The Nutrition Group continues keeping meals healthy and appealing to Tamaqua Area School District students, its director of food and nutrition told school board members Tuesday.

Amy Hehn provided an update on some of the newest offerings, promotions and ways it’s working on getting kids into the lunchroom.

“Our main focus is to provide healthy, nutritious food to our students, while we’re keeping costs controlled and looking at ways to increase participation,” she told the board.

Hehn noted the breakfast program always starts out slow in the beginning of the year, and picks up as the weather turns colder.

A lot of students participate in breakfast at Tamaqua Elementary because of breakfast in the classroom, she said, and they started a breakfast in the classroom program at West Penn this year.

“Our breakfast numbers have doubled at West Penn,” she said. “We’re certainly seeing an increase there.”

They also started a new breakfast cart at the middle school, and will continue to make adjustments on that as the year goes on, Hehn said.

One of the programs they offer is Lunch for Life, in which they bring in kindergarten kids to the cafeteria, have them go through the lunch line, sit and eat in the cafeteria, she said.

Hehn said it might not seem like a big deal, but it allows the younger kids to see what the older kids are doing and get them familiar with what is offered.

They also gear some programs toward what is happening at the school or area, such as fair week, homecoming or the NFL’s big game in February, when three-foot hoagies are offered in the middle and high schools, she said.

“So, it’s always being creative and trying to find new things that we an offer to them,” Hehn said.

She has been working with a few students in the high school this year who said they are vegetarian.

“I’ve offered all of them the Impossible burger, which is a black bean-based burger,” Hehn said. “They’re not interested. I have tried. I offered to bring it in.”

She said she is working with them and they’re eating the in cafeteria every day without an issue – just not the black-bean burger.

Other programs involve nutrition education, which focuses on ways they can enjoy healthy and nutritious options, Hehn said.

Board President Larry Wittig said the Nutrition Group is doing a great job. The board also thanked Hehn for bringing in samples of some of the new low-sodium offerings for their committee meeting last week.