Should the Healthy-Hunger Free Kids Act be Repealed?

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The Healthy-Hunger Free Act of 2010 was passed to provide a healthier lunch program for students across the country. Five years has passed and the Healthy Hunger Free Kids Act was able change of how schools serve their lunches. But for opponents of the Act, they feel that the changes is not helping children to eat healthier meals and thinks that the Act is just wasting money.

157 Republicans voted for “No” when the Act was still a proposed bill in Congress.  As this Act was supported by President Obama and the majority of Democrats. According to The Hill, Republicans wants to reauthorize the Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act. Republican Senator John Hoeven (R-N.D.) wants to a new legislation that would change the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) regulations. He wanted to stop the USDA from lowering more sodium in meals and not making every meal to be whole grain.

The article states that “The school lunch regulations have been a lightning rod criticism from Republicans who say the healthier meals—a central component of the First Lady’s Let’s Move Campaign to fight childhood obesity—are inedible and driving up costs for schools where fewer students are participating in lunch programs.”  To many Republicans the Act is causing more government spending and feel it won’t help many students who would likely not to eat the healthy meals that are being served.  This statement also shows their opposition with First Lady Michelle Obama’s campaign with childhood obesity like the same reasons with the Healthy-Hunger Free Kids Act, it would cost many government spending.

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Schools can potentially lose money because students would rather eat a packed lunch or not eat at all than eating healthier meals. The article also describes the school lunch budget nationwide, “The USDA estimates that the new school lunch standards will cost school districts $1.2 billion in additional food and labor expenses this year. Roughly 1.4 million fewer students are choosing to eat the school provided lunch.” With a large money spending for the Act every year many opponents (especially Republicans) feel that the government spending is wasted if students won’t buy/eat the foods they eat.

Modifying foods to become healthier is not helping students to eat the lunches. According to a New York Times Article, it points out that not much are changed besides taking out the unhealthier foods that children eat. According to Bertrand Weber, who works for the Minneapolis Public Schools says, “Other than mandating more fruits and vegetables, the new regulations haven’t really changed anything except force manufacturers to re-engineer products” This is a rising concern to the opponents of the Act because of how the Act is making schools to only provide whole grain based  foods. Whole grain foods are not very popular with students who would want to eat a pasta or pizza and most likely to be pre-packaged or frozen.

Time is important for schools and many students have less time to eat lunch due to their short lunch time period. Opponents believe that the Act is ineffective because students don’t have time to therefore they would throw away the lunches especially the fruits and vegetables in their lunch trays. A NPR article, shows a report from the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. It states, “…the researchers saw these students eating 13 percent less of their main entrée and 12 percent less of their vegetables. They drank 10 percent less milk, too, compared with students who had 25 minutes or more to eat. They also found more food waste among kids who had less time to eat.” This fact shows that to make the Act to be effective, schools should give more time for the students to eat food completely rather than wasting it away in the trash. In the statement, students would definitely focus more on the main entrée rather than the fruits and vegetables and one of the Act’s goals is make students eat fruits and vegetables but with this report it seems that the Act is not working effectively.

These factors about the Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act shows reasons why opponents of the Act thinks that the Act is not working effectively to schools and particularly to the students who are the primary consumers of the healthier lunches. If more concerns about the Act arise, it can possible that the Act might be repealed.

Packed Lunch or Cafeteria Lunch? Which is better for the kids?

Many young students rely on cafeteria lunch because it is primarily convenient for them as their parents don’t need to pack for their lunches. But there are still students prefer lunches being packed by their parents. The article compares packed lunches and cafeteria lunches as which kind of lunch can be more nutritious for the students. Comparing packed lunches and the cafeteria lunches seems to be under reported because people will assume that both types of lunches are the same.

Free reduced lunches, are one of the main reasons why students are getting the lunches in the cafeteria. School lunches saves parents time to not pack their children’s meal but also money.

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But on the other side other parents might want to pack lunches for the children as the article states, “If you don’t trust that schools are offering the best nutrition, however, or you’re the parent of a picky eater, packing a meal may seem like the wise choice.” Parents are concerned of what their children are eating as children can be very particular at what they eat. Sometimes, parents have no choice to prepare the lunches just to satisfy their kids and not complain about their food.

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The article shifts through the changes of the healthier school lunches. From more serving of fruits and vegetables to more whole grains. But those fruits and vegetables are sometimes not suited to children’s taste. Children could still have fruits and vegetables that they actually prefer to eat if their own parents pack their lunch. Taste of the school lunches can be bland to children, and they would depend to their parents to make them better food which sometimes can be not so nutritious.

The article also included the USDA’s school lunch standards as it explains, “Consequently, the agency has cut calories, lowered sodium and slashed sugar content.” This can be a good news to many parents are concerned of their children eating processed food in schools. Parents would still want their children to have healthy choices of foods while in schools.

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The news of the obesity epidemic is what concerns the USDA to develop the healthier choices and the cafeteria lunches are the best way to implement healthier choices. But the downside is that the healthier choices can be meaningless as parents would pack their children food that can considered unhealthy by the USDA. But the school and the USDA cannot interfere the parents’ decision to pack their children unhealthy or healthy food.

