At A Glance
- Empirical assessment of state administrative and statutory laws affecting school competitive foods.
- Empirical assessment of state administrative and statutory laws affecting school meal requirements.
- Empirical assessment of state administrative and statutory laws affecting food service director qualifications.
- Empirical assessment of state administrative and statutory laws affecting food and beverage-related advertising and promotion.
- Empirical assessment of state administrative and statutory laws affecting preferential pricing.
- Empirical assessment of state administrative and statutory laws affecting body Mass Index (BMI) screening and topics related to advertising/marketing and BMI.
- Empirical assessment of state administrative and statutory laws affecting physical Education (PE).
- Data are independently coded.
- Includes additional coding for factors that may enhance or inhibit implementation of law.
- Laws coded by school level (elementary school, middle school, high school).
- Scoring based on degree of alignment with national nutrition standards (e.g., US Dietary Guidelines for Americans, Institute of Medicine reports, USDA National School Lunch Program, CDC School Health Guidelines).
- State Profile Tool allows users to compare the relative strength of a state’s laws with recommended standards across multiple policy areas and grade levels at one time.
- Mapping Tool produces downloadable color-coded national maps depicting state comparisons for school nutrition and physical education/activity policy areas.
- Allows users to view relative change in the strength of state laws over time.
To collect data about state nutrition environment, physical education, and physical activity laws in the United States and score them in comparison to national standards.
State laws for the 50 states and the District of Columbia.
Began in 2003. Conducted annually 2003-2008. After 2008, data collected biannually. Most recent year conducted was 2012.
National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health, US Department of Health and Human Services
The core of C.L.A.S.S. consists of two policy classification systems, the Physical Education and Recess State Policy Classification System (PERSPCS) and the School Nutrition Environment State Policy Classification System (SNESPCS), to score codified state law on criteria derived from public health research and national standards for physical education and nutrition. The information presented in this profile was previously presented in separate profiles for the PERSPCS and SNESPCS. That information is no longer presented in the Catalogue of Surveillance Systems.
In 2009, the 2003-2006 C.L.A.S.S. SNESPCS was revised to reflect competitive food and beverage recommendations from the 2007 Institute of Medicine (IOM) report Nutrition Standards for Foods in Schools: Leading the Way toward Healthier Youth. As a result, the initial SNESPCS criteria and coding were changed for the 2003-2006 combined dataset.
For more information about C.L.A.S.S., please contact, a C.L.A.S.S. team member by email at email@example.com.
Census of state laws. Data representative to the state level, including the District of Columbia.
Source of Information
State statutory (legislative) and administrative (regulatory) laws obtained using Westlaw legal database.
Data gathering did not involve sampling. Data for all 50 states and the District of Columbia are available.
Annual Reference Date: Data reflect laws/policies in effect as of December 31.
|Competitive foods: a la carte in cafeterias; vending machines; other venues, e.g., school stores|
|Coordinating or advisory council requirements|
|Food service director qualifications|
|Marketing: advertising and promotion restrictions|
|Reimbursable school meals|
|School meal environment (e.g., meal scheduling time and length requirements)|
|Assessment of health-related fitness|
|Curriculum standards for physical education (PE)|
|PE time requirements|
|Moderate-to-Vigorous physical activity in PE|
|Staffing requirements for PE|
|PE proficiency requirements|
|Joint use agreement provisions to promote physical activity|
|Body mass index screening|
|Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) code|
Data Access and Cost
Obtain data in Microsoft Excel and SPSS formats.
Free of charge.
2010 physical activity and nutrition data are now available.
State, Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) code, year.
Interactive data maps are available on the C.L.A.S.S. website.
Chaloupka FJ, Johnston LD, Brownson RC, Yancey AK, eds. Bridging the Gap: Research Informing Practice and Policy for Healthy Youth Behavior.American Journal of Preventive Medicine 2007;33(4S):S147-S307.
Hennessy E, Oh A, Agurs-Collins T, Chriqui JF, Mâsse LC, Moser RP, Perna F. State-level school competitive food and beverage laws are associated with children's weight status. J Sch Health. 2014 Sep;84(9):609-16.
Mâsse LC, Chriqui JF, Igoe JF, Atienza AA, Kruger J, Kohl HW III, Frosh MM, Yaroch AL. Development of a physical education-related state policy classification system (PERSPCS). American Journal of Preventive Medicine 2007;33(4 Suppl):S264-S276.
Mâsse LC, Frosh MM, Chriqui JF, Yaroch AL, Agurs-Collins T, Blanck HM, Atienza AA, McKenna ML, Igoe JF. Development of a school nutrition-environment state policy classification system (SNESPCS). American Journal of Preventive Medicine 2007;33(4Suppl):S277-S291.
Mâsse LC, Perna FM, Agurs-Collins T, Chriqui J. (2013). Change in school nutrition-related laws from 2003 to 2008: Evidence from the School Nutrition Environment State Policy Classification System. American Journal of Public Health 2013 January 17. Epub ahead of print.
Oh AY, Hennessy E, McSpadden KE, Perna FM. Contextual Influences on Weight Status Among Impoverished Adolescents: Neighborhood Amenities for Physical Activity and State Laws for Physical Education Time Requirements. J Phys Act Health. 2014 Aug 7.
Perna FM, Oh A, Chriqui JF, Mâsse LC, Atienza AA, Nebeling L, Agurs-Collins T, Moser RP, Dodd KW. The association of state law to physical education time allocation in United States' public schools. American Journal of Public Health 2012;102(8):1594-1599.
Taber DR, Chriqui JF, Perna FM, Powell LM, Chaloupka FJ. Weight status among adolescents in states that govern competitive food nutrition content. Pediatrics, published online August 13, 2012 (doi: 10.1542/peds.2011.3353).