In LAUSD, students throw away over $100,000 in food every day. That adds up to a loss of around $18,000,000 annually, which is 10% of their food, wasted (Watanabe). Our nation's schools are losing billions of dollars annually, and our weak economy is paying for school meals that many students refuse to eat, despite the efforts of the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act.The government is making attempts to reduce childhood obesity by regulating school meals, PE, and health education, but it has all been to no avail. The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act is actually harming both the kids and their schools because the meals are more expensive, the yen up unappetizing, and many kids are left with empty bellies.
The obesity epidemic is a very severe problem that is especially serious in our nation’s children, and the government is taking several steps with the aim to fix that. 2010’s Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act aims to allow kids to get balanced, nutritious, yummy school meals as well as exercise that will reduce childhood obesity and other related health issues (Watanabe). While these new laws were set with nothing but good intentions, there is still quite a lot that doesn’t exactly match the lawmakers’ original intentions for the laws’ outcomes. Regulation adjustments called for many changes to the menu offerings along with other alterations, none of which came without a cost to the schools and students.
These new rules created by the government, try to make life, and the school environment, better for kids, but they might even make the situation worse by regulating the wrong things in the wrong ways.
“The 2010 Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act . . . imposed a dizzying array of requirements on calories, portion sizes, even the color of fr...
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...ily News. LA Daily News, 11 Aug. 2012. Web. 11 May 2014.
“La Cañada Middle/High School April 2014 Menu.” School Nutrition and Fitness.com. School Nutrition Plus, Apr. 2014. Web. 20 Apr. 2014.
Lusted, Marcia Amidon. “What’s for Lunch?” Odyssey Feb. 2014: n. pag. Student Resources In Context. Web. 8 Apr. 2014.
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“Nutrition Standards for School Meals.” USDA Food and Nutrition Service. United States Department of Agriculture, 6 Mar. 2014. Web. 20 Apr. 2014.
Unmacht, Jacob. “@MichelleObama Thanks for the ‘healthy’ lunch. This is definitely enough for a growing 16 year old boy. #not.” 7 Apr. 2014. Tweet. 20 Apr. 2014.
Watanabe, Teresa. “Solutions Sought to Reduce Food Waste at Schools.” Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times, 1 Apr. 2014. Web. 19 Apr. 2014.
The Healthy Hunger Free Kids Act has taken over schools nationwide and needs to be stopped. There are more negatives than positives that go along with this act and there needs to be an end. Schools should not have to waste money on expensive food to have it not be eaten. Students should be able to enjoy what the lunchroom has to offer. The students do not buy these lunches so the food goes to waste. In 2012, when the Healthy Hunger Free-Kids Act was made students stopped eating their school lunches and schools began to lose great amounts money. It 's beneficial to encourage healthy eating habits with schools but this act needs to be reformed.
Food and Nutrition Services. Retrieved November 4, 2013, from http://www.fns.usda.gov/nslp/national-school-lunch-program. Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). n.d. - n.d. - n.d. Facts About SNAP -. Retrieved October 28, 2013, from http://www.fns.usda.gov/snap/facts-about-snap.
We all remember that day when President Obama took office, and our school lunches changed forever. First Lady Michelle Obama, felt that too many American kids are overweight, so she thought she needed to make our school lunches healthier, with more fruits and vegetables. One of the major changes she made was how many calories the school cooks were able to give the kids. The new requirements are as follows: up to 650 for children in kindergarten through fifth grade, 700 for sixth through eighth graders and 850 for high scholars. These numbers are consistent with the Mayo Clinic’s recommendations ( Kuczynski-Brown). The main goal of cutting calories and taking away junk food, was to insure that kids are getting served a healthy lunch. At each lunch, schools must still provide a cup of fruit, a cup of vegetables, two servings of grains, two ounces of dairy, and a cup of fluid milk, so that students can get their needed vitamins and nutrients (Anonymous) . They are also wanting more local farmers to be involved, and give more of the food they grow to the school. At the high school I went to, we built a green house, and planted a garden to give us some local grown food. It was part of our Ag Science class. More and more schools are starting to do the same thing. The stats of overweight kids is really high. The guidelines are as follows:
Schools are meant to give our children a healthy and nurturing environment, and yet so much of the lunches in schools are fattening; does this stop schools from achieving the aforementioned goal? Childhood obesity in the United Sates continues to be a growing problem despite so any new programs to help combat it, and new research is showing how schools may be playing a large role in childhood obesity. School lunches are showing to be the problem, they encourage poor nutrition in our nation’s students, and simple reform is proving to not be enough to stop the rise in obesity rates.
