Should junk food be allowed at school?
Junk food is generally defined as “a diet high in processed foods and soft drinks” (Wiles et al., 2009, p.1). By definition, junk food contains artificial food colorings and preservatives, including fast food, oily foods, snacks and high sugary beverage. Students usually eat snacks between meals. According to McPhail et al. (2011), the snacking habit among students has increased in the past twenty years. This means students are taking more junk food in a higher chance every day. It is generally recognized that junk food is bad for health, while some scholars and researches argued that healthy snacks are beneficial to adolescents.( Martine et al. , 2011) However, the effects of junk food to teenagers
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Furthermore, selling junk food at schools can save time and expenses of students. It is because the second way for student to consume junk food at school is the meal programs (Diamond, 2011). For instance, hamburgers, pizzas and fried chicken are existed in the school meal programs. Despite the fact that school meal programs should not include junk food due to the low nutritional value, there are many concerns when schools have to decide the meal programs choices, such as the funding from school and the budgetary pressure (Gordon et al., 2007a). The cost of fast food are cheaper than making healthy food lunch since most of the fast food are processed already. Thus, students can enjoy the food after reheating them. Fast food saves time and it saves many unimportant expenses like the labor force. However, school must function as a parent and do what is best for the students when a student is away from their parents. School has responsibility to monitor a child’s diet, make sure those meals do not include junk food. Besides, schools should set a good example of nutritious eating for students. Consequently, junk food should be banned from school and this would fit in well with nutrition curriculum in health classes. In addition, some might argue that reject junk food cause imbalanced nutrition. Also, Richards et al., (2009) claim that pre-school children snacking habit can be affected by using social marketing tactics, like
Also, fast food has an abundant amount of calories out of an average diet of a teenager, leading to an unhealthy diet. Next, it was researched by scientists that eating too much fast food could lower the intelligence of a child. Finally, Many American children’s only balanced meal of the day is their school lunch and the rest of the meals are based around fast food. Then that means if a school serves fast foods such as McDonalds of Burger King, there would be nothing to balance out the child’s daily meal. Serving fast foods at schools would put more students into risk of their health.
Would it help students eat healthier? Should it be a student’s choice if they want to eat healthy or not? When junk food is banned, do schools lose out? With the increase of childhood obesity, some schools have completely banned the sale of junk food in vending machines and the cafeteria, because they believe it will encourage students to eat healthier. Although students shouldn’t eat junk food, schools should allow for it to be sold, because it increases profits for the school, gives students a choice in what they eat, and allows schools to teach about healthy nutrition and responsibility when it comes to eating.
Brand name fast-food items now account for almost 50% of schools sales (Brockett). As one can see, the financial benefits of the brand names in lunches can help boost a school’s declining profit. If fast-food was taken away from menus, many schools would fail to break even and have to cut their staff (Brockett). “Financially, it’s better for us if we go up to 400 meals” said Amy Hedrick, a food service supervisor in California (Lehmann). If she tries to sell off brand pizzas, her profit declines dramatically as she only sells 250 to 300 pizzas. If kids are being forced to eat healthy through their school lunch, they will leave the school over their lunch hour and go find a fast food restaurant. Even if they don’t leave, will taking away their brand name foods really solve the problem? The solution is not to frighten kids away with putting bans on school lunches. Rather, teach them about nutritional values of the healthier options and leaving them the choice, as it talks about in “The State Has No Place In The Lunch Bags Of A Nation”. If students know the benefits of eating healthy, they will start to turn away from fast
This article shows that fast food today is convenient because people have a lot of work to do in a very short time, so so thinking about driving through the fast food restaurant is easier and better than cooking. Therefore, one thing parents don't know is that fats, sugars, and salts are engaging their children primordial tastes. The most widely recognized disease that impacts children is obesity. Studies show that 15-20% of children aged 12-18 are overweight. In addition, obese children can affect emotional and
is what their kids are provided to eat all day (Dunford, Schultz, Rosenblum, Miller, & Lumeng, 2015). This is the kind of negative behavior of parents who really do not believe these behaviors cause obesity. According to the article (Lucan, 2016) a doctor in New York was appalled to discover that sugary snacks were being provided at the school that consisted of different kinds of chips, cakes, and drinks. She also discovered that candy was used as incentives or rewards in class projects. Social media can help with providing childhood obesity awareness considering people follow celebrities who are influential (Harris, Moreland-Russell, Tabak, Ruhr, &Maier, 2014).
