You should know that my job is on the chopping block just like so many educators. So even if I don’t lose my job for the blog, I still could be shown the door because they don’t have money to pay me.
Right now all over the country school administrators and principals are making some very difficult decisions. Cost cutting measures include: laying off all administration and ancillary staff including secretaries, assistant principals, reading specialists, curriculum coordinators, nurses, classroom aides, etc; closing pre-school programs, gifted programs, art, music, computer class, and extra-curriculars because they are not required by law; making kindergarten half-day thereby consolidating classrooms; offering early retirement to older, expensive teachers; letting go new teachers and closing their classrooms; and increasing class sizes to 40.
Have you ever seen a classroom with 40 students? I have… on multiple occasions. It’s chaos. How does even the most talented teacher manage the behavior of 40 (small) people? I couldn’t imagine leaving my child with 40 kids and one person. And that person would be in charge of educating my kid? Yeah, right. It’s called bad babysitting. Read: Reduce Class Size Now and Class Size Matters
Research has found that for kids K-3 they need a teacher:student ratio of 1:20 (or less) to learn effectively. Many wealthy districts already provide classrooms that size. The classrooms at my school are already in the 1:30 range.
Have you ever met a kid walk into kindergarten without any preschool experience and no prep or support at home? Yeah, I have… these kids haven’t been read to, don’t come from a print-rich environment, and don’t know rules and structure. Early childhood programs make a huge difference for children, especially those from disadvantaged homes. Read: Why investments in early childhood work.
I have gotten a couple questions from readers asking why I’m tackling school lunches when teaching positions are being closed because there is no money. I’d like to respond by saying: it’s not “either/or.”
We need make the long-term investment in children. We need to fund education. We need the best teachers. We need to feed students the best food we can find so that they can reach their potential as leaders. We are the USA after all! We act like we are the best, but look at how we fund education and school lunches. Do we really value children?
…Oh yeah, and let’s add recess back because the last time I checked running around was free.
My daughter goes to school in an extremely poor district— they recently introduced pay-to-play with high school sports, and last year the police and fire departments decided to freeze their pay so that the money from their raises could go into the schools. It hasn't helped much.
One thing my daughter's school is doing— her school is amazing and I can't say enough good things about them, I am amazed at what they accomplish in such an impoverished environment— is growing a produce garden. It's going to be tended by kids and adult volunteers during the summer, and come harvest time in the fall, the fruits (and veggies) of their labor will be part of the lunch menu.
So cheap! So easy! We have a community garden plot we share with three friends, and $70 of plants and seeds fed five adults and two kids all of the veggies they could want for months. And more!
Wonderful post. I wish the people writing the budgets for education were half as insightful.
Hear Hear!
When my mom went to school they had 80 to 100 kids in a class. They learned. She actually knows things like arithmetic and history better than I do (and definitely better than 90% of people I know) and I went to what you would probably consider a rich district with 20 to 30 kids per class. If teachers these days actually knew how to control the behavior of their students and if students these days actually understood that they can't just do whatever they want every second of the day, maybe some actual learning would get done.
@Anonymous 1:12 AM: I have been inside schools all over the country–most built in the 1930s during the Depression under the WPA–and I have never been in a classroom that could accomodate 80-100 kids. Study halls, yes; in my own high school there were two rooms designed specifically as study halls that accomodated 100 high school students, half in each side with the proctoring done from the middle. College classrooms, yes; it's pretty standard in American colleges to take classes, especially Intro courses, in groups of upwards of 200. Public or private elementary and high school classrooms? No. The largest I have ever seen were science lecture halls which will usually accomodate 60 kids–3 sections of Bio or Chem or Physics–which meet as a group two or three times a week, and then meet in "small" groups of 20 or fewer for the labs. I understand that some districts also teach foreign languages in a similar fashion, with a large group lecture aspect followed by smaller learning labs.
I'd be interested in when and where your mother went to school.
BTW, schools built SINCE the Depression have smaller classrooms than the older schools–the push to enrolling kids in smaller groups has influenced school design. There was a movement in building–and educating–in the late 60s and 70s that celebrated the "open classroom" experience–small rooms with moving walls that could be slid in and out of place as needed. Under such a plan, a child might be studying the Puritans with one teacher–in a standard group of 20-30–while other kids were learning about igneous rocks to the left and others were doing math to the right–yeah, that might seem like being "in class" with 80-100 kids, but in theory, kids should have been able to ignore all that other stuff going on around them…That quickly proved seriously deletrious to learning (talk about cacaphony and chaos!), and the walls were ultimately fixed and reinforced in the huge majority of those schools.
