NuVal® Is Here!

That's right! For the first time in Minnesota history NuVal will be launched at school. Although in 900+ retail stores nationwide, Sartell - St. Stephen Schools will be the second in the nation to offer this revolutionary food scoring system to middle school and high school students. Thanks to a grant from the Medica Foundation®, BLEND (Better Living: Exercise and Nutrition Daily) and the assistance of Coborn's Inc Sabre students will have the opportunity to make the healthy choice the easy choice at school.

Here's how it works. Created by Dr. David Katz with the Yale University Prevention Resource Center and a team of nationally recognized leaders in health and nutrition, the NuVal system scores foods from 1 - 100; the higher the score, the more nutritious the food. For instance, an apple is a 96 whereas apple juice is 15. Which would you prefer you child consume at lunch? Based on the ONQI algorithm, NuVal essentially takes the "good" elements in foods (vitamins, omega 3 fatty acids) and divides them by the "unhealthy" elements in foods (sugar, sodium) and computes an overall nutritional value to that particular item. Basically, "the good divided by the bad" creates the NuVal Score.

The NuVal scores are placed on the price tag of each food item. Unfortunately, not all food items are currently scored, as many are still going through the algorithm process. This says nothing about that particular item, other than it's waiting to be scored. Likewise, the recipe items in the lunch line are not scored at this time either, as NuVal has not yet created the perfect process to ensure accurate scoring.

To date, more than 145 items in the A la carte and vending machines at both the middle and high school will are scored with additional scores coming monthly. This will allow students and faculty the opportunity to look at the overall nutritional value of the foods they eat to see if there's an option to "trade up" to a higher scoring item. Foods are meant to be traded in categories, like produce, snacks, breakfast items, juices, frozen treats, etc. It's not expected for a child to trade their breakfast cereal for broccoli, but perhaps for a higher, comparable breakfast or cereal item. Likewise, for other meals and snacks.

To learn more about the NuVal system check out BLEND's website at www.BLENDCentralMN.org. Here, you can also sign up for BLEND's e-newsletters and NuVal blogs.

Here is a great way to test your knowledge - Take the quiz!