Healthier, locally sourced school lunch menus coming to Howard County

BALTIMORE -- School lunches are going to look different in Howard County this school year, with the district announcing Thursday it will be changing up the menus to offer healthier food.

The new menus are the result of community partnerships.

"In my time in high school, I didn't have the best school lunches," recent Reservoir High School graduate Amir Edris said. "A lot of people that I knew who didn't have lunch from home, they wouldn't eat the school lunches."

It's why Howard County Public School System leaders, along with members of the Horizon Foundation's Healthier Choices Coalition, announced a series of new initiatives Thursday.

Starting this coming school year, breakfast and lunches will be more locally sourced. The work on this started a year ago, stemming from a survey conducted by the Healthier Choices Coalition.

Glenn Schneider, the chief program officer for the Horizon Foundation, said the majority of the 375 students and parents surveyed "were looking for healthier, fresher and tastier food."

When they were shown the survey's results, school districts leaders said they were on board.

"School systems are community systems, we can only do great work when we work together. The challenges of hunger, food insecurity, are greater than just any school system," said HCPSS superintendent Bill Barnes.

The district is still determining exactly what will be on the new menus as they determine where to source the food.

Students and their families also will have a say through taste tastings and roundtables that are planned to solicit input.

A goal with the new menus is to also tackle food insecurity. In Howard County, according to HCPSS director of food and nutrition services Brian Ralph, the number of students who only eat school meals has gone up over the years.

"When I came here ten years ago, that percentage was like 16%," said Ralph. "Unfortunately now, we're close to 31%."

Edris and other students have been working with the Lindaben Foundation for years to make healthier foods more accessible. The Lindaben Foundation is a member of the Healthier Choices Coalition.

"It's really great to see all the hard work coming off successfully," Edris said.

The aim is to have the new menus established by September or October, according to Ralph.