Our board of education is in the process of hoping their budget will be approved by our town council. Teachers have already been given pink slips in anticipation of jobs being eliminated and everyone's concerned.
We *know* what children need – what the ratio of teachers to students work best – but if the money's not there to fund it what is a town supposed to do? The state doesn't have the money to provide that they have in the past, people with no kids (or no longer have kids in school) bitch about an increase in taxes when they have no kids in the system.
Our board proposed turning 8 k-5 schools into 4 k-2 and 4 3-5. From the reactions of parents you would have thought they proposed shipping their children overseas! Yes, it would have eliminated teaching positions, yes their kids would have to go to a different school for a part of their elementary education but they would be going with ALL the same kids that are in their class now, class size would remain low and it would even out the disparity of class size throughout the 8 schools. The BOE took so much heat for it, they scrapped the idea (for now).
I don't how the lack of money for education will ever be solved. Or if it ever will. I think towns and schools systems have to take a long hard look at how their run and make changes whether they are unpopular or not. It's that "well that's the way it's always been done" mentality that has to be changed.
It's unfortunate that so many in our society are more concerned about having enough money to go out to eat 4 times a week and drive a Lexus then paying enough in taxes to make sure our children are educated properly.
We've had a loud, vocal O tax growth group in our town for years and our school budget has been forced to have 0 or 1% increases which mean steep cuts in programming etc.
*nods* The school board just voted to close 4 schools in our district because of budget cuts. I'd also like to point out (and you might have mentioned this at some point) that for some of our kids, the meals at school might be the only meals they get to eat all day. While, yes, it's good that they're getting food, why would we want that food to be made of chemicals?
I agree with Abby. There have been a lot of people that have said "They should be happy they get any food at all", etc. It seems to me though, unless you are providing food at school to promote good health and relieve nutritional deficits from at-risk homes, why have a free or reduced school lunch program at all? Why waste people's tax dollars with empty gestures and posturing? It's time Americans demanded value for the way their tax dollars are spent! I would give more money if I could trust the government to spend it wisely! I think that is the case for a lot of people that complain about increases in their taxes to fund school programs – they don't trust government as far as they could throw it (metaphorically speaking). That's why blogs like this are so important! Let's get the conversation going in every household so that it spreads to every PTA meeting! We give the money so that children can learn and be nourished – mind and body! It's time we demanded that school boards and government treat that gift with the respect it deserves! Children learn from that, too – they see responsible giving, and they are inspired to be good citizens!
I hate to start ranting about education. I have no children, but I believe in education for all. To put my actions where my heart was, I attended teachers college (70s) and studied education methodologies. When I finally started teaching, I had a nervous break down and realized I was not teacher material. I did teach at a Waldorf school in an attempt to get back into teaching, but the students were much more brilliant than I was/am. Also, a member of this household has been on the local School Board for more than ten years. After the stress of closing schools and asking for budget increases, he made the decision not to be run for another term.
What I really want to do here is RANT! I want to scream about how much education funding has been funneled into sports. From my off-the wall calculations, if portions of NFL teams, baseball teams, tennis stars, and all other sports teams and players would make an investment into a greater-education fund, then money for sports would not need to come out of the local school district budgets. All schools across this country could have sports that do not come from tax revenue.
The same type of funding channels could come from music resources.
But my most fermenting rant comes from poor quality of education as a result of budget cuts. If there is no money for schools, and unlimited cash flow into wars, then the message is that war is better than education. This is not a new concept; I read bumper stickers with enlightening messages telling the military to hold a bake sale.
Without education and without food, I fear that our nation will create a vacuum. In that vacuum, para-military types will feed and arm our youth. Women will be denied education.
My hope is that school gardens, community gardens, organic farm to school programs, and an army of nourished individuals rise up to arms with nourishing foods, nourishing hearts, and a new millennium of nourishing traditions.
I know I have some doom and gloom languaging. But I believe that with good food, and the intention to nourish and educate a nation of young people, we can create a revolution through organic and good local food. As beat poet, Gary Snyder says, it would be a "take over from the inside."
