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Shelly Mohr - Covid 19 Oral History Project
Shelly Mohr and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
During 2022 the Child Nutrition Archives conducted multiple interviews investigating how child nutrition professionals dealt with the Covid 19 pandemic and its effects on the operations of school feeding programs. This interview examines the experiences of Shelly Mohr. Mohr is in her 23rd year as a Food Service Director in a K-12 School District.
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Belinda Moitt
Belinda Moitt and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
A native of the island of Antigua, Belinda Moitt immigrated to St. Thomas in 1961. After working for several years as a housekeeper and then in several restaurants, she was hired as a cook in the school lunch program.
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Patricia Mouser
Patricia Mouser and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Patricia Mouser is a retired Child Nutrition Services Director with 36 years of school nutrition service. She began her career in child nutrition working in the Texas Tech University food service, followed by work in the San Antonio schools and then 27 years as the Director of Child Nutrition Services for the Midland Independent School District in west Texas. Patricia received her bachelor’s degree in Foods and Nutrition from Texas Tech University and she continues to be active with the Academy for Nutrition and Dietetics as well as the School Nutrition Association, having served on local, state, and national boards and in offices over the course of her career. Patricia works as an independent consultant to provide training programs for school nutrition employees and she is a certified Master Trainer.
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Judy Mumphrey
Judy Mumphrey and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
After earning bachelors and master’s degrees at the University of Southern Mississippi, Judy Mumphrey taught home economics for eleven and a half years, before moving into school food service. She started out as the School Foodservice Administrator at Pass Christian before moving to Bay-Waveland Schools, where she finished her career. Her biggest challenge over that career was dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
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Peggy Nakamoto
Peggy Nakamoto and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Peggy Nakamoto is a retired School Food Service Manager and a past president of the Oahu School Food Service Association. Peggy is very interested in child nutrition and continues to attend the School Nutrition Association’s Annual National Conventions.
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Margaret New
Margaret New and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Alabama native Margaret New is the bookkeeper for child nutrition with the Bessemer City School System in Alabama.
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Ann Nicholson
Ann Nicholson and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Ann Nicholson is a role model to all who may want to work their way up through a system. Ann started out in the Okolona Public School System as a cafeteria worker, moved up to be manager of the Okolona Elementary School cafeteria, and has been food service director since 1980. A firm believer in on-the-job training, she is an inspiration to all who work with her.
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Mary Nix
Mary Nix and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Mary Nix grew up in Gordon County, Georgia during the late 1930s and 1940s. She started work in the School Lunch Program in the ninth grade, washing pots and pans at her high school. After graduating she went on to become School Food Service Supervisor for Gordon County, and later, after graduating from the University of Georgia in 1969, she became Bartow County’s first School Food Service Director. She worked for Georgia’s Department of Education for a number of years and then served as Assistant Director of School Food Services in Cobb County Georgia, where she resides. Nix was President of the American School Food Service Association from 1981 – 1982.
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Cyndi Nobles
Cyndi Nobles and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
A native of Baton Rouge, by way of New Orleans, Cyndi Nobles has spent her career in food service. After spending five years working for a food service management company, Cyndi has been with the Louisiana State Department of Education child nutrition programs for the last thirty years.
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Lynn Parker
Lynn Parker and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Lynn Parker recently retired from Food Research and Action Center, FRAC, after thirty years of dedicated service to improving the nutrition of the nation’s children. She has now moved to the Institute of Medicine, where she is heading up a standing committee on childhood obesity prevention.
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Helen Phillips
Helen Phillips and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Helen Phillips is a dedicated school nutrition advocate. Her current work involves projects relative to enhancing the good work of school nutrition professionals across the country. As a retired director of school nutrition after more than 25 years working in school nutrition administration, she has extensive program knowledge and experience. During Helen’s successful career she served in numerous state and national leadership roles with the School Nutrition Association of Virginia and the national School Nutrition Association, serving as president of each. She has worked on various projects with allied organizations including the Pew Charitable Trusts, American Heart Association, Share Our Strength, and the Alliance for a Healthier Generation to name a few. Helen has also worked on school nutrition issues with the White House, the United States Department of Agriculture, and the Commonwealth of Virginia. Helen has a passion for school nutrition and enjoys working to promote program integrity.
