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Chicago School Bans Brown Bag Lunches from Home


JBailey

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Don't worry 'bout picking on me, I can take it ;) I think the "lifestyle choices cost us all" argument leaves out an important factor: our RIGHTS. Until smoking is completely banned in this country, don't frown at me for eating Cheetos, or supporting the rights of Cheeto-eating kiddos. I know MDs, PhDs, and all sorts of people who smoke, and they're on my group health insurance. But they're entitled to smoke, or drink, or eat pork fat, or hate broccoli, or drink 20 cups of coffee a day. Consumption choices aren't rational economic decisions, thank God (or Buddha, or Allah, or the nuclear strong force or.....) For the record, today's lunch included a bag of Cheez-nips from the vending machine down the hall. I also had a carton of nonfat greek yogurt and a V-8. I picked the Cheez-nips 'cause the 2 oz bag has more protein than a comparably sized bag of potato chips. Did I make this calculation as a kid? No, I just ate the Cheez-nips 'cause I liked 'em, along with a spicy SlimJim and a Dr. Pepper. And I even managed graduate school on such inferior nutritional material, quelle horreur. (My bloodwork is fine, thank-you-very-much, and my grandma lived to 94 on pork fat & homemade white bread.)

I fully support better school food for kids...but we also need to teach basic home economics. Cooking, nutrition, and budgeting need to be a part of the curriculum--along with enjoyment, pleasure, and the power of food to bring people together.

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Think about this for a moment, particularly the USAers in here. Why do your health insurance premiums go up? Health care is getting more expensive, but not [just] because individual treatments are more expensive. Health care in the USA is getting more expensive because 1) we are living for longer periods of time, 2) we are dealing with more chronic illness, and 3) we are living lifestyles that facilitate the development of chronic illnesses (i.e. obesity and diabetes).

US Healthcare is expensive for all of those reasons and, the simple fact that it is the best. Tiny premature babies (<25 weeks) are kept alive until they are ready to leave the hospital, all at the cost of many thousands, if not millions, of dollars. No heroic measure is spared to persons who are injured in accidents and shootings. Care is not refused to anyone, regardless of their ability to pay. Research and development of new drugs, surgical procedures and instruments are costly.

My point, to bring it back around the Chicago's school lunch program, is that "healthy" lunches that are not being eaten, are a waste of tax-payer monies. I have long questioned the necessity of schools providing meals to pupils, anyway. I am tired of being lectured to by talking heads on television and unelected public officials such as Mrs. Obama who hold no degrees or special knowledge about nutrition and are not themselves dieticians. This is all my long-winded way of telling them all to get off my lawn.

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Why is a McD's breakfast being described as devoid of nutrition?

Egg, meat, grain-based starch, possibly cheese and potato.

Its high in fat and therefore calories, but not devoid of nutritional value.

Its probably no higher in fat than the much beloved egg-in-a-nest of many pages of eg discussion.

Are you advocating that people should regularly consume McD's? And I question the nutritional value of their offerings.

My breakfast today consisted of scrambled eggs w/cheddar, homefries and a dash of Tabasco; large orange; orange juice and a tall glass of milk. Slightly over 1,150 calories, 49g protein, 56g fat and 119g carbs. More important for my purposes are the total g of protein than the calories or fat.

I eat like this almost every day.

I'd be hard pressed to find an equivalent meal at Mc'D's that provided a similar macronutrient breakdown.

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What do you think? Do you object to the rule for the sake of the rule, or because the rule results in kids eating crappy food?

I object to the rule for the sake of the rule, and my child would be exempted from it for medical reasons. I'd not send my child to any school with that rule by whatever means necessary, even though she wouldn't be subject to it.

The idea that it is better for children to go hungry than to eat a less-healthy-than-someone-else-decided-is-required meal is insane. I had to supervise my child's lunch for a few days this year because she wasn't eating enough, and we were noticing behavioral and educational problems. Discussing it with her teachers, they were also of the opinion that a less-than-nutritious lunch was preferable to no lunch in terms of how much learning happened and how little in-class disruption there was.

