Atlanta Falcons to serve from new Model High salad bar designed to enhance student nutrition

Media release: Model High School will be one of the first schools in Georgia to receive a salad bar for the school nutrition program from the Atlanta Falcons professional football team.  The salad bar for Model High is funded through the Atlanta Falcons Youth Foundation and is part of a nationwide program to promote healthier eating with the youth of America by increasing the consumption of fruits and vegetables.  The Falcons Youth Foundation will also provide training to the school nutrition staff at Model on how to manage the salad bars successfully.  "We are pleased to partner with the Atlanta Falcons to promote healthy eating with the children of our community," stated Dr. Lynn Plunkett, superintendent of Floyd County Schools.  "Good health is essential to our mission of providing quality education for quality life for our students."  The Floyd County school system School Nutrition Department applied for the grant thought the Let's Move Salad Bars to Schools website.  Let's Move Salad Bars to Schools is a comprehensive grassroots public health effort to mobilize and engage stakeholders at the local, state and national level to support salad bars in schools. According to the program website, both academic research and actual experience in schools across the country are increasingly demonstrating that school children significantly increase their consumption of fruits and vegetables when given a variety of choices in a school fruit and vegetable salad bar.   The salad bar has been ordered and should be installed in the next four to six weeks.  The salad bar will feature a wide selection of fresh fruits and vegetables for the high school students at Model High.  Model High is a school of approximately 650 students in grades nine through twelve in Floyd County.  "The Falcons' salad bar will be a welcome addition to our school nutrition program," said Donna Carver, director of school nutrition for Floyd County Schools. "Schools across our system serve healthy, high quality meals for breakfast and lunch that meet the nutrition guidelines of the federal government and appeal to the taste of the children we serve and this will be a valuable addition to our menu selection for students."      The Falcons Foundation will provide salad bars to at least 15 Georgia schools this year. The Atlanta Falcons Youth Foundation (AFYF) was established in 1985 to serve as the philanthropic arm of the Atlanta Falcons.