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Vivian Pilant
Vivian Pilant and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Born in 1941, Vivian Pilant grew up in Martin, Tennessee. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Home Economics from the University of Tennessee at Martin, a master’s degree in Institution Management and a doctorate in Nutrition from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. She began her career as Director of School Food Services and Nutrition Education for Weakley County, Tennessee. In August 1970, she went to work as a Coordinator of School Food Services in Jacksonville, Duval County, Florida, where she remained for five years. In 1975, Dr. Pilant began work with the South Carolina Department of Education Office of School Food Services as a consultant or “state supervisor.” Two years later she took a position as a registered dietician with the South Carolina WIC program. From 1979 until 2009, she served as Director of School Food Services for South Carolina. Dr. Pilant served as president of the American School Food Service Association (ASFSA) (1994 – 1995). She has testified five times before Congressional committees on matters concerning food and nutrition education training. During her time as ASFSA president she was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent treatment. Dr. Pilant died March 29, 2010, at the age of 69.
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Kevin Ponce
Kevin Ponce and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
A native of Hawaii, Kevin Ponce left the islands after high school to join the US Air Force. After a 20-year career in the Air Force Ponce retired. Having earned a degree in hotel and restaurant management he took the position as an area supervisor for the Oklahoma City Public Schools. This was followed by a position overseeing the procurement of food and equipment. Eventually he took a food service director position, where he moved up to larger and larger districts. Kevin up running a district with over eighty schools before eventually retiring again after another-plus year career.
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Sandra Ponte
Sandra Ponte and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Sandra Ponte, a Michigan native, moved to Colorado after high school and worked for a decade in hospitality management. She is now a food service manager in rural Alaska.
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Eleanor Pratt
Eleanor Pratt and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Eleanor Pratt began her career in the child nutrition profession as food service director for Clarksville, Tennessee, schools in 1957. With a master’s degree in Home Economics she went on in 1960 to a career with the USDA Southeast Regional Office as Home Economist. She retired thirty-four years later in 1994. Ms. Pratt died at the age of 88 on August 18, 2014.
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Tommy Ramey
Tommy Ramey and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Tommy Ramey worked for 34 years in the State of Alabama beginning as a teacher/coach and retiring in 2000 as State Director of the Child Nutrition Programs for the Alabama State Department of Education. His major accomplishments include developing and instituting a commodity processing program that saved local education agencies (LEAs) $1.5 annually; being recognized by the USDA for having the most efficient method for delivery of USDA donated food; initiating the development of the State Nutrition Policies and Procedures Handbook; and initiating and assisting in the development and passage by the State Board of Education, certification standards for local child nutrition directors. Since his retirement, he has continued to be active in the child nutrition field by presenting programs on a variety of subjects throughout the nation.
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Ora Mae Reeves
Ora Mae Reeves and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Ora Mae Reeves did school lunch before there was school lunch. In the depths of the Great Depression, with four children in public school, Mrs. Reeves walked two miles in rural Vernon, AL, to volunteer to cook hot meals for the students, who brought a canned good from home as payment for their lunch. Update: Ora Mae Reeves, age 101, of Vernon, Alabama, died Jan. 31, 2012, at Aurora Australis Lodge in Columbus, Miss.
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Beth Rice
Beth Rice and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Beth Rice is a native of Tennessee and studied at University of Tennessee Martin and University of Tennessee, Knoxville, before entering the field of child nutrition. Beth worked in a residential child care institution, for the Tennessee State Department of Education, and as a child nutrition director for Lake County, Tennessee, before joining the Fulton County School District in western Kentucky, from where she retired. Beth now works as a consultant for the Institute of Child Nutrition, instructing other directors in a course called Orientation to School Nutrition Leadership.
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Pat Richardson
Pat Richardson and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Pat Richardson was born in Kansas and grew up in Arkansas before moving to Mississippi to attend Ole Miss. She is a former child nutrition director for Oxford City Schools and is now retired from the Institute of Child Nutrition as an Education and Training Specialist.