I have one more thing to add –
I recently went to Egypt and had a tour guide who was a former teacher there. She told me that it was the education-for-everyone movement in Egypt during her formative years that inspired her to be a teacher. It was thought that providing equal opportunities for all through public education was the way to raise millions out of poverty and help Egypt gain a foothold in the world global market.
By the time she started teaching, she earned 300EGP a month (~$55) and was teaching classes with 80 children! She had to tutor kids to make rent. She became worn out and disillusioned, went back to college, and became a tour guide. Now Egypt is back to where it was before the public education movement – only the rich can afford any meaningful education and many Egyptians suffer with poverty and a lack of skills. This will lead to a weaker Egypt overall.
I fear an attitude of "not my money; don't raise my taxes!" and "they should be happy with whatever they get!" will lead us down the same road. It was frightening to hear her list of complaints because I could identify with all of them having gone through the American school system. While Egypt's poor teacher salaries and overfull classrooms are extreme, it won't take too many budget cuts before they start to look all the more frighteningly similar…
Mrs. C, I just wanted to say a few things. I went to one of the elementary schools with "open" classrooms, and they were a bit different from what you describe. I also worked for a while in the same school district, so I visited all of the schools (40+ it's a pretty large school district in Texas.) Many of the "open" classrooms there were built into the 80's and 90's with the open design. There also was no such things as the dividers you mention. There were a few closed classrooms that had dividers between them (used for music, art, special education and a very small number of normal classes). The rest of the 'classrooms' were in a giant open room with nothing but the furniture to designate a "class" area. I stopped working there in the early 2000's, so I am not sure how things changed in the more recently designed schools.
Due to some of the points people brought up, I don't think we can just attack people without kids claiming they just want to go out to eat and drive a Lexus and not pay more taxes. As a single female without kids or enough money to own property where I live in Los Angeles, I get taxed at an outrageous rate at both a state and federal level (I really qualify for no deductions, not even my student loan interest) but I am extremely disappointed at how those taxes are spent on war efforts, subsidies for things we should not be subsidizing (corn anyone?) and even as they are constantly put into maintaining a car culture I think is completely unreasonable in the long and short term (depending on where you live.) Combine that with many property taxes decreasing and EVERYTHING is getting squeezed. Meanwhile, so many things that WE can do are either prohibited or no one is doing them.
For example, here in Los Angeles, fruit trees can be extremely prolific. I've never seen a single fruit tree on a school property, even at a school with a garden. Why? Are they just afraid of kids trying to climb the trees to get fruit? I really don't understand.
Not to say the people on here are like this, but even without schools or with less than ideal schools, we should be raising kids that have an inborn desire to learn on their own that crappy school resources can only affect to a certain degree. A friend of mine has been teaching college for years and still gets students in the classroom that simply declare that they deserve an A, regardless of their effort. These people are considered to be adults in most ways! My parents instilled in me a great desire to follow my interests and keep on learning, even once I left school. I have learned more useful things going this route than in school where I sometimes felt like someone was trying to torture me with boring material or the same material, over and over again.
And by the way, I rarely go out to eat because I make most of my meals at home, I don't even own a car because I exclusively use public transportation and my bike/legs and I live relatively modestly. I just think that sometimes parents are looking for schools to do a little too much when it comes to teaching kids. If their parents' education lead to this situation, then we have to really consider what happened when the parents were educated that lead to this situation.
what would happen if we slashed those defense contracts and redirected funds to education?
in our state, there are funds for prisons but they're slashing education budgets.
yikes…
"If teachers these days actually knew how to control the behavior of their students"
I teach at one of the lowest economic schools in my district, in CA. I teach Kindergarten. I teach "those" kids who don't have preschool experience, who live 4 families to a 1 bedroom apartment.
I teach "those" kids who don't have hot meals or clean clothes.
I have 24 of them in my class, and 7 of them were 4 years old when they started with me.
This has nothing to do with teachers knowing how to control the kids' behavior. It has to do with us having NO control over their home lives. It has to do with us doing THE BEST we can the 6 hours they are with us….
(and a garden has BEEN attempted at my school, but it is vandalized more than it is productive…). I know this is about food and money, but it needs to be about KIDS and what they need. And not all schools are created equal, every school in every district has different needs…the whole situation makes me sick…thank god I will have a job net year, granted, I may have 33 of "those" kids, but it's a job.
