Friday, October 12, 2012

Blog 7: Kids Need More Calories in Their School Lunches Lawmakers Say, Jennifer Wall October 12, 2012 12:29 pm.


In 2010, Congress passed legislation that required schools to limit the calorie counts of school lunches to 650 for Kindergarten through fifth grade, 700 from sixth grade to eighth, and 850 for high school students. These rules pertain to the federally subsidized lunch program. The changes also required schools to serve more fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and low-fat and fat free milk. The goal of the legislation was to create a situation where the children would get a more healthy and nutritious lunch while reducing childhood obesity. However, the problem is that due to the calorie limits, many children are not getting enough to eat during lunch and go through the rest of the day being hungry. In order to make sure that the children are given the chance to eat the amount of food that they need, new legislation called “No Hungry Kids Act”, has been introduced to change this old law.

Of course, both the old and the new legislation affected only children in the United States, but this issue relates to the global problem of childhood obesity and the desire to raise healthy children. Childhood obesity has been a growing problem around the world for a while now. The causes of the problem are many including children overeating, which relate to larger portion sizes, children eating the wrong types of food, and the fact that children are not as active today as they should be. It is easy to understand the reason and intention for the old law but it’s also easy to see how setting a limit that applies to all of the children in specific groups could cause problems as well. Each child is different and has different needs. Setting limits that apply to everyone in one category ignores the individual child. While obesity is clearly a problem and something that should be addressed, so is allowing children to go hungry because the amount of food that they are allowed to be given is regulated by the government. It is good that the government is trying to look after the health of the children, but there also needs to be a balance so that no child is prevented from getting what they need in order to not be hungry.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-congress-school-lunch-20121011,0,6515653.story

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