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Dora Rivas Oral History
Dora Rivas and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Dora Rivas has dedicated more than thirty-five years of service to child nutrition and related programs. A Texas native, she grew up in the small town of Los Fresnos and attended collage at Texas A & I University (now Texas A & M) where she received a degree in nutrition and dietetics. She first entered the field of school nutrition in 1977 as a school dietitian and eventually promoted to Assistant School Director and then School Director in Brownsville, Texas. In 2005, she moved to Dallas, Texas to work as the Executive Director in the Dallas Independent School District until 2015. She is currently working with the Army and Air Force Exchange on child nutrition on military bases. Mrs. Rivas is also a former president of the School Nutrition Association in 2009-2010.
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Cynthia Ruffin
Cynthia Ruffin and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Cynthia Ruffin began her school nutrition career in Louisiana more than 35 years ago. She received a B.S. in Dietetics from Louisiana State University and an MBA from Southeastern Louisiana University. Cynthia has worked at the local school level, with the Louisiana Department of Education, and as the Director of Child Nutrition in St. Charles Parish Public Schools near New Orleans. Some of her career highlights include developing the Louisiana School Lunch Cycle Menus; expanding Breakfast-on-the-Go programs, implementing The Main Course, a culinary training program for food service technicians; and contributing significantly to district recovery after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. She was the recipient of the SNA of Louisiana Child Nutrition Director of the Year award in 2013. Cynthia often says that once you’ve been bitten by the school lunch bug, you’re infected forever! Her desire to remain involved with the school nutrition profession has led her to training in her post-retirement career. Cynthia is a consultant trainer for the Institute of Child Nutrition.
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Marilyn Rylie
Marilyn Rylie and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Marilyn Rylie was born in Ohio and grew up in Wisconsin before settling in Arkansas. She is currently the Food Service Director in Sheridan, Arkansas. Another firm believer in the value of training, she also credits Ms. Ernestine Camp as an invaluable asset to her career development.
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Barry Sackin
Barry Sackin and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Barry Sackin has more than 30 years’ experience in child nutrition programs, including 18 years in program operations, such as school breakfast, school lunch, summer feeding, Head Start, senior feeding, and the commodity program. He is now president of B. Sackin & Associates, a child nutrition consulting business. Barry was staff vice president for SNA, a founding board member of Action for Healthy Kids, former president of the Southern California School Nutrition Association, and member of the SNA executive board. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of the American Commodity Distribution Association and the CSNA Public Policy and Legislation Committee. Barry is the author of many peer-reviewed journal articles and is regularly asked to speak at state and national conferences. He also serves as a trainer for the National Food Service Management Institute.
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Wanda Salley
Wanda Salley and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
An Alabama native, Wanda Salley holds degrees from Auburn University and Mississippi State University, and is also a Registered Dietitian. After beginning her career in hospitals she transitioned into school food service, first becoming a food service director in Houston, MS, followed by stints in Greenville, Pass Christian, and Harrison County, MS schools.
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Becki Schreiber
Becki Schreiber and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Becki Schreiber has worked in many different food and nutrition management arenas that include schools, restaurants, hospitals, long term care, and businesses. She has also taught at the college level.
She received a Bachelor’s degree in Food, Nutrition and Institution Administration from the University of Maryland and a Master of Adult and Occupational Education from the University of New Hampshire.
Becki has worked or consulted in over 40 kitchens and in one large edible school garden during her 40-year career. She was Director of School Nutrition for 15 years in the state of Maine, becoming a passionate advocate for child nutrition.
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Adrianne Schwartz
Adrianne Schwartz and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Adrianne Schwartz is a food service supervisor in Juneau, Alaska.
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Frances L. Self
Frances L. Self and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Frances L. Self was asked to “sub” for a few weeks in the cafeteria of Dickson County Tennessee Schools back in 1973. She is still there, and has been Manager for the last thirty-two years. She credits her ability to adapt and her dedication to lifelong learning as keys to her success.
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Shirli Self
Shirli Self and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Shirli Self is an Idaho native who has worked in school nutrition both in Idaho and Oregon, in a unique position. The area where she currently works in Oregon is so rural and remote that Oregon pays for her students to finish high school in Idaho after they complete eighth grade in Oregon, because the nearest Idaho high school is much closer than the nearest Oregon high school. She has twenty-one years of school nutrition experience and is a one-woman show, having no employees and being responsible for feeding ninety-three K – 8 students every day.