I'm horrified by the comments of Anonymous.
I don't think there is any reason for attacking teachers. They are doing the best they can and they don't get paid that much. Teaching children is a thankless job and many times you don't see the rewards of your efforts until years later.
I'm not a teacher and I don't have a child in a public school but I agree that there needs some changes to be made. I also agree that there are some parents that are relying on schools too much. Parents need to take an active role in their children's lives and actually be a part of it. But how frustrating is it for a parent that is trying to teach their child something like healthy eating and nutrition only to have lunches like the lunches that are served in schools? There needs to be some reinforcement.
Anonymous I agree with Lalab,you're on "crack" you get 100 of our kids anywhere and you won't need teachers, you'll need riot police. My good friend works as a sub-teacher in one of the poor-er regions in Iowa he has the hardest time with some of his kids. It's either lack of motivation/apathy or behavioral problems and i honestly think that if there's someone made for teaching its Bryan. Unfortunately, television has been raising our kids, and we are reaping what our laziness as parents has sown. Kids 100 years ago are not kids today, teachers today have a way bigger task in front of them. Not the same problem, you are basically talking apples to oranges.
On the other hand lets look at the allocations for education from our nations budget http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/02/01/us/budget.html . Is something absolutely messed up here or what? Bryan is desperately searching for a full time job closer to home. The high school in our town had an opening, so he applied, but guess what? "No money, the spot won't be filled next year, we're just going to shuffle things around and make it work" Something is terribly wrong here.
Mrs Q! Your blog is amazing. I wrote about it here:
http://shine.yahoo.com/event/haven/where-the-germs-are-lurking-in-your-home-1162530/
I have an immediate question for you about this from Yahoo. Can you please contact me ASAP? Thanks and I will be cheering you on!
Good news from Washington for school nutrition programs…
Lincoln Unveils Child Nutrition Bill
by Jerry Hagstrom
CongressDaily
Senate Agriculture Chairwoman Blanche Lincoln today unveiled a bill to reauthorize child nutrition programs that would boost funding by $4.5 billion over 10 years – less than what President Obama has called for but still larger than previous increases.
Of the $4.5 billion, $1.2 billion would help lift the number of children who receive food, while $3.2 billion would go toward improving the quality of meals and fighting childhood obesity.
The proposal is less than half of the $10 billion increase that Obama proposed in his FY11 budget. But in a news release, Lincoln said her bill shares Obama's goal of ending childhood hunger by 2015. The biggest increase in the past has been $500 million over 10 years, Lincoln said.
Her bill would mark the first time that lawmakers have dedicated such resources to increase the payments the federal government makes to local schools to pay for school meals, she said.
The bill covers reauthorization of the National School Lunch Program; School Breakfast Program; Special Supplemental Program for Women, Infants, and Children and the Child and Adult Care Food Program. The only major food program it does not cover is the supplemental nutrition assistance program, also known as food stamps.
Because the bill determines what foods local school districts and the federal government can buy, various sectors within agriculture are expected to fight over the bill's final contents. In general, the campaign to improve children's diets and reduce obesity would lead to fewer purchases of meat and traditional dairy products and more purchases of fresh fruits and vegetables and low-fat dairy products. But the increase in spending is likely to lead to greater purchases of all types of foods.
According to Lincoln's release, the bill would allow localities to be reimbursed for providing after-school meals rather than snacks, while schools in high-poverty areas could offer free meals to all students without collecting paper applications. This simplified application process would encourage more children to sign up for the meals and reduce administrative burdens on schools, Lincoln said.
The bill would also simplify certification for low-income children in other ways and make foster children categorically eligible for free meals. In addition, it would require school food authorities to coordinate with institutions operating the Summer Food Service Program to develop and distribute materials to families to inform them of the availability and location of summer meal sites. It also contains pilot programs to improve the way hungry children get food during out-of-school times.
On the nutrition side, the bill would provide schools that meet new school standards an additional 6 cents per meal. It also gives the Agriculture secretary the authority to establish national nutrition standards for all foods sold on school campuses throughout the school day. This provision is likely to be controversial with local school districts, which have used money from foods sold in vending machines to pay for sports programs, as well as with some of the food companies that fill the machines. But it is a key goal of nutritionists and the Obama administration.
The bill also establishes nutrition requirements for childcare providers participating in the Child and Adult Care Food Program and provides mandatory funding for schools to establish school gardens and bring local foods into school cafeterias.