68 percent of students say they buy food from the cafeteria every day. Proper nutrition is tied to better academic performance. This means that kids will not do their best in school if they are fed unhealthy lunches (Black). The unhealthy lunches kids are given at school are the main contribution to childhood obesity. According to scientists, children who eat too much fat, sugar, sodium or processed food and too few vitamins and minerals are likely to develop a higher risk over time for several chronic health problems (Angela). These health problems include heart disease, and diabetes. At this time, more than ever, 55 percent of Americans are obese and 20 percent of Americans are overweight (Three Facts About School Lunches). Many schools offer healthy choices, but they did not decrease the calories in them, and they typically still offer unhealthy snack items (Three Facts About School Lunches). In a school cafeteria with both healthy and unhealthy choices offered to kids, most kids are not willing to choose the healthier choices over the unhealthy ones. So where an apple is avoided and a bag of potato chips is selected as a child’s first choice for a snack
Americans today eat junk food constantly, knowing it diminishes their health. The American standard diet consists of unhealthy factors that lead to diabetes, heart attacks, and high cholesterol. School lunches consist of those diseases. Schools should mandate control and enforce regulations that would reduce the wide availability of unhealthy foods and processed snacks. Furthermore, junk foods should be taxed on a national scale and promote natural ingredients. Too many of our schools offer little or almost no
In Schools all over the state, students complain about the quality of school lunches. As a result, many schools have decided to let fast food restaurants like Taco Bell, McDonalds, and Pizza hut into their school's cafeteria. This was an extremely bad idea. We all know teenagers love fast food. Whether it’s the crispy salty french fries from McDonalds or the Cheesy pizza from Pizza hut, but is this food healthy? I would disagree.
However, parents are not the only ones to blame. One of the primary culprits of feeding our children junk is the common school cafeteria. School lunches have become one of the most prominent political debates. Nicholas Confessore in The NY Times, shows the problems of school lunches that contain “exceeding amounts of fat and salt in their products” and even count pizza as a vegetable
What is this food doing to our children? The childhood obesity epidemic has increased because of the contribution of junk food that is being served in public schools. It has been found that children who eat fatty school foods are more likely to become obese than those who brought lunch from home. Why is this we may ask has a lot to do with the above student that I stated brought their lunch from home daily. You can count the intake of calories that is in your lunchbox but you have no idea what is in the food from you school, half of the time you will not even know what the food is. Also, the specials that are provided for students on special food days increases their calorie intake as well such as; pizza day or wing day. On these days children have shown to intake more food because these are the days that they provide greasy foods that taste swell and the children like them so they will gravitate to them because they do not have the proper knowledge to know what this food can do to your body.
For the past 22 years, the public school system has been serving unhealthy foods to kids (Psyche Pascual).Schools are changing salad bars for ice cream bars and fruit for candy. Your body is not designed for harsh amounts of sodium, fat, and sugar. In the school system, kids should be allowed to only choose healthy alternatives. The community and parents need to change laws to promote healthy nutrition in schools. There are overwhelmingly too many obese children because of school lunch menu. Fast food should not be served in schools because it is not healthy, students cannot focus, and fast food has harmful chemicals.
Many people in today 's generation are constantly are craving junk food. It is patently evident junk food plays a major role in the cause of obesity. According to a study called "Psychological science", Obesity leads to numerous health issues including heart disease, high blood pressure and type 2 diabetes. The treatment of these health issues cost billions of tax health dollars (Physiological science, 2014). Permitting junk food in schools will cause greater chances of obesity. Students will be heading on a venture. Furthermore, obesity is a continuous major problem since the past several years. In 2010, a 4 year old girl named
School's do not generally provide the nutritious foods that children should be eating. Instead, they feed their students processed foods. "Elementary school cafeteria food is often mass-produced and chosen for its cost-effectiveness." (Boehlke). School's try to provide students with healthy options, but they are failing. "Students have access to sugary drinks and less
Junk food, junk food, junk food is around all corners of schools. Chocolate, cookies, soda, potato chips, and Sour Strings may sound delectable to some people, but are they nutritious? Some people wonder if there should be a change. Encouraging exceptional nutrition in schools is essential by reasons of students will consume foods that are better for them, schools will pay less for meals, and fewer students would go hungry.
Restrictions should be made against junk food in school in order to decrease the rate of obesity and diabetes.“Junk food can be addictive for children and complications like obesity, chronic illness, low self esteem and even