Miguel Villarreal

Mr. Villarreal currently serves as the interim co-executive director of the National Farm to School Network, where he has been a passionate advocate for connecting schools with local food systems to improve the health and well-being of children nationwide.

Latasha McJunkins: Good afternoon. My name is Latasha McJunkins, and today is November 14, 2024. I am here at the Institute of Child Nutrition in Oxford, Mississippi, and today I have the pleasure of speaking with Mr. Miguel Villarreal, who brings an incredible 45 years of experience in the field of child nutrition.

Mr. Villarreal currently serves as the interim co-executive director of the National Farm to School Network, where he has been a passionate advocate for connecting schools with local food systems to improve the health and well-being of children nationwide. We are very excited to learn about your wealth of experience and hear more about your journey in the field of child nutrition. So, we will begin by first asking you to share a little bit about yourself and where you grew up.

Miguel Villarreal: Absolutely. First, let me thank you for giving me this opportunity here at the ICN—an institute that I have looked up to for a very long time. The Institute, as you know, celebrated its 35th year, and that is something we have in common—we’ve both been around for a long time, so I’m grateful to be here with you, Aleshia, and the rest of the team.

I should start by saying that I have been engaged in this field, school food services, which is now the National Farm to School Network, for about 45 years but I have been thinking about and living a life of nutrition and wellness since I was five years old. It has been a part of me this whole time, but I did not know it was called nutrition and wellness back then.

I was inspired by someone I saw on TV. My earliest recollection is of a gentleman named Jack LaLanne. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of him, but he’s known as “The Father of Modern Fitness,” and he’s really the one who planted the seed. I remained interested in nutrition throughout my teen years. I was always reading about healthy lifestyles, and my friends, even to this day, remind me how I was constantly educating them about what they should and should not be eating. I was doing a lot of reading at the time.

Well, I know you have a few other questions for me, but I just wanted to give you that background—that this has been a passion of mine for a very long time, even longer than I’ve been working in the field.

Latasha McJunkins: Okay, that’s awesome. What you just shared kind of ties into this next question, but I’ll ask it anyway, so you can maybe elaborate a little more if you’d like. What is your earliest recollection of child nutrition programs?

Miguel Villarreal: Sure. I’ve shared this story many times, but my earliest recollection was in Idaho. I grew up in a migrant farming family. This was the type of work my mom, dad, and grandparents did. It was the life I was born into.

So, my earliest recollection of school food services was in Idaho, because that is where my family was working at the time, when I was a young boy. What I remember most about the people who served us in the schools there, primarily women, was how friendly they were to everyone, including me. Not that I expected them to be any other way, but just that they were so warm and welcoming. I remember being greeted every day by the school lunch staff and being asked how my day had been.

And of course, I remember the food. Back then, a lot of it was made from scratch. It was very appetizing but it was the staff who really made the experience memorable. Those memories never left me, and they remain some of my earliest and fondest recollections. As you know, I later had the opportunity to experience it as an adult, working alongside the women and men in child nutrition. So it was like, “I know you—I met you many years ago.”

Latasha McJunkins: That is great. Are there any favorite menu items that you recall?

Miguel Villarreal: At that time, when I was growing up, I always loved the mashed potatoes—they were made from scratch. The rolls and bread were also made from scratch, so there were lots of wonderful aromas.

I’ve always been the kind of kid you didn’t have to convince to eat vegetables. I was always open to trying different foods. I wasn’t the little kid turning his nose up at different food. No, I wanted to try everything, so I tried many different vegetables that were being served.

Honestly, I do not remember what the nutritional standards were back then—this was in the early 1960s, but I do remember that the food was very flavorful.

Latasha McJunkins: Okay. Tell us about your educational background. What schools did you attend? What degrees did you earn?

Miguel Villarreal: I always knew that I was interested in nutrition. I did not know until I was probably in my late teens that there was a degree in food and nutrition. In those days, you did not have the internet, so you had to do all of your own research. I later learned that a degree in nutrition existed, so I applied to a university. At the time, it was called North Texas State University in Denton, Texas. It is now the University of North Texas in Denton. I attended there and earned a Bachelor of Science in Food and Nutrition.