I agree class sizes can be too large. Before we moved in September I had a neighbor who was a school principal and now is pursuing a doctorate in Educational Policy and Procedure. The amount I learned from her is amazing. Such as, she is the ONLY person with an education background in her program. Her advisor has an economic background so looks at things from an economic perspective. Sure 40 children per classroom makes more sense economically but not in practice (another argument is that a good teacher can impact lives of children when there are 20 or less students per class but a bad teacher it really does not matter how many students are in the class.)
On another note, recess is critical. Think about adults – when we go to conferences we have breaks, we fidget and we doodle. Why do we not allow our children the same privileges?
I eat with my daughter at school often. Beige, beige, beige, with some sugar and fat. It's a travesty that it is treated as a business in the line item. They recently pulled the salad bar because of lack of funds. Education needs to be about more than holding teachers hostage over their students' end-of-year grades–feed out children and cut own a few of those "education summits" and "professional development requirements."
Scott Nicholson
This is fabulous. I have also been "fed up with lunch" for a long time. Thank you!!
Lorraine
p.s. Surely a principal could not (would not) fire a teacher for this blog…?
I feel for every teacher out there. Parents need to be more involved in their child's education and not blame the teacher or the school for how poorly their child is doing Unfortunately teachers and nurses in today's society are not paid for the work they do. But let's pay those big athletes the big bucks.
For 7 years, I taught in a school that served lunches that looked just like the ones in your pictures, and I often thought that there is no possible way that children can reach their full potential when they eat crap (because the breakfasts the kids eat are just as bad or worse as lunches).
I've always believed that simple changes such as better lunches and more recess and/or PE would yield huge results, but what do I know? I'm not a politician, so I guess I don't know what I'm talking about.
Did I mention that I don't teach anymore, but not because I didn't love or or because I wasn't great at it. I stopped because of things like what your blog discusses that people seem to not want to change. It's very frustrating.
Good luck to you as you continue!
All good comments…but back to the "food".
My stomach hurts just looking at the pictures.
My sister, the teacher, informs me this is precisely how she gained 60 lbs in 19 years of teaching.
I can still remember the day my daughter came home from school and told me there was a roach in her salad, the "lunch lady" does not wear a hairnet, and there was a dead mouse visibly stuck in a chink in the wall(in her classroom )which would probably never be removed.
I called the Public Health Inspector ASAP.
Oh, there were changes…
When I entered school as a first grader, I didn't know a word of English or how to count numerically. Twelve years later I'm at the top of my class of 560 student.
The thing that helped shape my result was having good two teachers, valuing education and my own determination.
All too often students are babied; they need this, that, more of those, blah blah blah.
I think its maturity and a taste of real life.
Why should taxpayers fund lunches for the kids of someone else? And why is this more vital than helping the people of Haiti have just one meal a day?
Bless you for taking on this project!!! My daughter is a vegan and my son has a pancreas condition that requires him to eat low fat. Neither of my children can get their nutritional needs met at school. I was shocked to hear my daughter tell me they would force her to put meat on her plate stating she "didn't have to eat it" – even some of her friends that are vegetarian for religious purposes have this forced upon them. My son has had pancreas attacks because he can not get low fat food except for the pre-packaged chicken salad which they don't always have. They have a "fruit basket" that rarely has fruit in it. They actually took away the only salad bar to put in a new line offering "Double, double cheeseburgers" and "double meat pizza" – and we wonder why childhood obesity is an issue… Then there is the time they are given to eat – often the bell is rining within minutes of them sitting down. We can not keep feeding our children junk and giving them 5 minutes to scarf it down – we are creating health problems that contribute to the healthcare expenses we have as a nation – a vicious cycle.
I live in southern Illinois where budget cuts are deep and teachers/staff are being let-go at alarming rates. I find it so terribly offensive to see our fired governor parading around on national TV. I would hope that he at least has the decency to give back to the state of Illinois every penny he has earned while he is having fun in Hollywood. Our education funding system is down the drain thanks to him.
Our school lunches are dismal as well. Both my kids have taken to being "a bringer" everyday. Despite the best efforts of our lunch coordinator and the crazy taxes we pay, if the states don't repay the schools money that is owed, I fear it can't get better anytime soon.