Are there societal bad things that happen when people eat too much? Yup. Is that the problem of the schools? Does this solve that problem? Not in my opinion. Schools are there to educate. Educating about nutrition and healthy choices and taking care of you body can fall within that mandate. Requiring the consumption of specific foods? No.

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I'm not from Chicago or even the States, but I am a primary school teacher. The first term of the year has just finished. Our topic for the term was 'Are we healthy? What's the big deal?' and focused largely on healthy eating. The vast majority of my students come from low socioeconomic backgrounds. The food is often bad: mum dropping off cold McDonald's fries, cold chicken nuggets stored in an unchilled lunchbox for a couple of days, sandwiches made from mouldy bread. A packet of sweet biscuits. Sometimes no food at all, meaning I have to walk little Sandra down the hall to make her a jam sandwich for the third time in March.

Schools in Australia by and large have canteens or, where 'lunch orders' are rarer (in higher socioeconomic areas), get their food in from somewhere else. The Department of Education, in Victoria at least, deems canteens can only sell 'healthy' food. Healthy food includes frozen pizza, chicken nuggets, heavily processed pasta-based meals. Nothing, aside from the sandwiches, is made on site. The ingredients in the sandwiches aren't always fresh or particularly good, either. Mayonnaise that has nothing to do with eggs, not even a little bit, anyone? Our school canteen, despite the poverty of the area, is very popular as our ... demographic has the belief, I guess it's a cultural thing, that you're showing a lot more love if you buy your child something as opposed to make them something. Conversly, I have a couple of parents who come in with freshly made dumplings or noodles every single day (sometimes giving me some, which is pretty rad, no?).

We tread lightly. Basically, I can't look at little Sandra's lunch of biscuits and leftover cake and tell her that's unhealthy, that maybe she should bring a sandwich tomorrow. I mean, we attempt to educate, without browbeating, the children, but they're not the ones who buy the food. Maybe, when they're given three dollars, they could choose an egg and lettuce sandwich over a tub of spaghetti bolognese-flavoured shit when they hand in their lunch order, but that's about it. Kids, mostly, will choose the nuggets or bolognese over the egg and lettuce, if the choice is left to them. Many of my kids make their own lunches out of whatever is in the cupboard--meaning maybe there's bread, maybe, but probably there isn't much more than the sweet biscuits and the leftover muffins, purchased when the supermarket was trying to shift produce nearing its use-by, from a few days ago.

The parents themselves are often uneducated, too. They might really care but they might not realise that some of these options aren't really appropriate for a growing body.

Getting used of this was, for me, difficult. The people I worked with were hardened to it. I was horrified, those first few days, at some of the lunches I saw. At the lack of lunches. And yet, it's not my place or the school's place to deal with it directly. We can hope to tackle it indirectly by getting the kids to make cut-and-paste healthy food pyramids. Or send them off to research terms like 'balanced diet' and 'vitamins' and 'protein' and 'cereal'. Maybe show them snippets of that Jamie Oliver TED speech. We can make Sandra and Jasmin sandwiches when they have nothing: when there's nothing in the cupboard, when Dad should've swung by at lunchtime to bring lunch but 'forgot', when the seven year old kid was piss farting around watching cartoons before school and didn't make sandwiches--after all, dad's God-knows-where and mum starts work at maybe four in the morning, so no one is around to remind the kids that they better get their act together and crack open the Nutella. And yet we can't tell the parents off for feeding their kid shit. We can't tell Tri that maybe it's not the best idea, especially for a kid already that big, to be eating cold, rock hard chicken nuggets day in, day out. If we do, we get in trouble. And really, these kids work with what they have. So do the families in some cases. It's not good. It's not right. But it's the way it is. I can't change it--and even if I could, I'm way outside of mandate if I try. It's not a school's place to enforce some policy that says, 'You must eat this or that.' It's worse, of course, when the food you 'must' eat is crap. But even if it was really healthy and really cheap, it's still not the school's place to enforce it--they can and should encourage it without condemning the parents who feed their kids crap but at some point it has to be on parents, not on schools, to devise and enforce suitable diets for children. I don't think our mandate should be expanded. We take on enough as it is.

