This morning when I checked CNN, I found this article:
Basically, an anonymous teacher at a public school in the Midwest was horrified by what her students were eating for lunch each day. She decided to expose this madness by eating school lunch every day, taking pictures of her meals (trust me, part of the experience is trying to figure out WHAT you're eating) and blogging about her experiences. When I thought about doing this, I wanted to throw up. That is a problem.
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| This picture doesn't do school lunch justice. Usually the kids buy cookies or ice cream and a sugary fruit drink too. |
I want to discuss school lunches with you today for several reasons. Here is why you, who probably have no affiliation with public school cafeterias at this time, should care:
1. You may have children in the future who will be subjected to the food in public school cafeterias some day
2. You have a heart. Did you know that for many of our students this is the last meal they will have for the day? How sad to think that the one time I eat I get pizza with stale crust, cold artificial cheese, and rubbery sausage that is only about 30% real meat?
3. You pay taxes--- and your money pays for the medicaid/medicare bills of obese people who are losing their legs to diabetes, having heart attacks, strokes, and gastric bypass surgeries. In fact, in a 2003 study, taxpayers were paying $39 BILLION a year in obesity related medical costs. Newsflash: the obesity epidemic is getting worse. Any hope of making it better starts with teaching kids today how to eat nutritious foods and plan healthy meals.
Now, this isn't a political blog. I'm not about mandating calorie limits (have you been to Europe lately?) or dictating what the American people can buy and eat. BUT, I am on a soapbox today because it makes me sad that we are failing our kids. At least set them up to succeed! If they choose to mess up their lives as adults by eating their way to death then at least we can rest assured that we laid a healthy foundation for them as children.
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| Obesity epidemic by state- Texas is in the RED- meaning more than 25% of people here are obese. |
The bottom line is that for nine months out of the year, kids are taught that pizza, mashed potatoes, fruit soaked in high fructose corn syrup, ice cream and a soda is an acceptable meal every day. Every meal! Never mind the fact that most of this stuff is processed, fake, and tastes disgusting.
There have been a few days that I've had to eat school lunch. There is one semi-healthy choice on the menu each day: a baked potato. This is assuming that I eat 1/2 of it, don't load it, and skip on my sides. I stopped getting this last year because three other teachers and I ate them and we all got stomachaches plus other unmentionable side effects. Now my option is a chicken sandwich, which thankfully is edible- not nutritious- but I can eat it without feeling sick afterwards.
For our kids on government assistance, they don't have this option. They are REQUIRED to pick out two sides- one has to be a vegetable. Guess what counts as a veggie? Potatoes. Guess what is served every day? Potatoes. Mashed and loaded with butter. Or fried- as in FRENCH FRIES COUNT AS A VEGETABLE. Sure, there might be the occasional day of carrot sticks, but guess what the kids don't put on their trays? Ding ding ding ding ding ding- Common Sense Bell (all credit goes to Dr. Smith for this phrase.)
I am not above the law- if I ate this way I would weigh 400 pounds too! Thankfully, I had a mother who made my lunch and cooked dinner for my family every night. I learned what to eat and what not to eat through her example and advice. No, I am not 105 lbs and yes, I occasionally indulge in pizza, french fries, ice cream and the like. I should exercise more. BUT I know what the basics are. I monitor what I eat during the week and try to not over do it on the weekends. My mother set me up for success.
Many of these kids have parents that are A) working two jobs- one through the night- and so the kids are left to fend for themselves for dinner and/or B) working, and after a long day of work, the drivethru at McDonalds is a faster, easier, more crowd pleasing option than going home to prepare a meal. Now, more than likely I will be a working mother. I completely empathize here because the last thing I want to do some nights is make dinner for Mike and I after a particularly stringent day (and that is without kids!) I understand it isn't easy-- but easy is not always right!
On top of this, the crap that is served in cafeterias is CHEAP. Times are tough, the state just cut our education budget by hundreds of millions of dollars, and serving kids nutritious foods doesn't fit into that because it can be costly.
I often wonder what serving a nutritious meal at lunch (followed by a 15 minute nap time) would do for our kid's test scores. Imagine how much more energy they would have to participate in the after lunch math lesson if they had grilled chicken and a salad versus nachos and a chocolate chip cookie?
Jamie Oliver, The Naked Chef, has made it his personal goal to change the food that our kids are being served in schools. He had a special out last year called Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution which tried to expose this issue by visiting the school cafeterias of the fattest city in America: Huntington, West Virginia. You can visit his website to sign his petition to keep cooking alive in our cafeterias, view personal recipes, and learn more about what the government is doing to advocate child nutrition in schools.
And, if you are really fired up, my advice to anyone about anything really is to write your State Representatives and Senators.
Okay... breathe... stepping off my soap box...
Happy Hump Day!
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