Because this was quite some time ago, I graduated in 1982, the nutrition program was housed in the Home Economics Department. There were students, mostly women, taking textile or other clothing-related courses. As you can imagine, it was a School of Home Economics, so my nutrition classes were there, but the rest of my classes were in the chemistry and biology buildings. I took all of my chemistry classes with pre-med students. I thought there was a real disconnect here. Why are we taking all of these courses with medical students and at the same time taking classes with textile students?   But of course, in the nutrition department, we were learning how to cook.

Initially, child nutrition and school food services were not on my radar. I was always interested in athletics and enjoyed participating in various athletic events, so I thought I would pursue a career helping athletes, professional or college-level, improve their performance in their profession. As it turned out, when I was about 20 years old and getting ready to graduate, one of my professors said, “Hey Miguel, there’s a position in the Dallas Independent School District. They’re looking for a nutritionist. You should apply.” I thought, why not? What do I have to lose? So I applied and was hired. That was the beginning of my child nutrition career back in 1982.

I should also mention that I was the only male who graduated with that degree at the time. When I started working for Dallas Independent School District, I was one of only two men in the food service department. Back then, there were not many men in this field. You would see men as delivery drivers, but not typically as professionals with degrees working in staff education and development.

Latasha McJunkins: That is very interesting. What you just shared ties into this next question, but I’m hoping you can elaborate a little more. Who would you say was a mentor or someone who influenced you to go into the child nutrition field?

Miguel Villarreal: Yes, that would be my professor but there is a little story behind it. I am not a registered dietitian. I do not have an RD and that was intentional. While attending the university, I worked at the local hospital as a dietetic intern. My job was to oversee what we called the tray line. I made sure trays were prepared correctly—for example, a low-sodium meal for someone on a low-sodium diet, or the correct meal for a renal patient. I had to ensure each patient received what the dietitian had prescribed. I also got to make patient rounds with the dietitian as part of my training.

It was at that moment that I realized being a registered dietitian, if that is what the role involved, was not for me. I was not that person. I wanted to figure out how we could prevent people from ending up in the hospital with conditions like renal disease or diabetes. I did not know what that job would look like at the time, but I remember intentionally saying, “This is not what I’m going to do. I don’t know what I will do, but this is not it.” That realization happened before my professor told me about the Dallas position. Things just came together after that. I like to share that part of my story because I believe I have been able to use that knowledge to help others.

Latasha McJunkins: That is great! Tell us about the positions you have held.

Miguel Villarreal: Yes, so when I was hired by the Dallas Independent School District, one of the first things they did, even though I was a degreed nutritionist, was to have me work in an elementary school for a month or so to experience the day-to-day operations. At that time, many of the meals were still scratch-cooked. I trained employees there and then did the same at a middle school where I worked as a manager. Later, I moved on to a high school, where I trained for about six to eight months, maybe a little longer, before becoming an Area Supervisor there.

That initial training gave me valuable insight into what staff experienced daily, from the moment they arrived to when they left. That included prepping, serving, cleaning, and everything in between. In those days, there was no technology. Everything was done manually, even counting the number of students going through the lunch line. Literally, everything was done by hand. Those were great learning experiences.

I worked as an Area Supervisor in the Dallas Independent School District, overseeing 20 schools and 20 managers. I held that role for a total of eight years and worked with approximately 120 employees and that gave me a solid foundation. I remember many great stories where I met so many wonderful people. As I mentioned earlier, these were some of the same people I encountered as a young boy and now as an adult working in school food services, and still the same passion. I have said many times, that the people who work in school food services are there because they care about the work they are doing, and they care about the children they are serving. And the majority of them, for the most part, do this because they care about the children, their health, and their well-being.

Latasha McJunkins: I agree. It is definitely a passion.

Miguel Villarreal: Yes.

Latasha McJunkins: How did your educational background help prepare you for your career in child nutrition?

Miguel Villarreal: My academic background gave me a solid foundation in nutrition, which I was already passionate about. I was just learning more about its long-term importance—how to help people stay healthy and maintain that health over time.

Then, once I began working in the school food service department, I decided to go back to school and earn a Master’s in Business Administration because school food service programs are essentially run like businesses. Having a business background, understanding financial reports, profit and loss statements, budgets, and especially how to manage people was essential. Honestly, learning how to motivate people, how to lead, and how to build an effective team are skills I learned early on and applied throughout my entire career.

