School Lunches Essay

Food within school lunches scares many as it is a growing issue that has already been present for many years. Poor food quality, management of cost, and choice of food all prove the growing need for improvement to school lunches. School lunch is a high percentage of most children’s daily calorie intake. Given this reasoning, it is of utmost importance to improve the quality of school lunches to ensure the proper growth and development of the next generations. It is not an easy problem to fix by any means but it is accomplishable. With the cooperation of food distributors and government organizations, improving school lunch is not an impossible feat. The quality of food in school lunchrooms is well below par compared to other industries that

Many schools face issues where vending machines and heavily processed food are prevalent. These are main contributors to a big problem many schools are facing, obesity. Obesity is a problem on the rise and wont stop until the quality of food is improved. “Fifteen percent of U.S. children and teenagers are overweight—triple the rate of 35 years ago, and a higher percentage than in any other industrialized country” found by the American academy of Pediatrics amplifies the thought that obesity is definitely a rising problem and is growing at a rapid rate (Harkin). A recent study tracked fourth graders going into fifth grade and found astonishing results in a bad way, “…where they gained access to school vending machines, snack bars and other food sources. As fifth-graders, they consumed 33 percent less fruit, 42 percent less vegetables, and 35 percent less milk than they did the previous year as fourth-graders” (Harkin). This shows the drastic change in children's diets when exposed to unhealthier food options. Also, most schools claim the food they serve and prepare is made from scratch but that is not the case. An example of this, “...she retrieved several five-pound bags of ‘beef crumbles,’ grayish-brown bits of extruded meat and soy protein, from a walk-in freezer and loaded them into a commercial steamer” is shown by this quote stating the beef that goes into the food into school lunches is bagged up and heavily processed (Bruske). Many students suffer from mental disabilities that are only more severe when they consume unhealthy food, like school lunch. Growing children are what they eat so when they eat unhealthy food they are going to see unhealthy results. “As the brain grows, it selects building blocks from among the fatty acids available in what the child eats” is an important piece of information when considering the brain is about 60% structural fat (Greene). So how much does