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There is still a troubling growing paradox in hungry children and childhood obesity. Children are either getting too many or too little calories. NSLP is still criticized to this day, nonetheless they made a tremendous improvement to the program since publication of Fast Food Nation in 2001. The NSLP only provides student with 1 to 2 meals out of the day. It is up to the parents to teach and provide their children with nutritional food,“HEALTHY eating and physical activity habits are key to your child 's well-being. Eating too much and exercising too little can lead to overweight and related health problems that can follow children into their adult years. You can take an active role in helping your child--and your whole family--learn healthy eating and physical activity habits that can last for a lifetime.”(National Institute of Diabetes & Digestive & Kidney Diseases). By teaching and encouraging healthy eating habits, Offer healthy food options at home and Limiting fast food and junk food. It is also important to Limit your child’s time using a TV, computer, cell phone, or game station and encourage them to participate in physical activity. A great way to do this is to sign your children up for sports. Fast Food Nation started the discussion of America’s Food epidemic, yet sadly fifteen years has later
Wu, Sarah. Fed up with Lunch: How One Anonymous Teacher Revealed the Truth about School Lunches--and How to Change Them! San Francisco, CA: Chronicle, 2011. E
Education plays a dominant role in the lives of students all over the United States. Since most students spend roughly eight to twelve hours in school, it is important to make sure that they are provided with a healthy and nutritious breakfast, lunch and snack.
As discussed throughout this paper there has been controversy about Michelle Obama’s school lunch guidelines. The reader has heard multiple arguments developed from this topic from each viewpoint expressed in this dispute. Now it is up to them to take a side.This paper is about Michelle Obama’s school lunch guidelines and how they are affecting schools and students across the nation. To help reduce the number of overweight children in America, Michelle Obama made lunch regulations schools had to follow and sparked a widespread conflict.
United States Department of Agriculture. "School Meals." Child Nutrition Programs. USDA, 23 Dec. 2013. Web. 26 Jan. 2014.
...n with a culture of obesity seemingly set in stone, our nation still has a chance to escape this predicament by spreading the message about healthy eating, imposing limitations on teacher food choices, setting additional requirements for Phys. Ed classes, and serving healthier foods in school lunch programs. For the sake of our nation’s children, let’s eliminate this problem and give parents the peace of mind they deserve. We must regulate the food we are serving our students and correct this problem once and for all before it gets out of control. More expensive, quality food will decrease obesity rates;however, continuing to serve dangerous foods will only cause more problems in the long run. Is our nation going to act upon this ruinous epidemic, or are America’s children not worth the investment? With your support and direction, we are sure to experience success.
With the implementation of the “Healthy Kids Hunger-Free Act” schools are not serving as many lunches and participation is decreasing. According to the Government Accountability Office (GOA), “Nationwide, student participation declined by 1.2 million students(or 3.7 percent) from school year 2010-2011 through school year 2012-2013, after having increased steadily for many years”(sec. 1). The school lunches became more distasteful and bland; the combinations of foods did not make sense, and the portion sizes decreased significantly. In order to support the cafeteria
Paul, Maya W. “Healthy Fast Foods.” Help Guide. Help Guide, 10 Sep. 2010. Web. 9 May 2011.
“My wish is for you to help a strong, sustainable movement to educate every child about food, to inspire families to cook again, and to empower people everywhere to fight obesity” (James Oliver). Food has a huge impact on our societies, it can turn a person’s life around. Jamie Oliver wants to inspire families to cook again, so they can live longer and pass on their knowledge to their future generations. Jamie Oliver wants to make our a world a better place, however it cannot be done by one man, but it is achievable if everyone has the appropriate knowledge. Schools have the power to deliver that kind of knowledge, our lives are completely dependent on the schools.
There is a global crisis arising from the poor eating habits which the majority develop at an early age, and stick to, for the rest of their lifetime. Every year, many individuals lose their lives from the complications related to poor eating lifestyle such as obesity. The schools are the foundation of every discipline and lifestyle that people adopt, and so for the nation to have a healthy lifestyle free from health related complications, the first and foremost step, is to avoid junk food in schools such as soda, candy, and cakes among others. So, thanks are to the 2012 mandate for changing the school menus from junk food to healthy foodstuffs including fruits and vegetables.