Latasha McJunkins: Is there anything that you would say is unique about the states you have worked in with regard to child nutrition?

Miguel Villarreal: My career began in the Dallas Independent School District, and then I worked in several other school districts in Texas. I have been interested in improving child nutrition programs for a long time now. I saw the evolution from scratch-cooked food to more frozen food items being brought in, moving away from providing kids with the healthiest foods possible to focusing on more low-cost items schools could afford.

That evolution, for me, was honestly what started to push me away from school food services because there were a lot of barriers. It was about the food being served, and I just didn’t agree with what was happening. Even though I made those decisions as a food service director, I still reported to other officials who also made decisions on our behalf.

I’ll give you an example. When I was working in one of the last districts I served in, the chief business official said, “Hey Miguel, we just signed a contract with a soda company that has vending machines. I need you to oversee the sale of those vending machines as part of your administration.” I thought, No, I’m not going to do that. I’m actually going to leave this job. I was young at the time. Those decisions were made by someone else, focused on the financial bottom line rather than what was best for the children.

Then, coming to California soon after that, I wanted to make the comparison. I thought California was farther ahead. I thought they had already solved these problems—that they didn’t have sodas or highly processed foods in schools, and that most food was still being cooked from scratch and coming from local farms.

What I found out when I arrived in California, just north of San Francisco, in the school district where I got a job, was that their food program was no different from the one I had just left in Texas, including sodas in schools and vending machines. Early on, I said to the business official who hired me, “I’m willing to stay here, but we need to change. If you want to change the food and improve the health and wellness of this community, I can do that, but we have to change what we’re currently doing in the food service program.”

And that was the start of the next 20 years of my career. That completely changed what I was doing from the beginning, regarding menus and collaboration with the community at large. There was a lot more of that being done on my behalf because I knew it would take the entire community.

When I say the entire community, I mean parents, students, teachers, administrators, school board members, city officials, health organizations, nonprofits, universities—everybody. Farmers, too. If we were going to make this work, everybody had to be engaged and understand why we were doing this work.

Latasha McJunkins: Did you receive much pushback on that?

Miguel Villarreal: I did.

Latasha McJunkins: I would imagine so.

Miguel Villarreal: But because I already had 20 years of experience, I knew what I had done previously did not work. This time, I was not approaching it alone. I had a lot of people beside me, in front of me, and behind me. Since I was collaborating with so many people, I knew that when I approached administrators or community leaders, it was not just me at the table; it was me with a large group of individuals who shared the same vision and wanted to help change the system.

Yes, there were barriers, even with the group, but we were persistent and kept moving forward.

Latasha McJunkins: Wow, that is wonderful! What would you say was a typical workday, if you had one? Would you say there was ever a typical day during your career?

Miguel Villarreal:
I recall one time, I was interviewing someone for a role in our school district, and they asked me that question: “What’s a typical day like?” I said, “There are no two days alike. There are no typical days.”

We are going to have the same vision, the same purpose, and the same goals every day, but every day was different. I enjoyed that about my job—the unpredictability. We knew we were going to serve children, that was a given but how the day would unfold, we never knew.

What we did know was that, regardless, even if a kitchen was burning down, we were going to serve the children. That was clear and we were going to keep children safe and ensure no one was exposed to harmful foods.

The one thing that is not talked about enough in school food services is the work that’s being done. Think about the millions of children—40 to 50 million—served every day, in safe environments. That is a huge responsibility.

Latasha McJunkins: Absolutely.

Miguel Villarreal: This has not changed since I started in the early ’80s. Some of the cleanest environments are in school food service. We had health inspectors come in regularly, and I would always say, “You guys are nitpicking—this is one of the cleanest establishments in the community.”

And I know that because I’ve been in a lot of restaurants, and they were not clean.

Latasha McJunkins: They have to have something to say, right?

Miguel Villarreal: Yes. I just could not understand it.

Latasha McJunkins: What would you say were some of your biggest challenges throughout your career?

Miguel Villarreal:
One of the biggest challenges early on was getting everyone on the same page so people understood the “why.”

