COVID Field Experience Policy (Effective through 5/31/2023)

ANFP requires that all ANFP approved Nutrition & Foodservice Professional training programs follow institutional and/or program policies and procedures. A program may temporarily consider alternate experiences or additional make up hours should any student need to make up time missed due to illness or find that facilities are unable to accept students due to COVID-19. It is up to the program to determine when and how those experiences take place.

ANFP has determined that in instances where programs and/or students are affected by COVID-19 and only during this occurrence, programs may complete 75 hours in a simulated environment and 75 hours should be authentic. Of the 75 authentic hours, 25 hours should be in nutrition and 25 hours in foodservice.

Definitions:

Simulated Field Experiences are activities that simulate what a nutrition/foodservice professional does in the real-world. They are active experiences rather than passive such as giving a presentation (live, recorded or online), developing menus or educational materials for a specific population, creating and administering a survey, analyzing data or menus, interviewing/counseling a “patient” (could be a family member, classmate, acquaintance), performing inventories (perhaps on a student’s own pantry), creating a research poster in PowerPoint, executing a theme meal for one’s friends and/or family and many other actual experiences.

Authentic Field Experiences are activities in real-world professional settings but do not need to be in-person, however they must include real clients/patients and entail real-life situations. Preceptors or program directors may supervise these activities. For example, the preceptor may assign cases remotely and review intern documentation delivered via email or a student may present their research proposal remotely to a group or faculty. Other examples of remote authentic work experiences include, but not limited to, using telehealth to counsel clients/patients, developing educational materials remotely for a community site, and creating menus for a foodservice facility.

Review ANFP’s recommendations for field experience competencies completed via simulation versus authentic here.