School Lunches

Nutrition and School

When I look back at my experience through elementary and secondary school, and think about school lunch my memories are not cherished. The gray messy masses that smell and jiggle in a nebulous blob while the lunch lady deposits it onto my tray. No, those were not fond memories at all. I do remember having to look at the month ahead with my mother, because she wanted me to at least eat one school prepared meal a week. These were tough decisions for an elementary student, with picky taste in food. I remember most of the students in my class eating the chocolate cake or the cookies as the main course of their meal. Now that I look back on this, I realize how foolish it was that teachers did not pay better attention to our diets.

American's "sweet tooth is tied to sour health" according to Jane Brody of The New York Times. We are "squeezing out nutritious foods like fruits, vegetables, whole grains and low-fat dairy products that can help to prevent disease." A nutritionally complete diet should involve no more than ten percent of its calories from added sugar; "American children now consume nearly twice that amount. The average teenager derives 19 percent of calories from added sugar, with the average boy consuming 34 teaspoons and the average girl consuming 24 teaspoons of added sugar daily, according to Federal surveys. Younger children, too, have diets far sweeter than desirable: 6- to 11-year-olds get 18 percent of their calories from added sugars" (Brody, 7). Yikes, these numbers do not look good when trying to promote nutrition, but how does one teach children to eat things like vegetables?

Some children do not like to eat the vegetables that are given to them because they are not quite sure what is in the mushroom surprise. A lot of children just do not like school lunches, while others really enjoy them. Some may think that they are fattening, rubber in them, too greasy and unhealthy. While others find them more convenient, taking some chaos out of their morning routine, since they do not need to pack a lunch, or worry about what to eat. Nancy Polk, for the New York Times, wrote why in the past 5 years, the regulations for the School Meals Initiative for Healthy Children needed to be put in effect. This drastically changed the way we feed American youth. They specifically looked at making the United States Dietary Guidelines mandatory in school meals. Prior to that they were only recommended. Many schools did a good job of complying, but since they were not required, many did not involve it into their system (Polk, 3).

The Dietary Guidelines include rules that keep fat to 30 percent or less of the total calories, saturated fat to less than 10 percent, and to eating more fruits vegetables and grain products . This also means more variety. They also look at sodium, fiber and cholesterol. "They have really revamped the whole system to make school meals healthy for kids" (Polk, 3).

Nancy Polk seems to believe that school lunch is headed in the right direction, while Robert Gottlieb for The Los Angeles Times, claims that "school lunches consist of high-sugar, high-caffeine and high-fat foods." Although, all of the types of foods that I just listed taste good, they can shorten attention spans and impede learning. More lasting problems can also arise if children consistently eat the wrong types of foods at school.

In New York it is claimed that the foods being served in schools is healthy, Los Angeles is claiming that too many foods consisting of high-sugar, caffeine and fat are being served. Maybe each state or district should be examined on the foods being served there. This way problems can be conquered as to which school districts need more money in order to serve better food. We might be able to hypothesize that the eastside of the nation has a better handle on school lunch than the westside.

Congress created the National School Lunch Program 50 years ago as a "measure of national security, to safeguard the health and well-being of the Nation's children." During World War 2 while they were drafting men, they found that they had to turn away many young men because of serious nutritional deficiencies. The NSLP was determined to provide the opportunity for children across the United States to receive at least one healthful meal every school day (Food and Consumer Service, 2). I thought that my school lunch was bad, obviously it has come quite a way because I was never left feeling malnourished.

The NSLP provided meals to 26.1 million children in 1998. Over 93,000 schools currently participate in the National School Lunch Program. About 95 percent of all elementary and secondary school students partake in school lunches. Where does the money come from in order for schools to provide nutritious meals at low cost? Why the federal government of course. In 1997, the federal cost for the National School Lunch Program was $5.5 million. If you ask me, it's a small price to pay for the education and well being of our children (Food and Consumer Service, 3).

No matter what the school-based program is for school lunches, they can all "play an important role in promoting lifelong healthy eating" (Journal of School Health, 9). Diet influences the potential for learning as well as health. Healthy eating from preschool to the 12th grade is very important, because the effects it has on the "health, growth and intellectual development" of our youth (Journal of School Health, 9). The effects of unhealthy eating patterns include undernutrition, iron deficiency anemia, and overweight and obesity. Even just a little bit of undernutriton can have a lasting effect on a child's thinking skills. They can attain lower scores on standardized achievement tests, especially those on language ability.

I hate feeling hungry, when you get cranky and then begin to feel sick. When you become "so hungry you could eat a horse,"