Kids no longer can bring lunch to school?

[Greyelephant]

Any school that bans homemade lunches also puts more money in the pockets of the district's food provider, Chartwells-Thompson. The federal government pays the district for each free or reduced-price lunch taken, and the caterer receives a set fee from the district per lunch.


Is Chartwell-Thompson a union?

[Fencerjared]

Originally Posted by Greyelephant

Any school that bans homemade lunches also puts more money in the pockets of the district's food provider, Chartwells-Thompson. The federal government pays the district for each free or reduced-price lunch taken, and the caterer receives a set fee from the district per lunch.


Is Chartwell-Thompson a union?

Chartwells-Thompson is a mass quantities caterer. Chartwells alone used to be the food provider at Texas State University.

[ollie]

Healthily.

Food in schools is a hugely important topic, but I can't get through a post that uses "healthy" as an adverb without getting far more annoyed by that than the issue at hand. I know that this does not reflect well on me, but still. We all want the kids eating healthily. Please?

[robbdaman]

I'd be insulted if I was a parent with a kid in that school. Some parents have no clue and give their kids crap but others are going to give their kids a lot healthier food than the processed garbage that school will. Hell the food in prisons is probably healthier than some of the tripe they serve in schools.

[Wonderball68]

Originally Posted by robbdaman

I'd be insulted if I was a parent with a kid in that school. Some parents have no clue and give their kids crap but others are going to give their kids a lot healthier food than the processed garbage that school will. Hell the food in prisons is probably healthier than some of the tripe they serve in schools.

Absolutely. In fact some of the schools in the suburbs here (I don't know about this particular school, but my school does) get meats like chicken and beef from the same companies that sell to dog food companies. Also, last year, one student read the expiration date on a bottle of ranch dressing and discovered it should have been thown out 4 yrs ago. Yet the school was still setting it on the table. Needless to say, I bring my own lunch.

If the school served healthy food this rule would be fine by me, but they most likely don't. Some kind of regulation/ban of certain drinks would be a good idea though, so many problems would be solved if everyone just drank water or milk (which to me are 10x more refreshing than mountain dew any day, I really don't understand the obsession some people have with soda).

[ABOMINATION]

This honestly makes me sick about the obesity that school food...and irresponsible parents...is causing. For lunch, I usually have a PBJ or a turkey sandwich made on homemade bread and water. Pretty healthy, I'm guessing. Parents today just don't seem to care about what they're giving kids, and truly it is sickening..

~ABOM, glad that he lives in a home where 99% of the time his meal is homemade and not from a restaurant.

[jschild]

They briefly mention a bit about what is served but no real details...

Every lunch must contain whole grains, only reduced-fat salad dressings and mayonnaise are offered as condiments, and the meals must feature a different vegetable each day. Meal providers also must reduce sodium content by 5 percent annuall

[Einar's puppy]

I go to a high school centered in the middle of the town (small enough town, no two story buildings past a few private houses) that has an open campus policy (go where ever you want at lunch, as long as you're back by the bell) so not allowing us to bring lunches really wouldn't be horrible. This is of course, for me personally.

Within 5 minutes of walking from the school, we have a grocers/deli with pretty much whatever non-perishable good you could want, a burger joint that deep fries everything, and the cafeteria which is crap. Cheep, cheep, crap.

Within 5 minutes drive, you have about 45% of the student's homes, aprox. 10 local places to eat, and about 4 chain resturants. The options are really pretty broad, especially compared to most schools in rural or suburban areas like us.

What I'm getting around to saying is this: If a school wants to get rid of the bag lunch, they'd better provide some good options for students to pick from.

[jschild]

Originally Posted by Einar's puppy

I go to a high school centered in the middle of the town (small enough town, no two story buildings past a few private houses) that has an open campus policy (go where ever you want at lunch, as long as you're back by the bell) so not allowing us to bring lunches really wouldn't be horrible. This is of course, for me personally.