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Danny Seymour
Danny Seymour and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Danny Seymour has been involved with school nutrition programs since 1971, beginning with a small suburban Philadelphia school district. His career path led him to direct four different school nutrition programs and to become director of the second largest school district in Pennsylvania - Pittsburgh Public Schools. Throughout his career in schools, Danny built each program on strong fundamentals of procurement as well as human resource management. While in Pittsburgh he developed the department’s Standards of Operations, outlining almost every policy and procedure for implementing a successful school nutrition operation. From 2007 to 2015 Danny held a position with the School Nutrition Association as Dean of Education. The newly created position afforded the opportunity to create professional training programs for both school nutrition employees and industry colleagues. Danny has a passion for dogs and in particular, Pointers. Danny is approved by the American Kennel Club to judge seventeen different breeds of sporting dogs. When not involved with the professional development of school nutrition programs, you can most likely find him at a dog show. Danny is a consultant trainer for the Institute of Child Nutrition.
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Carol W. Shanklin
Carol W. Shanklin and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Carol W. Shanklin, PhD, RD, is professor in the Department of Hotel, Restaurant, Institution Management & Dietetics and Dean of Graduate School at Kansas State University. Carol teaches graduate courses and mentors graduate students’ research in the areas of environmental issues, food safety, customer satisfaction, and dietetics and hospitality education. She has collaborated with several graduate students on research projects in child nutrition. Carol has authored or co-authored several articles in the Journal of Child Nutrition Management and the Journal of the American Dietetics Association. She has been active in the School Nutrition Association, the American Dietetics Association, and other professional organizations. She currently serves as Professional Interest Delegate for Research and a member of the research committee for ADA and is on the Advisory Committee for College and University Personnel for SNA. She recently was awarded the University of Delaware Michael D. Olsen Research Achievement Award and in 2001 received the Medallion Award from the American Dietetics Association.
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Wanda Shockey
Wanda Shockey and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Wanda Shockey, a native of Monroe, Louisiana, began her child nutrition career in Bastrop, Louisiana, first as the home economics teacher and then becoming the child nutrition director. After moving to Arkansas, Shockey was child nutrition director for Little Rock School District for nine years and had fifty schools. Later she moved to the Arkansas Department of Education where she has been director of child nutrition for the past fifteen years.
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Emma Sidney
Emma Sidney and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Emma Sidney was a child nutrition program manager in Alabama.
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Lou Simoneaux
Lou Simoneaux and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Lou Simoneaux spent twenty years traveling the world with her military family before returning to her home state of Louisiana and beginning a new career in school food service. She spent several years in the Panama Canal Zone and then moved to France. When her husband finally retired they returned to Lou’s hometown of Napoleonville, Louisiana, where she spent the next twenty-nine years providing healthy, nutritious meals to the children of Assumption Parish.
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Barbara Smith
Barbara Smith and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Barbara Smith taught Home Economics for six years before becoming Food Service Director in Russellville, Arkansas, for four years. She then worked for the Arkansas Department of Education until her retirement is early 2008.
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Marcia Smith
Marcia Smith and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Marcia Smith was born in Pennsylvania and moved to Florida when she was two years old. Ms. Smith graduated from Florida State University with a degree in food nutrition specializing in school lunch administration. She later earned masters and Ph.D. degrees from Webber College and Kennedy Western University. She started her career in school foodservice in Polk County, Florida, working with Helen Walker, School Food Service Director and President of the American School Foodservice Association (ASFSA) at that time. “Within the first two weeks of being on the job, I was going to Chicago to the national conference where she was national president,” Ms. Smith said. Ms. Smith became the School Food Service Director for Polk County, Florida, when Helen Walker retired, and has served in that position for over 21 years for a total of over 31 years in the profession. She served as president of ASFSA in 2001.
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Jeannie Sneed
Jeannie Sneed and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Jeannie Sneed is a former director of the Applied Research Division of the National School Food Service Management Institute. Sneed now holds a position in the USDA Food Safety unit.