Edited by ChrisTaylor (log)

Chris Taylor

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I've never met an animal I didn't enjoy with salt and pepper.

Melbourne
Harare, Victoria Falls and some places in between

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Why is a McD's breakfast being described as devoid of nutrition?

Egg, meat, grain-based starch, possibly cheese and potato.

Its high in fat and therefore calories, but not devoid of nutritional value.

Its probably no higher in fat than the much beloved egg-in-a-nest of many pages of eg discussion.

Are you advocating that people should regularly consume McD's? And I question the nutritional value of their offerings.

My breakfast today consisted of scrambled eggs w/cheddar, homefries and a dash of Tabasco; large orange; orange juice and a tall glass of milk. Slightly over 1,150 calories, 49g protein, 56g fat and 119g carbs. More important for my purposes are the total g of protein than the calories or fat.

I eat like this almost every day.

I'd be hard pressed to find an equivalent meal at Mc'D's that provided a similar macronutrient breakdown.

I first mentioned McD's as an example. While not devoid of nutrition, those who choose to feed that cheap , badly made and bad tasting food to their growing children on a REGULAR basis (as in 5 to 7 days a week...and yes I know those who do) are doing them a huge disservice. My kids eat at McD maybe once a month and that to them is a big treat. It is my responsibility to make sure they eat well. So I do appreciate what Mrs. Obama is trying to do with her message. she is not stepping on any lawns or forcing people do anything. You do not have to be a nutritionist to give some common sense advise like "soda makes you fat and drinking water is probably a better option". She is the first lady and that's her cause.

That is really not the point of this thread though and we are deviating from it a lot. We can discuss all kinds of political, economic, culinary and sociological issues that have come up but that might not be such a great idea, so to get back to the topic at hand,

OliverB and everyone else who objects to this question, would you be opposed to this school-provided-lunch mandate if the food was actually healthy? Most schools serve relatively horrible food (poor nutritional value, poor taste, etc.), which always comes up in the objection, but which if they served good food?

I don't think I would be opposed to such a rule, if the menu was something I, or maybe Jamie Oliver, would approve of.

What do you think? Do you object to the rule for the sake of the rule, or because the rule results in kids eating crappy food?

Yes I would be opposed to it because it makes no sense, unlike say the requirement for the children to be vaccinated before going to school. I would love it if my kid's school offered really tasty, healthy and fresh made food even if it is a 1 or 2 dollars more, but I do not appreciate having to be forced to buy it. The fact that this Chicago school is forcing the kids to buy the same junk food as every other school just adds insult to injury. Like someone said up-thread this is really simple, those who want to pack their kids their lunch should be allowed to do so and those who elect to buy the school's food can still do that. If I am faced with the option of the school not offering any lunches, that is fine as well. The parents need to feed their kids, not the school. Does anyone really think that what the Chicago school is doing is really doing the kids any good? I very much doubt even the motive behind it. I still think it's some kickback of some sort.

E. Nassar
Houston, TX

My Blog
contact: enassar(AT)gmail(DOT)com

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US Healthcare is expensive for all of those reasons and, the simple fact that it is the best.

I hope you are not serious. In which other countries have you lived especially in the western world ? Healthcare in the US compared to many countries in western Europe is far from the best but rather disappointing.

So go over to the UK next time you want to see a specialist or have a transplant. Be sure to let us know how it goes. You may have lived in other countries, but I'm sure you weren't seriously ill, or even worse, old and seriously ill... or you'd have another viewpoint.

US healthcare is indeed the best in the world though it is inefficient and expensive.

What's this have to do with food?

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I don't see the healthcare business being more trustworthy than the new business or politics etc. But I think we should in general stop this off-topic discussion as it is not really food related and nobody will convince anybody else. We have just agree to disagree.

Edited by Honkman (log)
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Why is a McD's breakfast being described as devoid of nutrition?

Egg, meat, grain-based starch, possibly cheese and potato.

Its high in fat and therefore calories, but not devoid of nutritional value.

