U.S. Feds: Remove These Foods/Drinks from all Schools

[the iron horse]

Trying to stay two steps ahead of the Food Police is getting harder and harder these days.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/02/us...nt&oref=slogin

[BVS]

Make them fat and die, woohoo...

[AngelofHarlem01]

Their intentions are of course good and school food could definitely be healthier and all around better.. Just thinking back to when I was in high school there were vending machines everywhere, but it's not like at lunch people would gorge themselves on pop and candy. Those that chose to eat from the vending machine would usually just get one thing and move on. Or get a drink from the machine and have it with what they brought from home. So I don't think that's entirely the problem. I actually find it goofy that schools are sponsored by Pepsi and Coca Cola in the first place.. If they really wanted to set an example they should get sponsors like Dole and Jolly Green Giant.

[phillyfan26]

Our school's cafeteria is run by a separate company, and we don't have soda (only on sale after school), but essentially most things are there. Ice cream is available, some of the non-fat TastyKakes, etc. Plus we have a business class run school store that sells candy.

[Moonlit_Angel]

Originally posted by AngelofHarlem01


Their intentions are of course good and school food could definitely be healthier and all around better.. Just thinking back to when I was in high school there were vending machines everywhere, but it's not like at lunch people would gorge themselves on pop and candy. Those that chose to eat from the vending machine would usually just get one thing and move on. Or get a drink from the machine and have it with what they brought from home. So I don't think that's entirely the problem. I actually find it goofy that schools are sponsored by Pepsi and Coca Cola in the first place.. If they really wanted to set an example they should get sponsors like Dole and Jolly Green Giant.

Exactly. I'm all for the effort to be healthy and everything, I think it's great that people are working to take care of themselves. But I also think stuff like this is a bit overboard. If you don't want to get something from a vending machine, THEN DON'T. But if someone else wants to, that's their choice to deal with, not anyone else's concern. Besides, you can ban the stuff all you want, a kid could still try and sneak in a bottle of pop or a candy bar or something anyway. An all-out ban is NOT going to solve the health problem, hate to break it to these people. Just continue to educate people on what foods are healthy and what foods aren't, and then let each person decide for themselves what they want to eat.

And besides, moderation is good. No, one's diet shouldn't consist of junk food and junk food alone. But if you eat a candy bar or drink some pop once in a while, it's not anything to fret over, really.

Angela

[Headache in a Suitcase]

they took all the soda out of the soda machines prior to the start of the school year... they've been replaced by some lame non-poweraid poweraid drink and a bunch of v8 mix things.

it's killing my 1:00 caffene fix

[Liesje]

Um, I would not have made it through high school conscious if it weren't for our school's contract with Pepsi. I needed at least 20oz of Mountain Dew in me by 9:30 in order to deal.

If parents don't want their kids eating/drinking that stuff, then don't give them money. If kids buy it with their own money, then who cares it's their money!

[Dreadsox]

The problem is that childhood obesity leads to adult health problems that cost the health care industry money. Better to fight the battle while kids are young.

I think it is a good move.

[Headache in a Suitcase]

i understand not having it in elementary schools but they should be allowed in high schools.

[anitram]

They'd have to pry that can of Diet Coke out of my dead, cold hands!

Actually I grew up in a house where we were not allowed to drink pop, so it was like a luxury/poison we got when we went to our friends' houses. Really all it did is delay the inevitable; although neither my brother nor I drink the non-diet kind anyway.

[LarryMullen's POPAngel]

I can't look back to my high school years without picturing every other desk in every class with a can of whatever their poison was on top of their desk.

Diet Coke was (and still is) mine.

[UberBeaver]

Remember Jolt cola? I drank that on a bus ride from Philly to Long Island when I was 12 and I think by the time we got to Staten Island they had to put me down with electric cow prods and horse tranquilizer darts. That shit was nuts.

[BluRmGrl]

^ Well that explains it... your avatar is actually a photo of you taken just before the darts struck, isn't it?

[UberBeaver]

lol, actually yeah. I was kinda like that, but with a bit more drool I think.

[phillyfan26]

I love soda. I hate that it's not available at school.

Caffeine has no effect on me. Whether I have it or not, I have the same amount of energy.

[yolland]

Hmmm, I attended high school in the late '80s and neither of my high schools had vending machines. We weren't allowed to drink or eat outside the cafeteria during class hours, either. Was that atypical for the time or something?

It sounds from the article like diet soda sales, at least, would be exempt from any bans in high schools. I know it sounds finger-shaking, but if you're going to ban candy vending machines you really should ban regular soda sales too--all they are is liquid candy. Dread is right; there's no way around the fact that regular consumption of foods most kids used to see as occasional treats (sodas, chips, pastries, candy) is a major contributor to childhood obesity problems--you can talk about nutrition education all you want, but for kids especially, eating behavior is driven much more by habits than by intellectual awareness of what's nutritious and what isn't. Which in the big picture does mean that what kids are eating at home is more important than what they're eating at school...but that's not in itself a good reason not to restrict access to junk foods in schools. It's not like having junk food available at your workspace or school is a constitutional right.