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George Sneller
George Sneller and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
George Sneller has built a child nutrition career on both coasts. George, who hails from Jacksonville, Fl, was State Director of Child Nutrition Programs for the state of Florida before taking early retirement, moving across the entire United States, and taking the same position with the state of Washington. Read George’s story to see some of the similarities and differences in how child nutrition programs are administered from state to state.
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Lynda Snow
Lynda Snow and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Lynda Snow is a native Alabamian and has worked in school nutrition for thirty-five years in Birmingham and Bessemer, Alabama. She holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Alabama A&M University. She is currently Child Nutrition Director for Bessemer City Schools.
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Barbara Songy
Barbara Songy and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Barbara Songy is a native of London, England, but has spent many more years in Louisiana feeding that state’s children than she ever spent in the United Kingdom. Barbara came to the United States as a war bride, having met and married a Louisiana airman during World War II. Displeased with what her first child was being served for lunch, she set about not only improving the menu, she raised the funds to build a new cafeteria. When the person who was supposed to manage the new cafeteria suddenly had to resign she agreed to take on the job temporarily. She retired fifty-five years later.
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Alan J. Stone
Alan J. Stone and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Alan J. Stone’s internships included co-chair of the Law Students Civil Rights Research Council, and what became the National Welfare Rights Organization, after going to law school at George Washington University in Washington, DC. He worked as one of the organizers of the Poor People’s March on Washington. After law school Stone went to work as the junior counsel on Senator George McGovern’s U.S. Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs. He went on the work on legislation that made School Breakfast, WIC, and Summer Food Service and Child Care Food Program all permanent programs in America. Stone later became a speech writer for President Bill Clinton, and later became Vice-President of Public Affairs at Columbia University.
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Theresa Stretch
Theresa Stretch and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Theresa Stretch is a native of the State of Illinois. After working as a food service director in both rural and metropolitan districts in Illinois, Theresa accepted a position as an Education and Training Specialist at the Institute of Child Nutrition, where she has been for the past twenty years. Theresa will retire on March 31, 2020.
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Kathy Talley
Kathy Talley and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Kathy Talley spent twenty years teaching Home Economics in West Virginia. Since then she has served for nearly another twenty years in the Nutrition Education and Training position at the West Virginia Department of Education. She is proud that her state was the first in the nation to mandate the School Breakfast Program.
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Rodney Taylor
Rodney Taylor and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Rodney Taylor is the Director of Food and Nutrition Services for Fairfax County, Virginia, Public Schools. He was formerly Director of Nutrition Services for the Riverside Unified School District in Riverside, California. He holds a B.S. degree in Public Administration from California State University. A noted pioneer and expert in farm-to-school salad bars, Rodney is known for establishing the “Farmers Market Salad Bar” program in 1997 while working as Director of Food and Nutrition Services in the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District. Rodney served on the California State Board of Food and Agriculture, the University of California President’s Advisory Commission for Agriculture and Natural Resources, and the Network for a Healthy California Executive Committee. He is the recipient of numerous honors and awards. Rodney is a consultant trainer for the Institute of Child Nutrition.
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Sue Tettleton
Sue Tettleton and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Sue Tettleton worked in the Nutrition and Education Training Program at the University of Mississippi, beginning in the 1960s, training state school lunch personnel. Sue is now retired from the North Mississippi Regional Center, a former member of the faculty at the University of Mississippi in the Department of Home Economics, Family and Consumer Sciences, and a member of the NET Program in Mississippi.
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Sue Uyehara
Sue Uyehara and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Sue Uyehara is a Louisiana native and a registered dietitian. She worked with the Women, Infants, and Children Program (WIC) in Louisiana, before relocating to Hawaii, where she works with the Office of Hawaii Child Nutrition Programs.
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Sebasthian Varas – Covid 19 Oral History Project
Sebasthian Varas and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Since 2009, Sebasthian Varas has worked for Canyons School District in Utah as the director for Nutrition Services. He is responsible for providing leadership and direction in matters pertaining to child nutrition programs for 33,000 students. He manages 43 schools and 275 employees.
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Martha S. Walker
Martha S. Walker and Institute of Child Nutrition. Child Nutrition Archives.
Martha S. Walker is New Orleans native and a graduate of Southern University. She has managed school feeding programs in East Baton Rough Parish for twenty-five years.
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