Its probably no higher in fat than the much beloved egg-in-a-nest of many pages of eg discussion.

Are you advocating that people should regularly consume McD's? And I question the nutritional value of their offerings.

My breakfast today consisted of scrambled eggs w/cheddar, homefries and a dash of Tabasco; large orange; orange juice and a tall glass of milk. Slightly over 1,150 calories, 49g protein, 56g fat and 119g carbs. More important for my purposes are the total g of protein than the calories or fat.

I eat like this almost every day.

I'd be hard pressed to find an equivalent meal at Mc'D's that provided a similar macronutrient breakdown.

I first mentioned McD's as an example. While not devoid of nutrition, those who choose to feed that cheap , badly made and bad tasting food to their growing children on a REGULAR basis (as in 5 to 7 days a week...and yes I know those who do) are doing them a huge disservice. My kids eat at McD maybe once a month and that to them is a big treat. It is my responsibility to make sure they eat well. So I do appreciate what Mrs. Obama is trying to do with her message. she is not stepping on any lawns or forcing people do anything. You do not have to be a nutritionist to give some common sense advise like "soda makes you fat and drinking water is probably a better option". She is the first lady and that's her cause.

That is really not the point of this thread though and we are deviating from it a lot. We can discuss all kinds of political, economic, culinary and sociological issues that have come up but that might not be such a great idea, so to get back to the topic at hand,

OliverB and everyone else who objects to this question, would you be opposed to this school-provided-lunch mandate if the food was actually healthy? Most schools serve relatively horrible food (poor nutritional value, poor taste, etc.), which always comes up in the objection, but which if they served good food?

I don't think I would be opposed to such a rule, if the menu was something I, or maybe Jamie Oliver, would approve of.

What do you think? Do you object to the rule for the sake of the rule, or because the rule results in kids eating crappy food?

Yes I would be opposed to it because it makes no sense, unlike say the requirement for the children to be vaccinated before going to school. I would love it if my kid's school offered really tasty, healthy and fresh made food even if it is a 1 or 2 dollars more, but I do not appreciate having to be forced to buy it. The fact that this Chicago school is forcing the kids to buy the same junk food as every other school just adds insult to injury. Like someone said up-thread this is really simple, those who want to pack their kids their lunch should be allowed to do so and those who elect to buy the school's food can still do that. If I am faced with the option of the school not offering any lunches, that is fine as well. The parents need to feed their kids, not the school. Does anyone really think that what the Chicago school is doing is really doing the kids any good? I very much doubt even the motive behind it. I still think it's some kickback of some sort.

The obvious answer, of course, is that parenting begins at home and is best left out of the school system. But I don't think that's so easily implemented because if you run with that line of argument to its natural conclusion, one can very quickly end up with "child abuse" instead of "parental rights".

It's funny you mentioned the angle about kickbacks, because I received that impression as well.

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US healthcare is indeed the best in the world though it is inefficient and expensive.

Measured how? If we are to measure by outcomes, it fairs poorly. It may well be that the "inputs" are significantly worse (almost certainly the highest obesity rates, etc in the industrialized world) and that the outcomes are bad because the system has such poor material to work with, but I think Americans should examine that assertion and get a lot more methodical about measuring its effectiveness. Casual observation says it is not only inefficient, it is poorer then other countries of similar wealth. That indicates that some serious inspection is probably in order.

As to school lunches, I don't have kids yet, but I'd seriously object to a school that told my kids they had to eat at the caf; to the point of withdrawing them. I'd also not tolerate a requirement for clear or mesh backpacks, or metal detectors. I will not have my children brought up thinking that level of authoritarianism is appropriate.

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OliverB and everyone else who objects to this question, would you be opposed to this school-provided-lunch mandate if the food was actually healthy? Most schools serve relatively horrible food (poor nutritional value, poor taste, etc.), which always comes up in the objection, but which if they served good food?

I don't think I would be opposed to such a rule, if the menu was something I, or maybe Jamie Oliver, would approve of.

What do you think? Do you object to the rule for the sake of the rule, or because the rule results in kids eating crappy food?

