2017.

USDA recently revised the CACFP meal patterns to ensure children and adults have access to healthy, balanced meals throughout the day. Under the new child and adult meal patterns, meals served will include a greater variety of vegetables and fruit, more whole grains, and less added sugar and saturated fat. The changes made to the meal patterns are based on the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, scientific recommendations from the National Academy of Medicine, and stakeholder input. CACFP centers and day care homes must comply with the new meal patterns by October 1, 2017.

The new CACFP meal patterns lay the foundation for a healthy eating pattern for children and adults in care. USDA also developed optional best practices that build on the meal patterns and highlight areas where centers and day care homes may take additional steps to further improve the nutritional quality of the meals they serve. The best practices reflect recommendations from the Dietary Guidelines for Americans and the National Academy of Medicine to further help increase participants’ consumption of vegetables, fruits, and whole grains, and reduce the consumption of added sugars and saturated fats. Best Practices are optional and not required for meal reimbursement.

The National Policy & Legal Analysis Network to Prevent Childhood Obesity (NPLAN) developed model joint use agreements to aid the development of such agreements. There is no one model joint use agreement and there is no single method to develop an agreement, but these are a great start.

Safe Routes to School (SRTS) programs and projects help schools and communities improve safety, and get more children walking and bicycling to and from school. This resource guide focuses on schools and communities where at least half of students or community residents are low-income; it is intended to fill that gap.

This fact sheet explains why liability fears shouldn’t keep schools from supporting Safe Routes to School programs, and offers practical tips for schools and community advocates.

This toolkit is a nuts-and-bolts guide designed to help school staff and other community leaders craft and implement joint use agreements. Complete with model agreement language and success stories from communities around the country. This toolkit provides a comprehensive overview of the most common ways to finance joint use arrangements, and guidance on how to overcome obstacles that may arise in negotiating and enforcing a joint use agreement.

This illustrated roadmap outlines thirteen policy options that can help make Safe Routes to School a permanent part of our communities. The accompanying brochure breaks down the policy options even further.

This illustrated roadmap outlines thirteen policy options that can help make Safe Routes to School a permanent part of our communities. The accompanying brochure breaks down the policy options even further.

This guide is a comprehensive reference manual designed to support the development of Safe Routes to School (SRTS) programs. It provides links to other SRTS publications and training resources. It contains several chapters about specific topics of a SRTS program and is an “all-inclusive” guide.

This tool aims to help get kids more physically activity on their way to school. This resource identifies areas to work on in order to get a walking school bus in your community which includes where to start, reaching more children, identifying potential routes, finalizing logistics and kicking off the program. To learn more, please visit: http://www.walkingschoolbus.org/

This fact sheet provides an introduction to and basic information about joint use agreements.

This guide is intended to help early care and learning professionals and their programs, including center based, family child care, Head Start and public preschools, successfully implement Family Style Dining practices. This guide focuses on serving meals family style with toddlers and preschoolers, though afterschool programs may adopt these practices as well.

This fact sheet is designed to help parents and community advocates ensure that their district’s policy is enforced.

The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 requires USDA to establish nutrition standards for all foods sold in schools — beyond the federally-supported meals programs. This infographic shows the difference between the types of snacks sold before Smart Snack standard and the types offered after the standard was implemented; it also highlights the difference in empty calories.

A conversation guide for parents and adult caregivers of children age 7 to 11 years old as it relates to being overweight and obesity.

This book offers 52 physical activities and their variations that are fun for young children. This is designed for children to develop fundamental movement skills and physical fitness, inclusive of children with special needs.

These guidelines are a set of recommended practices for programs to use as they strive for excellence in the care and education of young children throughout Arizona. This document is intended to provide guidance by delineating quality and providing a set of indicators that concretely describe what a program will look like when providing high quality early care and education for children birth through age six.