Food is Not Trash: Solutions to Cut Wasted Food, Strengthen Nutrition Budgets, and Turn Cafeterias Into Classrooms

Up to 40% of the food served in schools can end up in the trash. This amounts to an estimated 530,000 tons every year, representing $1.7 billion in lost nutrition. Some districts are tackling this problem head on by engaging students and communities to solve it.

This webinar brings together food and nutrition service leaders from Albuquerque Public Schools, Baltimore City Public Schools, and Project Green Fork to share how they use wasted food audits to identify what’s actually being thrown away, apply those findings to adjust menus and better align with student preferences, and implement share tables and food recovery systems that cut costs while staying compliant with food safety requirements.

Moderated by Pete Pearson, Vice President at World Wildlife Fund, the discussion will cover what worked, what didn’t, and how to build staff and student buy-in without adding strain to already-stretched teams.
Whether you’re launching your district’s first wasted food initiative or trying to deepen an existing one, you’ll leave with practical strategies and real data you can use to measure, reduce, and report on wasted food in your own cafeterias.

Learning Objectives

• Explain the core components of a wasted food audit and how to use that data to inform menu and operational decisions, as a starting point for launching one in their own district.
• Identify the operational and cost considerations involved in implementing food recovery systems, including how to stay compliant with food safety requirements.
• Apply practical strategies for building staff and student buy-in for wasted food reduction efforts without adding strain to existing teams.

Earning CEUs
SNA CEUs: 1.0
Key Area 2000: Operations
Key Topic 2100: Food Production