Our Student-to-State Mission: Three Ways We’re Simplifying School Nutrition Processes

This past year school year will be known as the year of innovation. The ability to pivot, adapt, and change direction at a moment’s notice was tested over and over.  

One thing that never went away: the passion for feeding the 30-million children who depend your team every day. Your determination and ability to innovate helped ensure children received a healthy meal. Whether through drive-through, meal delivery, or turning bus routes into mobile meal routes, you made it happen.  

The LINQ Family continues to look for new ways to drive efficiency for school nutrition programs so you can focus on what really matters: feeding your students.  

In the months to come, we are looking at three big ways to simplify school nutrition. Here’s what you need to know.

Simplification #1: Monthly Claims  

Monthly claims are the backbone of your school nutrition program. From pulling monthly reports, resolving errors, logging into multiple systems, and manually entering your claims data this can be a daunting task, all this before you submit your claims data to your State Agency.  

Now that the claims are submitted to the state, it is time to check the status in another system.  

We know that this takes days, weeks, or even longer. As LINQ continues to innovate and streamline solutions for school nutrition programs, we look to connect school districts directly to state agencies to speed up reimbursements and reduce errors in claims data.  

Simplification #2: Eligibility and Verification 

Another aspect that is ready for innovation is eligibility and verification for NSLP. As a father of four, I receive not one, but four different forms in a green folder from our district’s school nutrition program. Each form gets filled out and sent back. And that happens every year! And every year, my wife and I fill the forms out and put them back into the green folder. Magically, the form makes it back in one piece. I think.  

I will never know what paperwork actually makes it back to the school nutrition team at the beginning of the year; if you ever met my son, you would understand why. That single paper form is very important. Many families and districts rely it to start the eligibility process. 

As we look for ways to innovate and increase the efficiency of your staff, verification at the beginning of the year could save hours of phone calls, emails, and administrative workload – running reports. We are looking for new ways to work with state agencies and the USDA to streamline this process, removing the burden from your entire team.

Simplification #3: Administrative Review  

Oh, those glorious words: “You have an AR this year.” Maybe they are not so glorious or maybe they strike fear and frustration into your brain. And yet, enduring this process every 3-5 years is a guarantee.

Today, that means you must start by dusting off your big, blue binder. Next, your team must generate a ton of reports. Finally, you prepare for months of back and forth while your data is being reviewed. The administrative review process takes valuable time from you and your staff, limiting the creativity of your menus.  

The TITAN system by LINQ, houses much of the data school nutrition programs need for menu compliance. However, you still need to print and submit the data to the state during your administrative review.  

The LINQ innovation to school nutrition is to simplify this process by eliminating the need to manfully attach your review reports in your state compliance system. The entire process is done automagically. No more worrying about your reporting or submitting the wrong information to your state. It’s all done for you! 

Three Ways LINQ is Simplifying School Nutrition Processes 

Just as you innovated this year to ensure all students received healthy and delicious meals, we are innovating our software. We understand: school nutrition processes can be a giant time-suck. Our solutions boost the efficiency of your school nutrition program, from student-to-state. And you have more time to spend connecting with your students.

Before we end, I want to take a moment to thank you all for the hard work and dedication this year. It is your dedication and innovation that helped keep so many kids from going hungry.