By the end of the article, it sums up that the cafeteria lunch program is not as bad as many people can assume because of the new healthier options. The fact that packed lunches can be the food that children prefer is a good factor for children to eat their lunches. But the article explains, “For parents (or their children) who insist on a bagged lunch, the costs will be higher for comparable or better meals, and diligent effort is needed to ensure the contents are truly healthy.” This statement shows that packed lunches can be more expensive to parents and be actually not as healthy as the cafeteria lunches are serving.

As a student who experienced to buy cafeteria lunches and make my own packed lunches, I can see both of the positives and negatives of both lunch methods. When I get the cafeteria lunches, the food can still be hot and I don’t need to wake up early to actually prepare for food. The downside is that sometimes I would not like the food that is being served and I would just end up throwing the food away, which just wasted my money. For packed lunches, I have the choices I want to eat because I am making what kind of food I’m going to eat. The negatives is that not as warm anymore and I would need more time in the morning to actually prepare my food. I feel that both packed and cafeteria lunches both have negatives and positives and no method is better than the other. The students have the decision what they want to eat either made by their parents or their school cafeteria.

Is the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act a success or not?

When I first started researching about the healthy school lunches, I really wanted to know more about the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act because this act that was passed on 2010 by President Barack Obama started this concern of changing how schools serve a healthier lunch for students.

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According to the Wall Street Journal, the Hunger-Free Kids Act might not as be successful as it expected to be. Michelle Obama was stated being an advocate for the law for years to prevent childhood obesity and one way to actually prevent it is serving healthier options in lunches across the country.

The problem that the article points out is about Congress as it states, “…Congress prepares to reauthorize the program, which expire s in September, lawmakers are sharpening their knives to address complaints of inedible meals, food waste and misspent funds.” This statement is very alarming because there is a possibility that Congress will cut back funding to the funding and the budget of having fresh and less processed food will be hard for schools to actually buy. Cutting back funding can also mean going back to the old methods of how school lunches are.

Money is a big factor to make the Act to be successful. About $12 billion is spent to the National School Lunch Program, the program itself served 32 million students nationwide. This shows how fascinating that just serving healthier food can really be expensive with only the possibility that children will not eat their foods and throw it away.

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The article points out something similar in my experience when I was still in high school, “The students go hungry most of the day, until after school when enterprising vendors sell items like pork rinds, hot chips, or fresh corn mixed with cheese and mayonnaise from food carts outside of the school.” I am able to relate to this type of scenario because I am one of those students that are hungry by the end of the day either because the serving of the school lunch was just not enough for me or I did not have time to eat it and throw my lunch away. I remembered that after school hours,  I would go to the nearest fast food chain that was near at my high school almost every week because I am too hungry too walk home. I now realized that I spend a lot of money on my school lunches (I myself did not get did not get free or reduced lunch so I need to pay the full price of the lunch) and at the end I was still hungry.

Not only buying the fresher goods affect or the “free” lunch affect the Act but also other factors like buying food trucks and possibly labor are also needed to be funded so the lunch system can able to function properly.

An interesting fact about the article is about the school lunches helping fight obesity. The article points out many factors that doesn’t seem to give a good word towards the Act. The article shows, “According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, five states had childhood obesity rates from 15%-19% in 2009. In 2013 eight states had rates that high.” This is a serious information because one of the Act’s main purpose is decrease the childhood obesity but the Act is already in its fifth year being implemented yet the statistics showed no improvement.

Getting School Lunches In A Short Amount Of Time

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As I was searching through sources about healthier school lunches, I encountered a NPR article that actually was surprising to me and made me re-think of the idea that children won’t eat lunch just because they don’t like vegetables or fruits. Time of their school lunches also affect how much they eat.

The article states that many students in school doesn’t have enough time to finish their food during their recess time. A factor of this is that kids would need to fall in line for food and many students would have less time eating if they were in the back of the line because they spent their whole recess waiting to get their food.

Eric Rimm,  from Harvard School of Public Health and his fellow researchers conducted observations in Massachusetts schools of how well the students are eating. Rimm told the NPR, “Kids who had less than 20 minutes to eat were consuming, across the board, less of everything”. To my perspective, I do remember that if I bought lunch when I was in high school and I was at the back of the line, I would only have about 10 minutes to eat my entire meal before the bell rings for the next class to begin. In some days, I would most likely just throw away the food because I can’t finish it which is a waste money to me because I lined up for food but in the end it will be ending up in the waste.

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Another interesting fact was a report from the NPR, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Harvard School of Public Health about how many minutes students get to eat lunches, “…20 percent of parents of students from kindergarten through fifth grade told us that their child gets 15 minute or less to eat”. This was very interesting to me because children should have more time to enjoy their foods because it is their recess time. Making children eat faster because the time is short can really affect how children eat because children are aware that if they use more time to eat they would most likely cannot do other things they do during their recess (playing in the playground or talking with other classmates).

The article also states about the National School Lunch program’s free meals increased because many children were qualified for it. Which is a big factor of the longer lines to getting lunches and less eating time for the students. This should be positive, because children are getting free meals but at the same time if they don’t have time to eat the lunch it could just end up to waste. This can be a potential reason why that the government is keeping a low budget to spend on school lunches because they know that not every food served is eaten.

Overall, this made me think more of the factors of children not eating school lunches. Before reading this article, the only fact that I can come up with of children not eating is because children are picky eater I never expected that time for their recess is affecting how they eat. This is helpful for me for my research if there could be also changes adding more time in school lunches so students can eat and actually enjoy fresher healthier school lunches.