When I was a school food service director in California for 10 years, I removed all red meat from the program. I was not removing a lot of highly processed foods yet, but I did remove red meat. We were in a farming community, with cattle and ranchers all around us but I had already been meeting with many of them, so they knew me, and I knew them.

I removed red meat not because I didn’t care for it, but because of a beef recall. At that point in my career, it was my 10th beef recall due to E. coli. I thought, Why am I still having to worry about this? So I said, No, I’m removing beef.

When I told my superintendent, she said, “Miguel, have you gone crazy? We live in a farming community. The ranchers are going to be angry.” I said, “Oh no, they won’t,” because I had already met all of them, and we were not buying their beef anyway. They produced regenerative, grass-fed beef, which we could not afford.

I remember asking a rancher, “What would it cost me to buy a four-ounce raw patty, raw or frozen?” He said $2 to $2.50 per patty. I told them, “I have $1 per meal for all food expenses for the entire meal, including protein, bread, vegetables, and milk. I can’t afford your beef.”

That is why we were not using their product. Those were the kinds of obstacles I ran into early on. I was educating our entire community.

I spent a lot of time meeting with parents, students, and the community at large, educating people along the way. “Today, we use a term called values-aligned procurement. Why are we doing what we are doing? How are our values aligned? Maybe we both care about the health and well-being of children, or we care about where the food comes from. We know it is not traveling 2,000 miles, or we care about economic prosperity, supporting local farmers, or we care about the environment.

I did not use that term back then, but I use it today. It helps bring everyone onto the same page and helps people to understand and agree, “Yes, we do share the same values.”

That’s how we overcame many challenges—through education and helping people understand the “why” and getting into the mindset of why we were doing this for the children in our community.

Latasha McJunkins: What changes have you seen in the child nutrition profession over the years?

Miguel Villarreal: What I often say now is, “Today, I am living in my future.”

Back in the ’80s and ’90s, we had many discussions about what needed to happen. We needed people to talk about this. We needed communities and allied organizations to understand the importance of making sure our children were being served the healthiest food.

We were also talking about universal meals and that all children should have access to meals without having to pay.

Today, eight states are providing universal meals. Any child who wants a meal can get one.

We have organizations across the country—national, state, and local—engaged in these conversations. I cannot tell you how many presentations I have done in the last ten years throughout the country because people are interested. They want to know how I did it and how they can do it as well. so when I say I’m living in my future, these are the things we were talking about back then, and now it’s happening.

Now, is there room for improvement? Absolutely, but we are much further along than we were 20 or 30 years ago, for sure. This is what keeps me, I would say, sane: knowing that although there are still a lot of changes and improvements to be made, I can see how far we have come, and we have come a long way.

Latasha McJunkins: What do you think has been your most significant contribution to this field?

Miguel Villarreal: One of the things we talked about at the meeting here at ICN was what our superpowers are. So, we all had an opportunity to share what that superpower is. This is one I certainly did not recognize back then or even realize I had early on in my career, but I acknowledge it now, because people have told me. What I do is bring people together. I bring people to the table. I get people excited about the work we are doing, and once they are at the table, they start helping out and being engaged.

So, I would say my superpower is probably getting people excited about this work and giving them an opportunity to help out in whatever way they can. This is what I enjoy most about my job—connecting people and helping others. In my current role, it is about how we do this work at a national level. How do we help all communities attain this? And it can be done. It has to be done through the collaborative efforts of many people.

Latasha McJunkins: Do you have any memorable stories, like special children you have served or people you have worked with who come to mind as you think back over your years in this profession?

Miguel Villarreal: Yes. One of the stories I have shared is the story of Irene. Early in my career, when I was in Dallas, we had a management-training program that helped us advance our employees. I remember Irene, one of my food service employees. She was always pristinely dressed. She always came to work on time, and always did a great job.

One day, I said to Irene, “You should consider the managers’ program. I think you’ve got all the skills.” I must have been about 24 years old at the time, and she was maybe in her mid-to-late 40s. She sat there without saying anything, so I said, “You don’t have to give me an answer now. You can think about it and let me know later. I’m just suggesting you consider it.”

A week or two later, she came to me and said, “Can I meet with you?” I said, “Sure.” We sat outside somewhere, and she handed me a note. She became very emotional and told me she had been working in school food services for about 20 years. She had worked under many different supervisors, and not one had ever approached her about her skill set or her potential to do more—no one had ever believed in her. She put all of that in writing, too.

