School Lunch Program Essay

How much time do you usually take to eat lunch? A half an hour maybe more? Well, at the Mount Pleasant High School, we get around five minutes. Saying were rushed is an understatement, at the least. The amount of time we get, from the first bell, to the ending bell, we have "20 minute." By the time we actually get to start eating, there's five minutes left. I think the Mt. Pleasant High School should have a longer lunch period, because collectively all around it helps staff and students.

The National School Lunch Program(NSLP) is a federally funded program. The purpose of the program is to provide school age children with a nutritious meal in the middle of their day. Families can

One in six children in the United States do not know when they will get their next meal. Children who are facing hunger struggle in school, are more likely to repeat a grade, have developmental concerns and have behavioral problems. The National School Lunch Program has brought meals to millions of children from food insecure families for free or reduced rates.

The National School Lunch Program (NSLP), originally initiated in 1946 under the name the National School Lunch Act, has served in excess of 224 billion school lunches to children throughout the United States since its inception (National School Lunch Program). The goals of the program include serving a school lunch that meets certain nutritional requirements and is available at low or no cost to eligible students (National School Lunch Program). While the program has undergone many changes over the decades, the core tenants of the program have remained intact. Changes should be made to the way the National School Lunch Program operates to ensure that all students have access to a lunch that is nutritious and affordable for all income levels, while accommodating the palate of each child.

Having past those awkward teen years, I know exactly what temptations lurk around the corner when dealing with weight. I can only say it gets progressively easier to maintain a healthy weight as you get older, but only if you follow my tips. Tip 1: Do not smoke, drink or take "recreational" drugs. Am I serious? Well considering smoking is anti-beauty, drinking is a fattening sugar alcohol and drugs can lead to eating binges, my answer is yes. Tip 2: Don't eat school lunches. The reason schools created lunches were for busy parents who didn't have time to prepare lunch at home. The result? Fattening choices like French fries and deep-fried chicken nuggets, desserts and ice cream. If you are wondering why you have gained weight during the school year, you

The National School Lunch Program helps schools provide students who can not always afford their lunches, with healthy well balanced meals. The way it works is the school follows the requirements that the NSLP lays out and then the government reimburses the schools for the lunches of the students who qualify for the program. This program is very beneficial for everyone involved, there is only one problem. In recent years the requirements for lunches have become more strict and harder for the schools to follow. Students

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 lunch bell sounds and students run to get an nutritious meal but, it's really not nutritious.

Recently, parents began to swap out sugary cereals for ones that claimed to “contain less sugar” and filled their pantries with snacks that had “less artificial additives” (Kellogg Company). What parents may not know is that some of these substitute foods, like Welch’s reduced sugar fruit snacks, and fat-free turkey, are not nutritious and actually contain more sodium than the daily requirement, are highly processed, loaded with even more sugars, fats, and chemicals like diacetyl than the original product. (Jacques). It is no secret that processed foods are harmful and unhealthy for us, nevertheless, processed products dominate natural food in America’s kitchens and cafeterias. Our country needs to see strict regulations for school lunches that are FDA

The Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act was passed in 2012, in order to counteract rising childhood obesity rates. Creators of these requirements specifically targeted schools. There are several specific examples of the way schools struggle to meet these demands from a variety of sources. In the article, “Why Some Schools Serve Local Foods And Others Can’t (Or Won’t),” Katherine Ralston, a USDA economist is cited as stating“[t]he biggest barriers to going local --- [...] lie in the details; contract requirements, paperwork and a difference in the scale of need at the school and production on the farm” (McMillan). Another article written by Alexandra Sifferlin, published in TIME and titled “Why Some Schools Are Saying ‘No Thanks’ to the School-Lunch Program” explains that “[...] schools are dropping out of the healthier school-lunch program because they [… can not] afford to participate [...Because] Kids […are not] buying the better-for-them options in the cafeteria”. With all the legislation passed and community efforts, it would seem that school lunches would be serving the optimum amount of healthy nutritional foods; however, in countless cafeterias across the country that is not the case. Long before all the controversy surrounding school lunchrooms, the National School Lunch Act of 1964 was passed for one simple purpose, to feed hungry children. According to Emelyn Rude, a graduate of Harvard majoring in Social Studies and a writer for Time, a

The students of our school should rally together and hang the cooks in the Cafeteria. Well, maybe that is a little too dramatic, but something has to be done about the school lunch. The stuff that they serve the students is truly awful. Students should not be forced to eat in the cafeteria because the meals are not prepared well, there are foreign objects in the deserts, and many kids have gotten ill after eating certain items.

Over 100,000 schools have adopted the National School Lunch Program since its launch in 1946 by then president Harry Truman. It was orgininally designed to provide low cost, healthy lunches at a reduced cost and was relatively effective. Lately however, since first lady Michelle Obama fueled a massive overhaul of the program shortly after her husband took office stripping the meals of so-called "unhealthy content" and started to require the "School Lunch act to meet minimum nutritional standards..." This federal program has become too much about controlling what students eat vs. its content and it needs to be changed.

Though school lunch services are not free, school lunch is affordable, efficient and easily accessible. Students belonging to families of different income brackets may receive discounted lunches, if eligible. For these families, school lunch is extremely helpful and is offered at a very great price. Price and quality of school lunch is often in question. Price of meals can vary by region, city and state. The school lunch programs run off of participation greatly. Research has found, as quality in food decreases, the participation does as well. As the price of school lunch increases, quality and participation can as well. When a district can sell more lunches, they are able to spend more money on better quality foods, though they are not actually seeing a lot of profit from the sale of lunches. Often, students and parents think that the solution to unsatisfying school lunches is to end their participation with the program. This will only solve the problem for one student, which makes a huge impact on the program. Even one student leaving the school lunch program can have an outstanding effect on the quality of the meal provided. Parents and students have the common misconception that schools are the primary beneficiary of the profits of school lunch. Schools keep a very small amount per meal sold. Majority of the money from the school lunches is used to cover expenses for future meals. This is why it is important for schools to take an accurate lunch/ attendance survey at the beginning of each school

One of the core values of social work is service, whose goal is “to help people in need and to address social problems”.2 The goal of the National School Lunch Program is consistent with the values of social work through the cooperation among the three agencies of U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA): the Food and Nutrition Service (FNS), the Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS), and the Farm Service Agency (FSA). The FNS serves as the primary liaison between USDA and local education agencies. It is responsible for the general administration of the National School Lunch Program. The FSA and the AMS work hand in hand as the purchasing and delivery arm. In the past 68 years, over 31 million children have been served nutritious lunch in more than 101,000 public or non-profit private schools that participated in the National School Lunch Program.1

Schools in high-poverty areas with most children in need of free or reduced lunch, tend to do well with these new regulations. However, schools will less kids eligible for free or reduced lunch do not do so well, and a lot of districts in this category have dropped the program. Theory is that schools with more children than not eligible for free or reduced lunch, are more likely to eat what is served to them. “Some of our students show up for breakfast and haven’t had anything to eat since lunch the day before” (Hill). The Executive Director of Nutritional services points out a harsh fact, and the good these lunch programs bring to table.