Healthy nutritional habits are emphasized in all educational atmospheres throughout the country, but, ironically, they are highly ignored when developing school meals. It is no secret that American children are offered the wrong variety of nutrients, including sugars, carbohydrates, and fats. This is especially alarming, due to the fact, that in a survey conducted in 2012, nearly 21 million adolescents stated that they were dependent on school lunches as their main meal of the day (Perle). Therefore, it is estimated that the average student is receiving sixty five percent of their everyday calorie intake within school. Actually, many schools also offer breakfast along with lunch. To put it in perspective, if an elementary student eats all …show more content…
In 2009, a study was conducted on the average nutritional value schools served in their lunches. It resulted, that nationwide 80% of students are given more than the recommended amount of saturated fats (Suddath). These numbers are absolutely absurd, there is no reason for students to be consuming so many fats, except that these meals are cheap and are easy to supply within the funding and budget schools are provided for their meals. This is why, the five worst school lunches in the country are also the five most popular; they provide adequate amounts of protein, and extreme amounts of fats, but insufficient amount of fiber and other necessary nutrients. Pepperoni pizza, quesadillas, cheeseburgers, meatloaf, and nachos all can include up to 25 grams of fat and 1,500 grams of sodium (The Top Five). Meals such as the ones listed above only result in poor nutrition and health. Also, not to mention the fact, that the USDA states that the average school lunch exceeds the suggested 500 milligrams of sodium; in fact, certain regions serve meals with over 1,000 milligrams of sodium (Perle). Excessive levels of sodium are extremely dangerous for students susceptible to heart conditions, which is why it is imperative that meals are thoroughly regulated. In most meals containing meat across the nation, there is an outrageous of chemicals due to processing for freshness and coloring preservation. It has
In addition, there is no nutritious value in a single school lunch. Amanda Ray wrote, “Processed foods that are high in fat, sugar, and salt have become a mainstay of lunches in schools across America and the results are in, experts say these unhealthy school lunches are a contributing factor to the childhood obesity epidemic.” This shows that school lunches are absolutely unhealthy and school lunches has increased childhood obesity. It would be smarter if families across the United States would pack a more natural and nutritious school lunch for their student starting at a young age. The high in fat, sugar, or salt cause children to become overweight and very
Since 2009 Schools have been improving there healthy choices of food like fresh fruits and salad bars,but those foods take longer to eat (Hellmich). Turning school lunches into an actual sit down meal rather than a feeding frenzy is a good way of improving health (Parker-Pope). Students usually have less than 20 minutes to eat lunch which makes it less likely for them to choose the healthy choice (Elsevier). Kids often like to eat there favorite foods first,not giving them enough time to eat the healthy food (Hellmich). An increase in school lunches could encourage students to eat the healthier choice(5 Elsevier). School nutritionist suggest that students need to have atlas 20 minutes to eat (Hellmich). Research shows that when people consume meals faster they take in more calories because they get hungry sooner (Chen). The shorter lunch periods are starting to lead to more and more obese and overweight kids ( Hellmich). Doctors are saying there are more and more kids getting diabetes and other illnesses due to the lunches and something needs to be done about it
School lunches are not the epitome of meals in the world. Raising the level of nutritional output would highly increase the healthiness of the student’s body. For example, if a child were to drink only water at school the health benefits would help that student, just by cutting out the sugar and the calorie intake. If schools were to serve grilled chicken instead of fried chicken, the student would not have that extreme carb intake just from the fried part alone. Chicken and vegetables should be the entrée for most school lunches, of course, this does not allow for a great variety of meals, but the healthiness of the students would increase over time and could possibly be the healthiest thing they eat that day, but the only thing that they eat at all. The poverty in Mississippi is abundant, which may mean that children do not get three square meals a day, but maybe only one, which is at school. Therefore, the best way to affect student’s healthiness is by putting good, nutritious, and energizing food on the plate in front of
As adults, they are also at an increased risk for coronary heart disease and atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries) compared with those not overweight as adolescents.” It is important to help reduce the growing trend of obesity in children and young adults, as it has been documented in recent studies that children who are overweight tend to carry this problem with them into adulthood. Revitalizing the school lunch program would be an incremental place for the government to start revamping the obesity problems that they have caused in children. David Satcher stated in HEALTHY and Ready to Learn that, “Well-nourished students tend to be better students, whereas poorly nourished students tend to demonstrate weaker academic performance and score lower on standardized achievement tests. The majority of U.S. children are not eating a balanced, nutrient-rich diet. Inadequate consumption of key food groups deprives children of essential vitamins, minerals, fats, and proteins necessary for optimum cognitive function (Tufts University School of Nutrition, 1995). Children who suffer from poor nutrition during the brains most formative years score much lower on tests of vocabulary, reading comprehension, arithmetic, and general knowledge (Brown & Pollitt, 1996). In a 1989 study, 4th graders with the lowest amount
Childhood obesity is a serious health issue currently affecting America’s population. School lunches have gained a spotlight in the search for prevention of child obesity because the majority of America’s youth eat two school meals a day during most of the year. Although the nutritional standards of school meals have been changed over the years, there is still room for improvement. With additions such as a la cart and vending machines, school meals quickly fall from the federal nutrition standards. As children grow they spend an average of 7 hours a day at school over half of the year. With almost 95% of America’s children attending school, it is one of the most stable and influential aspects of their life. With so much of a child’s time spent
Currently, school lunches must meet the applicable recommendations of the Dietary Guidelines for Americans. According to these recommendations and based on individual meals, no more than 30 percent of calories can come from fat, and less than 10 percent from saturated fat. Regulations also establish a standard for school lunches to provide one‐third of the Recommended Dietary Allowances of protein, Vitamin A, Vitamin C, iron, calcium, and calories (National School Lunch Program, 2011). School lunches must meet Federal nutrition requirements, but decisions about what specific foods to serve and how they are prepared are made by local school food authorities.
