School Nutrition

Welcome to the Bedford County School Nutrition Program Homepage.  On this site you will be able to find all types of information regarding the school nutrition program including an al a carte price list, a school nutrition fact sheet, nutritional information on food items, a frequently asked question and answer section, school menus and more.  We hope that you will find the information provided on this site helpful in learning about the school nutrition program.

Toni Hill
Field Manager
thill@bedford.k12.va.us

Marlene Wertz
Secretary
mwertz@bedford.k12.va.us

Phone: 540-586-1045
FAX: 540-586-2076

Bedford County Public Schools
PO Box 748
311 S. Bridge Street
Bedford, VA 24523

The school nutrition program has onsite cafeterias at all 21 schools in Bedford County.  Each cafeteria provides a nutritious breakfast and lunch each day to students.  The program serves approximately 2,500 breakfasts and 6,700 lunches each day in the school cafeterias across the county.  The program employs about 145 staff members.

The school nutrition program is a totally self supporting program.  The program receives no local tax funding or funding from the school system.  The program is expected to make all of its own money.  Funds are generated from the sales that are made each day in the school cafeterias, federal reimbursement that is received each month from all reimbursable meals served and state funding that is received once per year.

From these funds the program pays all of the salaries and benefits for employees, purchases all foods and supplies for the cafeterias, purchases new equipment when needed and repairs existing equipment and purchases all other items that are needed to run the program.  As you can see, the school nutrition program is operating a business and is expected to be profitable.  This is a fact that many people do not realize about the program. 

The school nutrition program strives to offer nutritious, well balanced school meals.  The United States Department of Agriculture is the governing body that establishes meal requirements for school meals and local school nutrition programs are expected to follow these meal requirements.  School menus are planned at the local level and a nutrition analysis is computed from a USDA approved computer program called Nutrikids.  The goal is for meals to contain no more than 30% calories from fat and no more than 10% calories from saturated fat averaged over a week of menus.

The school nutrition program offers a wide variety of options each day in the school cafeterias.  It is not an easy task to put a menu together since it is very difficult to please everyone.  All schools offer at least four entrée choices each day with more at the middle and high schools.  A variety of fruits and vegetables are offered and all milk options are either low fat or skim.  Recent Government Accounting (GOA) reports state “school meals are healthy and children who eat school meals consume more fruits, vegetables, whole grains and dairy items than children who do not eat school meals.” 

If your child eats school meals we hope they enjoy their experience and we very much appreciate their business.  If your child does not eat school meals we would invite them to give us a try.  We would love to have them as our customer.  Any questions or concerns regarding the school nutrition program can be directed to Karen Arthur, School Nutrition Supervisor at karthur@bedford.k12.va.us or 586-1045 ext. 224.