In an effort to bring children’s school lunches up a notch on the nutrition scale, a public school in Chicago is not allowing children to bring home-made lunches to school. Children will be forced to eat the school’s lunches. Will your school be next on the list of following suit?
One might ask, what is there to say that school lunches are necessarily better than home prepared? Watching Jamie Oliver and his Food Revolution on TV, I wonder whether eating at school will do anything for our children’s health.
Efforts nationwide have certainly brought attention to the need for better nutrition for children. Many schools are involving area food producers in supplying local food for the schools. There is more interest in growing food as class or family projects.
But to ban home-made lunches?? Certainly not all home-prepared lunches contain soda, chips and Twinkies. Most parents know that lunches need foods rich in protein, calcium, vitamins and minerals, or do they? Education in the past few years has de-emphasized food preparation and nutrition information in the schools. Many home economics or family and consumer sciences programs have been eliminated. Is the only food and nutrition information now coming from the ads on TV? Let’s hope not.
It is important for parents to know what is being served in their school cafeteria. They need to stay updated on what changes, if any, are being made. Certainly the choice of their children eating at school or from their home-prepared lunch bag should be theirs alone.
Now, let’s keep encouraging healthy eating, no matter from what source. I invite your comments.
To your health and that of your family,
Lee Jackson, CFCS
Food writer and author