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Preventing childhood obesity essays
Impact of childhood obesity on the nation
The causes and consequences of childhood obesity must be identified so they can be overcome
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School Lunches are Unhealthy Schools are meant to give our children a healthy and nurturing environment, and yet so much of the lunches in schools are fattening; does this stop schools from achieving the aforementioned goal? Childhood obesity in the United Sates continues to be a growing problem despite so any new programs to help combat it, and new research is showing how schools may be playing a large role in childhood obesity. School lunches are showing to be the problem, they encourage poor nutrition in our nation’s students, and simple reform is proving to not be enough to stop the rise in obesity rates. Childhood obesity proves to still be on the rise in our schools and not enough is being done to stop it. Despite the many reforms …show more content…
Government date shows that in the past thirty years, rate of being overweight in six to eleven year olds is up 19% and 6% in age 12 to 19. Without support, school lunches remain high in fat. (Finkelstien) According to the CDCP, obesity is double what it was in children and triple in adolescents since 1980. Many reforms were attempted to help this problem, but many inadvertently caused more problems. (Finkelstien) A 730 calorie lunch should have no more than 24 grams of fat and no more than 8 grams of it saturated yet the average USDA lunch has 31 grams of fat and 14 rams of it is saturated. (Yeoman) These very high levels of fat are why obesity is becoming worse in children. It can be concluded that school food is still extremely high in fat and this can be directly linked to the high rates of obesity in young children and …show more content…
Unhealthy foods are what make the money for schools and that is why they serve them for students. (Schlafy) Schools feel like they need the extra money in the budget, even though it is at the student’s expense. Data shows that nearly 60% of all middle schools in the US serve soda from vending machines. (Schlafy) Soda is very high in sugar and is not at all good for children, but it is still sold in school vending machines. The ways food in schools is now are way too high in fats and sugars. This is not good for the children and very bad in the long run. Elementary schoolchildren have an estimated $15 billion of their own money that they can use to buy whatever they want in schools, and parents have almost another $160 billion to give students for food money. (Schlafy) Big businesses see this as a big source of profit and therefore encourage children to buy their products, and want them to be offered in school because of th4e likelihood of children buying the business’s product. All in all, obesity in the US is greatly influenced by the foods offered in schools
This documentary takes a look at how our school’s lunch programs and government play a role in the spread of obesity across the nation. The film really attempts to drive home the idea that our children are being immorally brainwashed into wanting unhealthy foods. At some points of the film, it appears that the director uses big companies and school lunches as a scapegoat for our nations crisis. It is a valid point that our nation’s children are being
In order to impede the epidemic of childhood obesity, the actual causes of the problem need to be evaluated and dissected. Obesity in children is becoming a huge problem in American society. In the past three decades, the rate of overweight children has increased by 300%. This is an alarming rate that is only climbing higher. Every member in society should take steps to becoming healthier. This would help the present generations as well as future generations to come. The lifestyle of Americans keeps us too busy to be a healthy society.
We all remember that day when President Obama took office, and our school lunches changed forever. First Lady Michelle Obama, felt that too many American kids are overweight, so she thought she needed to make our school lunches healthier, with more fruits and vegetables. One of the major changes she made was how many calories the school cooks were able to give the kids. The new requirements are as follows: up to 650 for children in kindergarten through fifth grade, 700 for sixth through eighth graders and 850 for high scholars. These numbers are consistent with the Mayo Clinic’s recommendations ( Kuczynski-Brown). The main goal of cutting calories and taking away junk food, was to insure that kids are getting served a healthy lunch. At each lunch, schools must still provide a cup of fruit, a cup of vegetables, two servings of grains, two ounces of dairy, and a cup of fluid milk, so that students can get their needed vitamins and nutrients (Anonymous) . They are also wanting more local farmers to be involved, and give more of the food they grow to the school. At the high school I went to, we built a green house, and planted a garden to give us some local grown food. It was part of our Ag Science class. More and more schools are starting to do the same thing. The stats of overweight kids is really high. The guidelines are as follows:
“Our Schools need to start teaching kids how to be healthy.”- Unknown. School lunches have created a chronic problem in a school setting, and since it hasn't been fixed, 6-11 year olds have had a 17% increased chance of becoming obese (Centers for Disease control and Prevention). Most school districts don't even bother changing the food restrictions just so they can please their students. Unhealthy school lunches are a huge problem among children in the United States, it can cause obesity, stress, and many other problems.
To avoid this type of fat at a young age is a proactive move because it can help avoid disease and can lead to a longer, healthier life. As a general standard, the Dietary Guidelines for Americans suggests that less than 30% of the calories in a school meal come from any type of fat; schools are required to follow this guideline (Poppendieck 111). Fats are not being eliminated from student diets completely, but the consumption is being monitored because of the negative consequences that can result ...
Thirty one million kids nationwide eat school sponsored meals twice a day for a hundred eighty days and on average for twelve years. In this sense school lunches are an important and critical component of childhood nutrition and development. Yet these meals are highly processed and filled with chemicals and preservatives. School lunch rooms are essentially fast food restaurants; they unload shipments of frozen food then heat it up in glorified microwaves and serve it hot and ready. This is the same basic principle of fast food restaurants and people all know how terribly unhealthy fast food is for them. Still America feeds this toxic material to kids every day. This has been a tremendous issue for years but it is more devastating now than ever before.
