March 7 2022 08:00 AM

It’s National School Breakfast Week  help us celebrate the role dairy plays in childhood nutrition.

Not that dairy farmers need another reason to celebrate and promote the consumption of dairy, but National School Breakfast Week is one more opportunity to do just that.

The School Nutrition Association (SNA) will celebrate the goodness and importance of school breakfasts this week, March 7 to 11. This year’s theme, “Take Off with School Breakfast,” reminds parents and stakeholders that a healthy breakfast helps ensure students’ academic success.

Dairy is well represented on SNA’s toolkit for kids, and rightfully so. In 2019, schools served 4.87 billion meals to 30 million children, which translates to a lot of dairy consumption. That same year, 3.6 billion pounds of total dairy were served for breakfast, lunch, and summer feeding programs. The majority was fluid milk (3.23 billion pounds), but cheese (250 million pounds) and yogurt and other dairy products (98 million pounds) also hold a firm place.

School breakfast and dairy go together, and the dairy checkoff is helping to celebrate the occasion with a series of posts on the Dairy Good Instagram and Facebook channels. The work began rolling out on February 15 with posts highlighting the benefits of breakfast and how dairy fits into a balanced lifestyle. The posts include:

• Building A Balanced Breakfast Plate

• The WFH Breakfast

• A Morning Routine Inspired by “that girl”

• Breakfast On-the-Go

• The Post-Workout Breakfast

The work will be re-packaged during National School Breakfast Week and throughout National Nutrition Month as video reels using hashtags #NSB22 and #NationalNutritionMonth shared on Dairy Good’s Instagram platform. On March 8, look for more benefits of breakfast content on Dairy Good’s Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter channels. Farmers can share these dairy-friendly posts on their channels to help spread the goodness of not only school breakfasts, but the important role dairy farmers play in producing these foods.

In addition to National School Breakfast Week, there are many other moments in 2022 where checkoff teams nationally and locally will help celebrate and acknowledge various occasions. Some of the more dairy-centric dates to keep in mind are:

March

22 – World Water/Ag Day

24 -- Cheesecake Day

April

Earth Month

11 – Cheese Fondue Day

12 – Grilled Cheese Sandwich Day

20 – Cheddar Fries Day

22 – Earth Day

18 – Cheese Souffle Day

June

National Dairy Month

4 – Cheese Day

7 – Chocolate Ice Cream Day

20 – Ice Cream Soda Day

20 – Vanilla Milkshake Day

21 – Smoothie Day

25 – Strawberry Parfait Day

July

National Ice Cream Month

14 – Mac and Cheese Day

17 – Ice Cream Day

23 – Vanilla Ice Cream Day

August

8 – Frozen Custard Day

14 – Creamsicle Day

25 – Banana Split Day

September

Hunger Action Month

5 – Cheese Pizza Day

12 – Chocolate Milkshake Day

20 – Pepperoni Pizza Day

20 – String Cheese Day

25 – Quesadilla Day

27 – Chocolate Milk Day

October

1 – Homemade Cookies Day

12 – Farmer’s Day

15 – Cheese Curd Day

21 – Pumpkin Cheesecake Day

November

6 – Nachos Day

8 – Cappuccino Day

17 – Butter Day

December

4 – Cookie Day

24 – Eggnog Day

To learn more about your national and local dairy checkoffs, visit www.USDairy.com or send a request to join our Dairy Checkoff Facebook group.


Don Schindler

The author is a Senior Vice President of Digital Initiatives at Dairy Management Inc.