I do not know if I have kept that note, but it was one of the most heartfelt encounters I have ever had. I was only 24 and just learning about people, and that moment helped me realize the importance of being kind and believing in others—helping people feel like they are more.

I did not know Irene’s full background or her story, I only knew what was in front of me and what I saw was someone who could do the job. I believed in her. When she told me no one had ever approached her in that way, I thought, “Wow, what are we doing wrong?”

I’ve shared that story with food service directors, employees, and managers—the power of simply believing in people, and I think that applies to all of us. It doesn’t matter who you are. We all do our best when someone believes that we can. I do not consider that to be a superpower; I just think it’s intrinsic. We do it because that is how we move forward as a society, knowing that kindness will always lead us to that next step, and we cannot do it alone.

Latasha McJunkins: That is an awesome story. You helped her to believe in herself.

Miguel Villarreal: Yes, and the sad part about it was that I knew many of her previous supervisors, and in all those years, no one ever said anything to her.

Latasha McJunkins: Wow. That is unbelievable. What advice would you give someone who is considering child nutrition as a profession today?

Miguel Villarreal: Over the years, I have hosted hundreds of dietetic interns in our food service program, and I never said no. I wanted them to see the possibilities in school food services—that it is more than just serving food.

I talked earlier about values, but it is really about creating wellness environments that involve so many different layers. Someone entering school food services who is interested in nutrition and wellness can find an area they’re passionate about and then develop and grow it.

So many of the dietetic interns we hosted over the years had never considered a role in school food services. I would not say all of them, but a large majority eventually chose that career path. They would often reach out to me and say, “Hey Miguel, could you write me a letter of recommendation?” I always said absolutely because I knew we needed to train the next generation coming into this field.

School food services have truly become a hub for nutrition and wellness in every community. The problem is that these programs are either underfunded or not treated as a high priority. If I could change anything moving forward, it would be to convince local administrators and others, alongside a coalition of partners, of how important the role of school food services is in creating a healthy community.

I got to see that in my own career—in a community where we had teachers, parents, students, administrators, and others giving us feedback about the changes they saw in students: their behavior, their ability to concentrate, their physical well-being, and even their overall happiness.

People would visit our campus and say, “Miguel, the one thing I noticed at your school is you have a lot of happy kids.” It is all connected. When your community understands that, because they have been part of the process, which is when you are really making a difference. That is when people are truly engaged.

Latasha McJunkins: And that is what it is all about.

Miguel Villarreal: Yes, that is what it is all about. And that is why I’m still here.

Latasha McJunkins: Amazing! Well, we have covered a lot, but is there anything else you would like to add before we close?

Miguel Villarreal: Thank you for asking. We did cover quite a bit. No, I think we touched on everything I can think of. I guess, in closing, I would like to say that the work we do each day—
I used to say early in my career that I used 90% of my brain and 10% of my heart to make decisions, but in the last 25 years, I’ve actually reversed that. Now, I say I use 90% to 95% of my heart to make decisions on behalf of the work we do, and 5% for the business side.

If you sit back and analyze the work that we do, you can call it a business; the business of taking care of children, their well-being, and their future, and their future’s future. So, in order to do that, we have to step up and implement the things we know are good for children.

Then, when people say, “Well, Miguel, I just didn’t know,” I respond with what one of my favorite poets said—her name, I always get it backwards. I wanted to say Angelo Maya, but it’s Maya Angelou. She says, “You do your best until you know better. And when you know better, you do better.” It is that simple. So let us move forward.

Latasha McJunkins: Absolutely! That is great. I love it.

It has truly been an absolute pleasure speaking with you today. Your dedication to the field of child nutrition and your ongoing work with the National Farm to School Network is truly inspiring.

On behalf of the Institute of Child Nutrition, Child Nutrition Archives, I want to express our deepest gratitude for your contributions to this oral history project. Thank you so much for sharing your insights and the impactful stories that have shaped your career. Your commitment to improving the health of children through nutritious and sustainable food programs, through the Farm to School Network, will undoubtedly leave a lasting legacy.

So, thank you again, so very much, for your time and for being a part of this important initiative.

Miguel Villarreal: And thank you so much for including me.