Yes I would be opposed to it because it makes no sense, unlike say the requirement for the children to be vaccinated before going to school. I would love it if my kid's school offered really tasty, healthy and fresh made food even if it is a 1 or 2 dollars more, but I do not appreciate having to be forced to buy it. The fact that this Chicago school is forcing the kids to buy the same junk food as every other school just adds insult to injury. Like someone said up-thread this is really simple, those who want to pack their kids their lunch should be allowed to do so and those who elect to buy the school's food can still do that. If I am faced with the option of the school not offering any lunches, that is fine as well. The parents need to feed their kids, not the school. Does anyone really think that what the Chicago school is doing is really doing the kids any good? I very much doubt even the motive behind it. I still think it's some kickback of some sort.

The obvious answer, of course, is that parenting begins at home and is best left out of the school system. But I don't think that's so easily implemented because if you run with that line of argument to its natural conclusion, one can very quickly end up with "child abuse" instead of "parental rights".

It's funny you mentioned the angle about kickbacks, because I received that impression as well.

I don't really buy the slippery slope argument here. Of course, if someone is feeding their kids dog food, then it's not a matter of parental rights anymore. We are just talking about parents packing their kids a sandwich or some leftover rice and beans. See, if we follow the whole argument to its eventual eventual conclusion, some people are not fit to take care of themselves let alone their kids, but unfortunately they can still have kids. That is definitely a different subject :smile:

E. Nassar
Houston, TX

My Blog
contact: enassar(AT)gmail(DOT)com

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Hmm, the cafeteria needs a minimum level of participation in order to be economically viable. If half the school opts out, the whole endeavor may become unworkable. I can't see how making all kids buy a school lunch is horrifically authoritarian...if you can't afford a school lunch in the US, you'll get a free or reduced-price lunch. Kids sit together, everyone eating the same thing: if you don't like it, you trade parts of it away for the stuff you do like. You don't like nuggets? Fine, then eat the banana. You want two desserts? Hey, if you do my math homework, the dessert is yours. Don't want the milk? Then don't drink it, or learn to dump it into the pudding to make the whole mess more palatable.

If the cafeteria food truly borders on the inedible, then get involved in improving it. That's what PTOs are for, isn't it?

What's controlling and authoritarian, to me, is a set of parents who can't stand the idea that SOMEONE ELSE might violate their precisely structured nutritional/food rules. Get over it, people: as soon as your kid is old enough to leave the house with more than 50 cents in pocket money, he's gonna eat whatever he damn well pleases, regardless of your nutritional counsel and/or food rules. If inferior school food once a day is a threat to your parenting and/or ability to impart values to your children, you'd better get a Canadian prescription for Valium to take you through the teen years.

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OliverB and everyone else who objects to this question, would you be opposed to this school-provided-lunch mandate if the food was actually healthy? Most schools serve relatively horrible food (poor nutritional value, poor taste, etc.), which always comes up in the objection, but which if they served good food?

I don't think I would be opposed to such a rule, if the menu was something I, or maybe Jamie Oliver, would approve of.

What do you think? Do you object to the rule for the sake of the rule, or because the rule results in kids eating crappy food?

Yes I would be opposed to it because it makes no sense, unlike say the requirement for the children to be vaccinated before going to school. I would love it if my kid's school offered really tasty, healthy and fresh made food even if it is a 1 or 2 dollars more, but I do not appreciate having to be forced to buy it. The fact that this Chicago school is forcing the kids to buy the same junk food as every other school just adds insult to injury. Like someone said up-thread this is really simple, those who want to pack their kids their lunch should be allowed to do so and those who elect to buy the school's food can still do that. If I am faced with the option of the school not offering any lunches, that is fine as well. The parents need to feed their kids, not the school. Does anyone really think that what the Chicago school is doing is really doing the kids any good? I very much doubt even the motive behind it. I still think it's some kickback of some sort.

The obvious answer, of course, is that parenting begins at home and is best left out of the school system. But I don't think that's so easily implemented because if you run with that line of argument to its natural conclusion, one can very quickly end up with "child abuse" instead of "parental rights".