Within 5 minutes of walking from the school, we have a grocers/deli with pretty much whatever non-perishable good you could want, a burger joint that deep fries everything, and the cafeteria which is crap. Cheep, cheep, crap.

Within 5 minutes drive, you have about 45% of the student's homes, aprox. 10 local places to eat, and about 4 chain resturants. The options are really pretty broad, especially compared to most schools in rural or suburban areas like us.

What I'm getting around to saying is this: If a school wants to get rid of the bag lunch, they'd better provide some good options for students to pick from.

I think the comparison isn't very accurate here as it's High School vs. Middle and Urban vs. Rural. The differences there alone are vast.

[Hahma]

We just got done watching Jaimie Oliver's Food Revolution premiere of season 2 in Los Angeles. It's pretty disturbing the kind of crap they serve in the schools in L.A. The school board doesn't want to let him in the schools, so he had parents bring in school lunches that their kids brought home and it was pretty scary.

His big thing is in fighting obesity, especially in kids. He demonstrated how much sugar goes into flavored milk in L.A. schools every week by filling and overflowing a school bus with 57 tons of sugar. That's how much is used every week for flavored milk in L.A. schools. Jaimie is from England and he is amazed how like 70% of milk consumed in U.S. schools is flavored. He says flavored milk is banned in England and Europe. What's wrong with just drinking regular milk?

He was trying to get a family run fast food place to change their menu, but it wasn't going so well as the guy doesn't care what is in the food he serves because his customers want that food and don't want to pay $4+ for a grass-fed Angus burger with different sauce that has 400 calories when they can get an 800-1200 calorie burger for $2.50 that has who knows what kind of meat is in it.

Part of the obesity problems is that too many people are in such a darn rush to do everything anymore and fast food takes the place of home made meals far too many times. Same goes for the crap food that people grab at gas stations or whatever, have doughnuts for lunch, or eat a 1200 calorie bucket of popcorn at the movie theater.

I know people that eat fast food 3 times/week for lunch and a few times/week for dinner. Some more than that even. Kids aren't going to turn it down as it tastes good, but where do kids learn many of their habits? From their parents. So kids will grow up eating crap food.

Granted healthier choices in food are more expensive in many cases, so I can see where people in poverty or lower-income will more likely eat less healthy. But still, pop, candy, and other crap can be easily replaced enough with a healthier choice.

I don't need a school telling me that my kids have to eat what they serve. That is total crap IMO, but I do understand to a degree their motives. Many parents need to change their habits and that is nationwide, not just in one school district in Chicago.

We may order a pizza once or twice a month, but we only eat typical fast food (McDonalds, BK, KFC) maybe 6 times in a year. I used to eat a lot more of it when I was younger, but now I just like regular dinners that have some form of veggies. My kids are learning that fast food is more of a "treat" or rarity and not the norm. They may try pop a few times per year, but mostly have milk, water, juice.

So while this tactic at that school in Chicago is very radical and controversial, at least it has a lot of people across the country talking about it, and hopefully looking closer at themselves and how they feed their family. Hopefully this has increased awareness and will get some people to make some changes in their eating/feeding habits.

[delphic]

It is ridiculous to force all students to buy their lunch from the school to ensure universal nutrition.

It is equally ridiculous to send your kid to school with a chocolate bar for breakfast.

What you eat is as basic a freedom as can be defined.

Tough call. 3 Extremes all in one package.

Make the good food cheep and easily available with an attractive lunch lady. Make the junk expensive and served by Helga.

Deep Fryer tax. Grease disposal tax. Calorie Tax.

Regulation is always better than prohibition.

Delphic

[EternalThanos86]

If the issue is adolescent health and the problem is poor parenting, then OBVIOUSLY the solution is for a school to ban outside food.

It just follows, right? At least according to our otherworldly sense of logic.

Fix the foundational problem. Band-aids are not long term solutions.