The time has come for America to make education a priority. I know we are supposed to financially help other countries but let's take the airline approach for a bit. If you experience turbulence in the air, you are instructed to put on your oxygen mask first before you help anyone else. Let's get our American education system working before we worry about other countries.
Enjoy your Salisbury steak!
Im not going to lie im not the healthiest person in the world but i look at some of these photos and its barely going to be 9 years since ive been in a class room and i went recently with some children of friends of mine and the schools i went to the food looked nothing like your pictures in fact i dont think i saw food anything anywhere near the bad looking at my own school back in texas :-(our lunch line was good decent had good looking food salads and more to pick from and i ate it every day i think your lunch food issue has to do with like my issue with sports alot of schools spend more on sports then education well same might go with the foods?????
In Escambia County Fl, unfortunately 65% of children are born out of wedlock. To me, learning really begins with, and is reinforced at home. While these single parents are struggling to make ends meet, their kids are left to their own devices. I don't care how much money you throw at this problem, until the breakdown of the family is addressed, it will go on. I know, because I was a single mom of one child until this past year, when I married. It was very difficult to be there for everything, but I have managed to. I am fortunate in that I have a good paying job. Others are not so lucky. It's good that kids who come home to no parent get some sort of food at school. It should definitely be better.
I am SO happy about this. I have felt this way for years, and I don't even have children yet. I am 25 years old, and come from a family where healthy eating has always been important. While I was in grade school however, I ate school lunch with everybody else because it was "cool". At the time, I loved having Pizza, fries and ranch dressing for lunch rather than mom's sack lunches. But when I look back now, I am appalled at the thought of what I ate. In fact, I attribute any bad eating habits that I have today as a result of school lunch. Eating too fast, and too much just to name a few.
So please don't feel guilty about this. You are standing for a GREAT cause. What we eat effects our bodies so much. I am continuously amazed at how often we as Americans put healthy eating at the bottom of our lists of things to do each day. When, if we were to put it at the top, we would have so much more energy and happiness, and less sickness and depression.
You hit the nail on the head. If we don't teach our children better eating habits, they will be less affective in everything that they do, and they will suffer as a result.
THANK YOU so much for making a stand. Keep going. I have a feeling you will be supported by millions.
Megan
My oldest will be going to school next year, and I'm a little worried about this. It's hard enough to send your children off with a complete stranger, but to know that there's the possiblility that it will be "bad babysitting" and their meals will just make them obese, is evern worse. Come on people! This blog is amazing. I'm hoping it will jump start us on getting to where we need to be. Parents, say something! Teachers, stand up! These are our kids on the line.
I appreciate your commitment to advocating for children. Children should not be taught anything unhealthy, specially about something as important as nutrition, in school. It's a lack of imagination, not funds. Also, it's a reflection of the fact that healthy foods are far more expensive to buy, than the junk. And it all goes down to agricultural practices. Watch the movie "Food Inc"!
School food…
I am a student in high school and the food at my school is disgusting. Yes, some changes have been made to make it heather (a salad bar was introduced)but all in all, it is incredibly nauseating to look at the rest of the food. Most students at my school choose the fatty foods that grease is literally dripping off of, or the food is undercooked sometimes. This blog will start a school food revolution, hopefully.
Classroom size is also a big problem as well. Being a student, I know how difficult it is for a child to learn in a class with 30+ others. Some people are left behind.
Mrs. Q, if you would do me a favor, I'd like you to voice your opinion on the arts (music, theater, etc.) in high schools. Recently I learned that some students can't take their preferred music or art class because requirements to graduate practically forbid it. I'd be grateful if you did share your thoughts on this topic.
Mrs. Q– love the blog. What a great idea. I'm a freelance writer in Chicago and would love to pursue a story on this, if you're interested in getting more attention. You could remain anonymous. Would love to discuss. Please email me: thekatesilver@gmail.com
YOU GO, GIRL! MAKE A DIFFERENCE!!!
I have been reading your blog and checking out the photos…and I have never seen a lunch like this in any school. The schools around me offer many options, including salad bars and sandwich lines. Your entire blog is about how bad school lunches are, but you have failed to research any other schools in different parts of the country.
I just found this blog and it is quite disturbing. My kids do eat lunch at school and I'm seriously second guessing that decision!
sad to say i am impressed with this lunch we never had a single vegetable served with school lunch when i went to school (graduated 2004) so as much as it still needs work its a big improvement already!
though like you my mom NEVER let us eat school lunch and i will be homeschooling my child cause lunch is the least of my worries, over crowded classes, to many non English speaking students, are even bigger issues..