It's funny you mentioned the angle about kickbacks, because I received that impression as well.

I don't really buy the slippery slope argument here. Of course, if someone is feeding their kids dog food, then it's not a matter of parental rights anymore. We are just talking about parents packing their kids a sandwich or some leftover rice and beans. See, if we follow the whole argument to its eventual eventual conclusion, some people are not fit to take care of themselves let alone their kids, but unfortunately they can still have kids. That is definitely a different subject :smile:

I don't think it's a slippery slope argument. As you might be aware, neglect is part of the reasoning behind many of the wellness policies you see in place in schools today, based on the premise that a child that has access to good food behaves better and becomes more of a model student than someone who doesn't. Neglect can stem from any number of factors ... some economic (poverty), some social (poor parenting skills) and others.

Though this particular policy is akin to throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

They should take a page from NYC per this NYT article: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/06/nyregion/06critic.html

Edited by SobaAddict70 (log)
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What do you think? Do you object to the rule for the sake of the rule, or because the rule results in kids eating crappy food?

For me, I object "for the sake of the rule." I might think what other folks choose to feed their children is horrid. And in fact, every time I see a kid sitting there sucking down a sugar-laden soda, I do think that's horrid. Or stir some sort of sweet chocolate or strawberry powder into a perfectly good glass of milk. Or fill up on Cheetos and candy bars. And I certainly didn't let my three kiddos do any of that. But I don't think it's my business to order others to do it my way, no matter how strongly I feel that my way is better. Even though, of course, it clearly is.

If this were a private school, that would be one thing. You can choose to send your child or not. You can sit in the office when you're enrolling them and be told that "our school policy is that everyone must participate in the lunchroom program, so I'm sorry, but little Atticus and Scout cannot bring their lunch."

If you don't like it, you don't have to go there.

But to have the government mandate you, by law, to send your children to a public school where they also do all the deciding as to what you can and cannot send in with your children to eat, and your only recourse is something as difficult, expensive and, for many families, completely unworkable, as relocating your home, sending your child to a private school, or homeschooling is, to me anyway, utterly reprehensible.

Do you think, if I lived next door to you, and I saw you feeding your children things I deem to be harmful and unhealthy, causing all these dire consequences some of you are pointing to, like obesity, diabetes, etc., that should give me the right to go into your pantry and toss out everything I believe is contributing to these problems?

Would any reason I might give you, no matter how true, how valid or how justified and rational make that okay with you?

Because that's exactly what this is. Only instead of me, or some other members of the food police coming to your home, we're using the awesome power of the government to accomplish the same thing.

______________

Edited by Jaymes (log)

I don't understand why rappers have to hunch over while they stomp around the stage hollering.  It hurts my back to watch them. On the other hand, I've been thinking that perhaps I should start a rap group here at the Old Folks' Home.  Most of us already walk like that.

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My wife is a teacher. We have purchased at least a metric ton of "Malt-O-Meal" cereal, because if she didn't give many of her kids a breakfast, they wouldn't eat anything until dinner. (Yet mommy has a new nail-job every week and daddy has so many gold chains, he looks like "Mr. T.")

Neglect is pervasive and a lot more wide-spread than people seem to think.

Incidentally, she said, "Oh HELL no," when she read the original post. Our district feeds kids a diet of chicken fingers. The veg and the fruit get tossed, uneaten. (We never have to buy apples or oranges -- she brings home a dozen a day. 10 times as much is simply thrown out by kids who only eat fried, salty, sugary fat-laden crap.)

I think Jamie Oliver is preaching to an empty room.

Who cares how time advances? I am drinking ale today. -- Edgar Allan Poe

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Seriously, this is not about nutrition, but about money. It's the same in colleges: you have to pay for the food service (at Harvard that was about $8K/yr), even if you don't want/never eat the food and have to buy your food elsewhere, as my son did (he is congenitally averse to institutional food). The difference here is that the kids are not allowed to leave school to eat what they want.