School, eating foods that contain whole grains and unsaturated fats will supply energy for a
According to the Centers for Disease Control, “Childhood obesity has more than doubled in children and quadrupled in adolescents in the past 30 years,” meaning that America’s children need to start eating healthier, including healthier school lunches. The National School Lunch Act is a fairly recent addition to American society. For, as the world waged war a second time, the United States began to worry about the strength and health of the country’s soldiers. However, in the beginning, selling excess agricultural goods was more important than building a healthy, well-balanced meal for students. Unfortunately, many children coming from poorer families could not afford well-balanced school lunches, so in order to compensate, the School Lunch Program changed its focus to help these students. This program, however, decreased schools’ lunch budgets, and schools had a hard time keeping up with the amount of free meals they had to provide, so they came up with some extra ways to increase revenue. However, in a small town in Massachusetts, one chef makes a difference in the health of the school lunch students eat each day, and proves that hiring a trained chef to cook real, healthy meals can increase profit. Unfortunately, that is not the case in most schools across the nation. The quality of health of the food being served in school lunches is extremely poor and was allowed to decline even more with a new set of rule changes. However, there are some improvements currently being made to increase the quality of health of the food being served to students, including teaching them all about food and its nutritional information, both good and bad. In order for students to eat healthier lunches at school, the USDA needs to implement healthier ...
It would be a great idea for all schools to switch to an healthier school lunch. They should change it because it will help children focus on test, quizzes, and inside of the classroom when taking notes. The kinds of foods that should be token away is the kids least favorite foods. For example kids will write down the most ten hated school foods served, which ever is the most voted gets token away. Then kids could give options of healthy school lunches to be replaced.
Today, America is plagued by obesity, heart disease, diabetes, and many other health maladies linked to unhealthy food. Although it is important for American youths to eat healthy, nutritional diets, it is an absolutely bad idea to alter the school menu and cut out students' favorite foods in favor of a "healthier" menu. Schools should have a positive influence on their students' health choices, but they should not be forcing them to eat to their standards. A "healthier" lunch menu would result in negative consequences for both students and their schools. Cutting out unhealthier foods from the cafeteria would not effectively curb teenagers' penchant for unhealthy eating.
Childhood obesity has recently become a major problem not only in the Unites States, but all around the world. No one knows the real reason as to why childhood obesity has recently become a major epidemic, but it has been found that the environment that the children live in plays a factor in the child’s weight status. Not only that but, some people believe that fast food and their million dollar industries is the reasons why so many children are obese. Whereas others have found that it all relies on their parents, that they, the parents, are the reason why their children are the way they are. Some even say that it’s the school’s fault because they do not teach the children how to live a healthy lifestyle. Whatever it is, it need to be fixed so that we can have a healthier America. At the same time that I believe that the parents play a big role in the weight status of their children, I also believe that schools play a factor in the recent outbreak of childhood obesity.
The foods that are available in schools play a huge role in the overall consumption of food/calories eaten in a day by our children. This in turn gives our children the energy to learn in class. An improper diet can lead to childhood obesity and other health problems (diabetes, high blood pressure, cancer) which can stem from being overweight, both physically and emotionally. One article states how childhood obesity, ages 2-19, tripled from 1980 to 2008 and as of June 2014, 17% of children were obese (Cluss, Fee, Culyba, Bhat, Owen, 2014) and another article states that as of September 2014 one-third of our children, ages 6-19, are overweight or obese (Hennessy et al., 2014). My priority issue focuses on bringing healthier food menus to schools
Parents are not teaching children how to eat healthy. They feed them cheeseburgers, chicken fingers, and fries. Kids are not being exposed to a regular diet of health fruits and vegetables. Now some people are just naturally overweight, but being “overweight” is not the same as being “obese.” Someone who is overweight has reached a maximum weight limit for their height. When someone goes beyond this maximum limit, then they are considered “obese” (Kiess 1). Research shows that “obesity is generally defined as the abnormal or excessive accumulation of fat in adipose tissue” (Kiess 1). The increase in childhood obesity today is mainly the fault of the parent because they are unable to tell their children “no” when it comes to junk food (Kiess 104). Parents are the one buying all the food that comes into the house. They are the ones buying the sugary drinks and chips. They are the ones allowing the children to “have what they want.” Because parents are not teaching their children how to eat healthy, we will continue to see childhood obesity increase. Unfortunately, overweight children will be the ones who suffer because statistics show children who are overweight are more likely to become obes...
Is the school lunch program actually helping? Is junk food the cause of obesity? The food program, which requires that schools have to follow strict rules on what they can serve at lunch, currently has 94% of public schools participating but some are considering dropping out. Even though the program is healthier, schools should drop out of the system because schools are losing money, every student does not require the same amount of calories, and junk food isn't the only reason for obesity.
Imagine entering into a school cafeteria and being seated at any one of the lunch tables. The first thing one may take notice of is the obese or heavier students also seated at the tables. This probably wouldn’t have been nearly as noticeable thirty years ago. Yet, child obesity rates have nearly doubled in thirty years according to the Centers for Disease and prevention Control. Students are making unhealthy meal choices or eating unhealthy foods such as soda pop, candy bars, foods loaded with preservatives, and unhealthy fats. Now, imagine sitting down in the same cafeteria where the students have been educated about healthy food choices. Vending machines had been removed, and parents had made an effort to help their children eat healthy. Due to increasing rates of U.S childhood obesity in the past thirty years, investing in serving healthy meals to school children never sounded so reasonable. The only way we can accomplish our goal is through healthier meals, wiser spending, and getting students to participate.