Standards of Excellence - Summer Programs

When Summer Nutrition Program sites serve quality, kid-friendly food, it attracts children to the program and makes them more likely to consistently participate.

To identify and promote quality summer nutrition sites, FRAC has created the following documents:

These documents can be used to evaluate summer nutrition sites and acknowledge quality programs.

The primary goal of evaluating summer nutrition sites and holding them to high standards is to increase the quality of food served and the site environment so that participation increases and more hungry children receive healthy and nutritious meals and snacks during the summer months.

We encourage you to use the summer nutrition criteria to evaluate sites in your area for any of the following:

  • Evaluate what is working and not working at summer nutrition sites in your area;
  • Distribute the checklist to site coordinators so they can perform a self-evaluation of their site;
  • Conduct city or county-wide evaluations of the Summer Nutrition Programs;
  • Determine high-quality sites and recognize them for their work;
  • Identify what areas need to be improved the following year and encourage sites to reach the next level of program excellence.