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Seriously, this is not about nutrition, but about money. It's the same in colleges: you have to pay for the food service (at Harvard that was about $8K/yr), even if you don't want/never eat the food and have to buy your food elsewhere, as my son did (he is congenitally averse to institutional food). The difference here is that the kids are not allowed to leave school to eat what they want.

And the other difference is that the government is not ordering you to send your child to school at Harvard.

I don't understand why rappers have to hunch over while they stomp around the stage hollering.  It hurts my back to watch them. On the other hand, I've been thinking that perhaps I should start a rap group here at the Old Folks' Home.  Most of us already walk like that.

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Seriously, this is not about nutrition, but about money. It's the same in colleges: you have to pay for the food service (at Harvard that was about $8K/yr),

My university did not force me to take part in their meal program. It would surprise me if more than 30% had a mandatory meal program -- too many students live off-campus.

Who cares how time advances? I am drinking ale today. -- Edgar Allan Poe

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The school cafeteria is not a balanced budget institution. It is heavily subsidized. Its a marvelous thing to have, for kids who otherwise might not get a breakfast or a lunch. A brain needs fuel to function. Long-term the body prefers fuel that includes micronutrients and vitamins. Right here and now, the brain just wants calories.

So junk or not, kids who eat learn better than kids who dont.

Those of you who keep a stash for the kids who arent eating - many thanks for your thoughtfulness and kindness. I know to some degree its also self-serving - those kids are less disruptive when not hungry too, but there's no harm in getting two benefits from one kindness.

I dont like the policy of mandated school food only, because its one more right taken away because big brother knows best.

Besides, I can pack just enough food that herself has to eat it all in order not to be hungry. This gets the less desirable bits eaten (like the carrot sticks). School meals are the same size for 5 yr olds and 12 yr olds. That lets mine pitch 2/3 of it, which of course is the veg, fruit and milk.

Thus, she'd get plenty of protein and calories for the day (burgers, chicken fingers, and school pizza are good for that), but miss on the other benefits.

I like being able to micromanage lunch.

"You dont know everything in the world! You just know how to read!" -an ah-hah! moment for 6-yr old Miss O.

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Why is a McD's breakfast being described as devoid of nutrition?

Egg, meat, grain-based starch, possibly cheese and potato.

Its high in fat and therefore calories, but not devoid of nutritional value.

Its probably no higher in fat than the much beloved egg-in-a-nest of many pages of eg discussion.

Are you advocating that people should regularly consume McD's? And I question the nutritional value of their offerings.

My breakfast today consisted of scrambled eggs w/cheddar, homefries and a dash of Tabasco; large orange; orange juice and a tall glass of milk. Slightly over 1,150 calories, 49g protein, 56g fat and 119g carbs. More important for my purposes are the total g of protein than the calories or fat.

I eat like this almost every day.

I'd be hard pressed to find an equivalent meal at Mc'D's that provided a similar macronutrient breakdown.

Are you advocating that people should regularly consume McD's?

How did you get there from what I posted?

I question the nutritional value of their offerings.

Feel free: McD's nutrition breakdown

Not having the exact preferred nutritional breakdown of a specific adult male does not change the fact that the food from McD's does have reasonable, if high on fat, macro nutritional content. Most folks I know dont eat > 1000 calories at breakfast. They live somewhere in the 2000 cal a day range (2000-<3000) and split their calories between at least 3 meals (sometimes to include snacks).

Nevertheless, yours is the example given, so lets look at it:

Your meal ~ 1:1:2 protein grams: fat grams: carb grams

Ex from life (not cherrypicked for the results I want)

Sausage McMuffin w egg:

Calories 450

protein (g) 21

fat (g) 27

carbs (g) 30

It also has reportable amounts of Vit A, calcium and iron.

While I wouldnt want to serve it day in and day out, as breakfast go, its basically nutritious.

Add a glass of orange juice: (complete with Vitamin C)

150 calories

0 fat

30 g carbs

2 g protein

now the "hashbrown" is definitely a luxury item:

150 calories

9 gm fat - about 1/2 calories are from fat. No surprise there - its all deepfried crust.