[melon]

Originally posted by Dreadsox
The problem is that childhood obesity leads to adult health problems that cost the health care industry money. Better to fight the battle while kids are young.

I think it is a good move.

I'm inclined to agree.

[indra]

Originally posted by yolland
Hmmm, I attended high school in the late '80s and neither of my high schools had vending machines. We weren't allowed to drink or eat outside the cafeteria during class hours, either. Was that atypical for the time or something?

I don't think it was atypical at all. I graduated from high school in 1980 and candy and ice cream bars were sold occasionally after school in this little "soda shop" at the school. That was mostly for the girls that lived there though (it was a private school with both boarding and day students). The school did have a couple of soda vending machines, but they weren't hugely popular. I remember most of us got a soda once or possibly twice a week.

We weren't allowed to eat or drink in class either. I remember one teacher (a nun) telling us we could chew gum in her class but only if she couldn't tell. She could always tell.

I don't remember ever eating or drinking in any of my college classes either now that I think about it.

[Moonlit_Angel]

Originally posted by Dreadsox
The problem is that childhood obesity leads to adult health problems that cost the health care industry money. Better to fight the battle while kids are young.

I think it is a good move.

While I fully agree it's best to get at this problem when people are young, at the same time, I'm sorry, I still say a ban isn't going to solve things. For one thing, one other major reason kids are becoming obese is because gym class isn't a requirement anymore, and parents aren't making their kids get out and get exercise. I hated gym class. HATED. IT. Namely 'cause I sucked at a lot of the games that were played in it. But I had to do it as a child, and I think we should reestablish that as a required class again. By the time I got to high school, junior/senior year you only had to take it for one semester and you could choose your activities-one of them was card playing. Not exactly a calorie-burning activity.

If kids get out and get some exercise, that'll help greatly. And I also find it really strange that adults are trying to restrict kids' eating habits, yet I've seen a commercial for one of those diet plans where an adult is all excited because she can lose weight and still have her chocolate foods in this plan as well. Uh...what?

I have no problem with individual parents dictating what their own children should and shouldn't eat. That's fine. But I don't think it's one group of adults' place to run all children's lives. And a ban just won't be successful. Banning stuff never solves the problem. Education and emphasis on time outdoors getting fresh air and exercise are the keys, I think (and yes, this applies to me as well. I'm horribly out of shape, I could do with more outdoor activity and healthier eating habits).

By the way, I hate diet pop . Tastes like crap.

Angela

[yolland]

Originally posted by Moonlit_Angel
For one thing, one other major reason kids are becoming obese is because gym class isn't a requirement anymore, and parents aren't making their kids get out and get exercise.

Dread can correct me if I'm wrong here, but actually, I think it's the case that as of now, 90%+ of the country's school districts DO have Phys Ed requirements--it's more that they're poorly enforced, and with the expansion of the academic curriculum in recent years, schools have found it harder and harder to make time for gym classes. I think better nutrition and better exercise are complementary goals, though, and I doubt that many people who support restricting junk food in schools are opposed in principle to increasing PE time. Adressing one doesn't cancel out the importance of addressing the other.

And I also find it really strange that adults are trying to restrict kids' eating habits, yet I've seen a commercial for one of those diet plans where an adult is all excited because she can lose weight and still have her chocolate foods in this plan as well. Uh...what?

The difference is that when you're an adult monitoring your own diet, or a parent monitoring your child's diet, the entire budget for that food is coming out of your own individual pocket, and the effort of putting it on the table is yours alone as well. You can, of course, expand that to your children's school lunches by having them bring their own--and to judge from the article at least, the proposed legislation would have no effect on what home-packed lunches might include. But traditionally, it's been seen as both valuable and necessary for schools themselves to offer prepared meals to students--not for the purpose of establishing an in-school 'marketplace' where students can buy whatever they feel like eating, but to help ensure their nourishment, especially for children whose parents might be on tight food budgets, or negligent about providing meals themselves. It's a function of the school in its capacity as provider of social goods, drawing on funds supplied by the total community it serves.

(One implementation problem the proposed reforms might have, though, is that for many schools their 'a la carte' sales are effectively subsidizing their insufficiently-government-subsidized 'standard' meals, which could lead to problems if changes in the a la carte offerings caused profits in that area to drop. Presumably that's what all these negotiations with corporations referred to in the article are about.)

I do agree that the most important influences are those that come from home. If parents are routinely letting their kids eat junk food and sit around on their butts all day when not in school, then for schools to ban sales of junk food and require more PE is unlikely to adequately lay the foundation for a lifetime of good eating and exercise habits. But again, I don't think that's a good reason for schools to not prioritize what's in the longterm best interests of public health--whether that takes the form of promoting better nutrition, or promoting more exercise; and whether every individual student and parent are happy about it or not.