The Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGA) is used as the “gold standard” of nutrition that is applied to meal plans for schools, nursing homes, hospitals, the military, and other government-funded programs.

Perhaps the DGAs have always been political, but in recent years, committee members have wrongly approached developing the guidelines not under the umbrella of nutrition, but with other things in mind – sustainability, animal welfare, and other hot, trendy topics – that have nothing to do with promoting health and wellness for all Americans.

We’ve seen this play out with recommendations that we as Americans greatly reduce our consumption of meat and dairy while eating more grains, fruits, and vegetables. The results, in my opinion, have been disastrous, with rates of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and more skyrocketing in the last 40 years.

To truly nourish our nation’s kids, we need protein-rich foods like meat and dairy on the menu. These products are nutrient-dense, brain-fueling, satiating, and wholesome, and our kids deserve to be fed well during the school day.

Now what should be included on the school lunch tray is perhaps a topic of discussion for another day. Today, something else is on my mind: With school out for the summer, many of our nation’s most vulnerable kids don’t have access to their school lunch program.

According to No Kid Hungry, an organization that is leading the charge in providing wholesome meals to kids during the summer months, “More than 12 million children in the United States live in ‘food-insecure’ homes. What’s more, one in six children in the U.S. live with hunger, and six out of every seven kids don’t get the summer meals they need.”

No Kid Hungry not only helps provide school breakfasts and after-school meal programs to kids, but a summer meal program is also available to those living in food-insecure homes. (If you have kids yourself, or know of families in need of breakfast and lunch this summer, simply text "FOOD" to 877877, and you'll receive a message with the closest location where free summer meals are available.)

Note, there is no paperwork to fill out and no income requirement to meet. No Kid Hungry just feeds kids ages 18 and under. It’s really as simple as that.

This program is made possible with the help of a wide variety of strong partners from both the private and government sectors, including the UDSA, Arby’s, Shake Shack, National WIC Assoc., National Dairy Council, Food for Good, Hunger Task Force, Alliance to End Hunger, Catholic Charities USA, and the Salvation Army, to name a few.

There are ways we can help, as well. No Kid Hungry takes donations and encourages folks to write to Congress and advocate for children in need because truly, no kid should ever be hungry in America – the land of plenty.

So, we can debate the merits of the DGAs all day long, and as the 2020 version is currently being updated and worked on before its release, I most certainly will revisit this topic in a future editorial. But today, we have an immediate concern facing our nation’s most vulnerable youth.

We can do something to help solve this problem in our own communities. With collaborations and accessing available programs like this one, we can help feed, nourish, and nurture the hungry, impoverished kids who just really need a filling meal to get through the day.

The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of Farm World. Readers with questions or comments for Amanda Radke may write to her in care of this publication.