1 g protein

15 gm carbs

We're looking at a total of

calories 750 = 450 + 150 + 150

protein (g) 24 g

fat (g) 36 g

carbs (g) 75 g

which is 1 : 1.5 : 3 which is not awful. High on fat as noted in my original post.

"You dont know everything in the world! You just know how to read!" -an ah-hah! moment for 6-yr old Miss O.

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Of course, parents that send in a bag of cheetos and a soda should probably have to talk to social services and get their head examined, see if something's in there. That's just outrageous.

I see this ALL the time. Their day starts with "My bus ride to get to school is 45 mins long and I wake up at 6am to get to school so I just eat some poptarts for breakfast" and then moves to a brown bag of chips, cold sandwhich and "fruit" juice.

At one school I worked at there was a kid who came in with a huge lunch bag that had a soda, a couple different kind of cookies, some M&Ms, all rounded off with a variety of chip snacks. The mother saw me looking at this "food" one day and explained that the kid was a picky eater and that she had given up on fighting with him over food choices. It was absolutely appalling -- this family would have benefited from the policy.

On the other hand, if the school had told ME I couldn't send a bag lunch with MY kid, I would have gone ballistic.

How would the kid have benefitted? He wouldn't have eaten anything at school almost guaranteed.

Maybe the kid would have discovered the joy of bread or potatoes, instead of having only packaged sugar or salt snacks. It's also possible that the kid might have tried something really exciting like jello or a piece of fruit. I didn't mention that the child was 5, so it's not as though the mom had spent much time trying.

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I'll make a leap of faith here that the Chicago school district that is mandating that the little cherubs eat only school provided lunches are not being bribed with candy rewards for doing their lessons as many school districts do. Because that would be wrong.

Edited by annabelle (log)
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"In a small double-blinded study of first-grade children, they had more behavior problems on the days that they were exposed to caffeinated colas than on the days that they had caffeine-free drinks. These findings may provide a simple answer to some instances of children's hyperactivity, according to principal investigator Alan R. Hirsch, MD." http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/505467

There are some excellent reasons to limit food choices of children because they have measurable adverse impact on the classroom environment and other children. A blanket ban on food from home, which coincidentally increases the profits of outside food contractors, is a boneheaded and ineffective way to improve things.

Re healthcare; the US ranks about 46th in infant mortality, despite spending almost twice as much per capita on healthcare as any other industrialized nation. Other measures of "health", which aren't so cut and dried as infant mortality(deaths per 1000 live births) also generally indicate that the US is somewhere around 30th to 40th in the world. see http://ucatlas.ucsc.edu/spend.php Mississippi has an infant mortality rate of ~10.7/1000; Minnesota has a rate of ~4.8/1000. Their per capita annual incomes are ~$30k and ~$42k respectively.

"Researchers at Goldman Sachs Group estimate that the top four publicly traded plans will show earnings increases averaging 21% in the fourth-quarter of 2010 compared to the year-earlier period. UnitedHealth could see profit rise in the fourth quarter by 17%, according to Bernstein estimates. Aetna Inc., which reports its numbers in early February, could see a 65% jump in the quarter just ended, says Goldman analyst Matthew Borsch." http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704590704576092202891817690.html

"In general, Americans think pretty highly of their own health care, a new poll finds."

"However, some 45% of people earning less than $50,000 rate their own care as a C, D or F, compared to 21% for those earning more than that." http://blogs.wsj.com/health/2011/04/12/americans-rate-their-own-health-care-highly-but-income-matters/

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There are some excellent reasons to limit food choices of children because they have measurable adverse impact on the classroom environment and other children. A blanket ban on food from home, which coincidentally increases the profits of outside food contractors, is a boneheaded and ineffective way to improve things.

I don't know about that. If everyone opted out of the lunch program, then there would be no money and virtually no way to ever improve the program.

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Was it just poor journalism that caused the authors of this article not to bother mentioning examples of the food on offer from this schools meals program? You would think that if the school is citing health as the reason to ban brown bag meals, then it would be worth mentioning what was on offer as an alternative.

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