I was a bit disappointed in today's discussion about school lunches. I realize that Thom likes to introduce conservative opinions (and generally I appreciate that) but there is a real movement to improve school lunches in the United States and it goes way beyond the "food police."
It would have been nice to get someone like Ed Bruske or "Mrs. Q" on the show to share their viewpoint.
Ed Bruske is fighting for improvements in the Washington DC school lunch program:
http://betterdcschoolfood.blogspot.com/
and Mrs. Q is a teacher who is eating school lunch with her students every day in 2010, and photographing what she is served
http://fedupwithschoollunch.blogspot.com
(go back to some of her posts last school year or wait until tomorrow to see the food.)
Or Chef Ann, the "Renegade Lunch Lady"
Whose current battle is to bring a salad bar to every school in America.
There are countless others working to revamp America's school lunch programs, maybe sometime soon Thom will have one as a guest on the show.
As Ed Bruske has discussed on his blog, there are actually financial incentives for districts to choose items which are high in sugar in order to more cheaply get to the minimum caloric requirement for federal reimbursement. Also, contrary to the guest who said that school lunch should only be for the poorest of the poor and children shouldn't be buying school lunches at all, school lunch programs rely on purchased lunches in order to keep their programs solvent. Less funding will not improve school lunches, and will not improve the quality of the food kids come to school with should the program go away.
Some people feel we shouldn't complain about the school lunch program, because it is free. It's not free, however. We all pay for it, and right now we are paying for kids to eat Cookie Crisp for breakfast and chicken nuggets for lunch. That shouldn't be acceptable.
Comments
There are so many issues concerning our food I don't know where to begin, but let me make the attempt. I think sometimes people who speak the way Ms. Gunlock did are (unwittingly) being elitist. There is an underlying assumption that everyone has two parents, one of whom is a stay at home parent who can fix lunches, visit schools, monitor what their kids do and watch at all times, and live in a two story three bedroom house with two children, a dog, a cat, a pet hamster or gold fish and a white picket fence. Hello Leave It to Beaver! Okay, now let’s look at reality. There are things that are most valuable and that is time and money. As was briefly discussed, many times one can feed the family by a visit to the local fast food company far cheaper than if they had bought ingredients and prepared the food themselves. Additionally, they save time from preparation, which if they work two jobs... Does anyone really think that a parent that is functioning on maybe 4 or 5 hours of sleep has time to prepare a lunch for their children (as much as they may want to) while running to the second job that helps them keep the roof over their head?
Also, most neighborhoods that serve the poorer communities don't have good grocery stores. There is usually a deficit of fresh fruits and vegetables in poorer neighborhoods or neighborhoods that aren't necessarily poor but are ethnic.
And yes, oftentimes for some children in public schools, school lunch is often the only meal they receive. I do wish it were more nutritious but they are not. Remember, it was Ronald Reagan who declared ketchup a vegetable. You also have the fact that now; many schools use the prepackaged foods. When I was in school (30 years ago) I remember you could smell the food cooking in the lunchroom a couple of hours before lunch. Now, its industrial microwaved and heat and serve. School lunchrooms are trying to compete with fast-food as now it doesn't get eaten unless it tastes like MacDonald’s and co. Also, schools make money on vending machines. And please answer why a bottle of water costs more that a can of coke. And what of high fructose corn syrup which is in so many foods? Even when you think you are packing healthy. For example some granola bars and even graham crackers?
As I stated to begin with, the issue is multi layered. Maybe someone can add to what I am trying to say, but I do believe school lunches are beneficial. School lunches don't just feed kids during the school year, but in some cities, they extend into the summers, through the schools and through the local parks and recreation department. We need to work to improve the content of our school lunches, not reduce the number of people receiving them and the funding for them.