The goals,is to improve school food, teach nutrition, support sustainable food systems, and create an education program focused on understanding the relationships between food, culture, health, and the environment.By the time today’s kindergartner finishes high school, she may have eaten well over 4,000 school meals—4,000 opportunities to strengthen her body and mind, introduce food pleasures that will make her a lifelong healthy eater, and deepen her engagement with the natural world. The more than 5.5 billion lunches and nearly 2 billion breakfasts served yearly in school programs, along with complementary education programs, can have a profound effect on issues of public health, academic performance, economics, justice, national security,
Research shows that school lunches are highly concentrated in salt, sugar and unsaturated fat. Elementary, middle and high schools are over populated with vending machines, school stores and snack bars. It is not uncommon for a student to grab more than 2 or 3 snacks at once from the lunch line without
About 220 billion lunches have been served since President Truman’s signing of the National School Lunch Act in 1946. However, according to the Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine study, about 36% of children ages 6 to 11 are overweight and 20% are obese. The rate of obesity has risen since the 1940’s, but school lunch has made revisions to create meals to be healthier and more nutritionally dense for the child. Research has shown overweight people are only becoming more overweight and normal weight people are staying the same or developing healthier lifestyle
Many kids throughout the United States (U.S.) attending public schools are continuously being labeled as overweight. A reason for this is because schools are not providing healthy lunches. School lunches are full of saturated fats and refined sugars, which contribute to problems like obesity. Despite this connection, there are some states that are deciding to drop out of the healthier lunch programs, because the cost is too high and the districts cannot afford to participate. Healthy food leads to improvements all over ones body system. For example Vitamin K, which is found in yellow and orange fruit and vegetables or whole wheat, gives more energy than fats and sugar. Improving the healthier lunches nutrition have the potential to benefit
It is a monumental challenge that is worsening every year which is why we must act quickly. Children in the United States in the 1950’s were fed unhealthy school lunches of high fat, high cholesterol foods, consisting of ice cream, whole milk, mashed potatoes, and pot roast, with 1,000 calories, 33 grams of fat, 1,300 mg of sodium. Today sixty years later, school lunches throughout the nation are lacking vegetables, still loaded with carbohydrates and fats, two percent milk, canned fruits, processed meats, with 45 grams of fat, 1,200 calories, and almost twice as much sodium. Lunches that are healthier of our kids consist of
It’s becoming common in America that kids are obese. Fast food joints, unhealthy meals at home, and even school lunches are contributing to obesity in young children. Monday through Friday kids spend most of their time at school. being educated in just about everything besides the food they put in their bodies. You would think at school kids would be given a nutritious meal along with some knowledge on how to live a healthy lifestyle. But school lunches in America contain large amounts of sodium and fat, there were six students that helped out with an experiment, “All six samples exceeded the recommended 500 milligrams of sodium, four of them had more than 1,000 milligrams” (“Tests show school lunches high in sodium’). Schools exceed
The improved nutritional standards of public school lunches benefit one’s individual health by providing them with the necessary nutrients to human
Do students eat healthy lunches when they are school? Statistics show that public schools are given students frozen and processed food such as frozen burgers, nuggets, even the salad is even frozen and processed. Not to mention that school lunch doesn’t offer water, instead students drink milk with more than 150 calories along with tons of hormones or juice with 100 calories per serving and more sugar than 5 donuts. Schools not only offer frozen food they also have bending machines around their campuses full with junk food and sugars. School trashcans are 40% full of hot cheetos bags, this means that almost every student eat a bag of chips every day. Eating unhealthy not only can cause you diseases, but also can affect the student emotions and academic performance. “If students aren’t eating sufficient amounts of food in schools, they may leave school hungry and then over consume less nutritious foods. This may place them at increased risk for unhealthy weight gain and mood changes” –Juliana Cohen This is clearly the lunch that will lead student’s to type one diabetes or obesity.
A slice of pizza, a cheeseburger, chicken strips, chocolate milk, French fries, or spaghetti: these all may sound like delicious options, but are they healthy to be serving students for school lunch? All of these foods are common items one might find in a school lunch line, whether it is elementary, middle, or high school. Normally these foods may not be seen as nutritional, and because of this, school lunches are often not viewed as healthy. The people who have this opinion about school lunches may not know the facts and the guidelines that food and nutrition departments need to follow when cooking for students. Thus, it is important that the lunches served to students are nutritious and healthy for them so that they can perform