Recently there has been an uptick in childhood obesity in America. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) states that since the 1970s childhood obesity has tripled. Childhood obesity is defined by the CDC as, “A BMI at or above the 95th percentile for children and teens of the same age and sex,” (CDC Healthy Schools 1). Jennifer Rutledge, Associate Professor of Political Science at the City University of New York, regards the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) as a beloved organization that, “Is understood today as a primary tool in the fight against poverty, as well as a primary arena for the fight against obesity,”(Rutledge 1). The increase in childhood obesity has led some important people, such as Michelle Obama, to be more concerned about this problem. One of her primaries focuses to reduce childhood obesity was school lunches. A study conducted by Diane Schanzenbach, Director of the Institute for Policy Research and professor for the School of Education and Social Policy at Northwestern University, said, “In a simple look at the data, students who eat school lunches are more likely to be overweight than their classmates who brown bag their lunch.” (Schanzenbach 689) The aforementioned data indicate that school lunches can contribute to children being obese. This problem can not continue to be accepted by parents and school administrators.
History of school lunches
Bernard Gifford, former Deputy Chancellor of the New York City Public School System, said, “The service of meals to school children was first undertaken in 1853 by the Children's Aid Society of New York, which organized a number of industrial schools for vagrant boys and girls.” (Gifford 3). These children had unstable homes and these meals were what they depended on to survive. Then in 1909, a few teachers created an organization to give out sandwich lunches for children at two Manhattan schools (Gifford 3). The concept of school lunches spread and the school lunch committee was created to address malnutrition (Gifford 3). Originally, school lunches were designed to give students their basic nutrition and included more vitamins. Bernard Gifford noted, “With the advent of the depression in the 1930s, the President of the (New York City) Board of Education, Superintendent of Schools, and chief school officials formally joined the School Lunch Committee.”(Gifford 4) With the funding from the school board for school lunches, the program grew even more and gained national attention. This led to the NSLP being formed in 1946. Even though this program had been around for many years it initially was not sizable or easily accessible to poor children. Susan Levine, an alumnus of M.I.T. and co-director of the center for early childhood research, adds, “Until the 1970s, the program reached only a small percentage of American children and served very few free lunches. All the while, however, the NSLP stood as one of the nation’s most popular social welfare programs.” (Levine 2)
Then the National School Lunch Act was passed and it was a revolutionary passage that proclaimed, “A policy of Congress, as a measure of national security, to safeguard the health and well-being of the nation’s children and to encourage the domestic consumption of nutritious agricultural commodities and other food by assisting the states, through grants-in-aid and other means, in providing an adequate supply of food and other facilities for the establishment, maintenance, operation and expansion of non-profit school lunch program.”(Gifford 6) This program not only helped kids with food insecurity but also farmers with surplus goods and the military. Bernard Gifford reports “In 1935 the Department of Agriculture was authorized to distribute 30 percent of their surplus commodities to school lunch programs. This served the dual purpose of improving the diet and health of schoolchildren and providing farmers a market for their surplus food.” (Gifford 5) Also around this time, World War II was unfolding, and “General Hershey told Congress that the nation sustained 155,000 casualties as a result of malnutrition.”(Gifford 5) This encouraged national interest in nutritional deficiencies and led to people becoming more invested in keeping children healthy.
Lunch Policies and Laws
School lunch has been a widely popular program for people who are interested in kids' well-being and health. However, school lunches attract attention from other less concerning beneficiaries Susan Levine asserts that “school lunches have been tied to the agenda of one of the federal government's most powerful agencies, the Department of Agriculture, and more recently, to the corporate food and food-service industries as well.”(Levine 4) This influence from corporate food businesses leads to their product being sold in these schools. When food is sold outside of the national school lunch and breakfast program it is commonly known as “competitive foods” this is because these foods can avert students away from NSLP. This may not seem like its a big deal but competitive food regulations are comprehensively different and limited. Helene Greves, assistant professor for the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Washington, and her colleague Frederick Rivara note, “When competitive foods are available in schools, children consume more fat and sugar and consume fewer fruits, vegetables, and milk. Schools face a dilemma in restricting the sale of snack foods and beverages because they generate significant revenue, especially in exclusive contracts with soda companies,”(Greves 2). The prevalence of these unhealthy snacks could lead to children becoming obese.
Until recently these foods did not have to follow federal regulations if they were not sold in NSLP food service areas. Jay Hirschman, director for special nutrition at the USDA, and Jamie Chriqui, professor of health policy at the University of Illinois at Chicago, said that “regulations were quite minimal; they prohibited the sale of 'foods of minimal nutritional value' (FMNV) which only included sodas and certain types of candies that competed with the school meal programs in places where meals were sold.”(Hirschman, and Chriqui 1) This was before the Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 which gave federal agencies the right to regulate food sold in school even if it was not sold in NSLP areas. That is only a fraction of what the bill modifies. Michael Todd, a professor at Arizona State University, and his colleagues state that “The 2010 Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act (Public Law 111-296; HHFKA) aligned National School Lunch Program (NSLP) and School Breakfast Program (SBP) requirements with the Dietary Guidelines for Americans. New NSLP meal patterns, implemented in a school year (SY) 2012–2013, included more fruits, vegetables, and whole grains and a gradual reduction in sodium content.”(Vaudrin, et al. 84)
Then in 2015, the politicians opposing the strict regulations of the Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act succeeded in their pursuit to change the bill. Maya Rhodians, the former New York Times writer, states, “2015 spending bill includes language that curbs any further reduction of sodium in school lunches “until the latest scientific research establishes the reduction is beneficial for children.” By the 2022 school year, schools are required to serve meals with less than 740 mg of sodium—roughly equivalent to a six-piece chicken nugget kid’s meal with a side of fries at Burger King and about half of the levels currently allowed under the current guidelines.”(Rhodan 1) If the policies surrounding school lunches would be less politicized then there would be a much more cohesive impact on children's nutrition.
Conclusion
Something must be done to reduce the childhood obesity epidemic. Although fixing school lunches will not solve the whole problem, it is a start. We must decrease the excess fat, sugar, and preservatives which are a direct link to childhood obesity. Lawmakers and educational board members must work together to find a solution that will positively impact the children, especially as it relates to the NSLP. If there’s no healthy solution, soon, then the people who are most at risk are the children.