But i really do commend you for finding a fault and taking a stand
First, I love your blog – what a great idea! When I was teaching I would eat lunch once a week with my students in the cafeteria and not only was the food tasteless, but we only had about 10 minutes to eat. This doesn't allow the kids (in this case 7th graders) time to relax a bit and talk with their friends because everyone was too busy gulping their food!
Second, the school funding issue is a huge problem. I've been trying to get a teaching job for months after finishing graduate school and have been told, "we would love to hire you, but you are too expensive." It's sad that schools cannot hire very qualified people. Now I know why many students from top tear schools do not teach – we can't get jobs!
Anyway, rant finished. I wish you well on your food journey and hope that solutions to all of our country's educational problems are on the horizon.
Maybe they should stop purchasing individualized everything and killing the environment while they are at it… Seems like this might cut down on costs. This schools meals look terrible! My sister is the head of an afterschool program in Vermont and she tells me that they have to add cheese to the pizza based on rules on how much cheese kids need. Since when is completely fatty cheese a staple of diets… Can't they drink low-fat milk for calcium!
I am about to become a RD (registered dietitian) and I have to say that each county is different in exactly what they serve for food. I worked with the RD at the school foodserivce office in my county, which happens to be a lot more modern in their choices- with whole grains and nice salads on the menu.
However, my mother is a teacher in another county and I have heard a lot of bad experiences from her. Some kids get free breakfast as well as lunch and have been served completely stale, hard bread as well as expired yogurt (eww). Kids are at school to learn about a lot of things, and nutrition should be one of them. It is especially sad to me that the kids who are on free lunches be served such a poor excuse for food. It's been researched that a healthy breakfast helps kids focus and be more alert. Hopefully we will see changes in the future. I hope to be a part of it!
I look forward to reading your blog. It's an eye-opener for many.
Just wanted to say thank you for caring.
I applaud you, Mrs. Q. This is a subject worth investigating. Our new superintendent made the following comment posted in the local newspaper, "the district should not have been serving what he dubbed “platinum” meals with pricey fresh fruit daily." He appears to be out of touch with the reality of childhood obesity. I am wondering how many other superintendents believe this.
I just discovered this blog and am fascinated! Have there been any discussions about the plastic film over the top of the food? Dioxin is in plastic and is released into the food when it is warmed. Is the covering something you should worry about? Dioxin can cause cancer.
I am a high school senior in West Virginia. Basically, our lunches suck (please excuse the word, but it's true), but at least they don't come in cardboard containers with plastic (!) coverings. About once every month we have pepperoni rolls (pepperoni wrapped in bread…WV classic!!), but the grease literally drips from them… this is not normal for pepperoni rolls!!! The food at my school could not possibly have ANY nutritional value…it's mostly "shredded cardboard" and "chemically manufactured meat" that's disguised by bread, sauce, etc. I don't eat lunch at school, but rather wait till I get home to eat. I know this isn't healthy, but I think it's better not to eat than to eat what the school provides.
I think what you're doing is great…it's about time that someone tried to get the point across that school lunches are not healthy. We need to start taking care of the kids. Give us REAL FOOD!!
I wish there was more I could do than quietly support you from my computer desk. I hope your efforts here make as much as an impact as they should, and more.
-E
It's people like you who make a difference in this world (you've probably heard this a billion times)! You are taking a huge risk in a very unstable economy, but you are fighting such an important war, for the sake of our children. I applaud you!!!
Good for you Mrs. Q! I love that you have taken the bull by the horns and are exposing what our kids eat at school. I am a mother to three school-age children and they bring their lunch. I remember growing up in a single parent home and I received reduced-price or free lunches. I can recall receiving a piece of pizza and picking it up and grease just running off of it. YUCK!
I also want to point out that my brother worked in a prison kitchen. The boxes on the side of the food stated that it was for "Prison and School Consumption Only". The food they used for one meal he said was about 1200-1500 calories. I am not a nutritionist but I believe that is about how many calories an adult should be eating in a whole day! Yikes!
Some parents try to teach their kids at home how to make good eating choices, but how can they if they spend more time at school eating cheap foods with really no nutritional value.
ROCK ON MRS. Q!!!!