Critics of the movement argue that students will shun these healthier, more expensive menus. Zumwalt’s experience partially supports these concerns. “Almost 50% of the elementary students make healthy choices on a regular basis,” says Brenda Hills, Assistant Director of Student Nutrition Services. A conventional lunch (entrée, 2 sides and a drink) is the healthier choice but even at the elementary level students can choose side items that eliminate vegetables or salads.
“But the percentage is much lower in the high schools.” Hills went on to explain; “High school students have more daily choices and many are still choosing hamburgers or pizza slices over the conventional lunch.”
To lower costs, the district takes advantage of Federal Commodity Food Program that provides surplus beef, turkey and chicken at no cost. Moreover, Zumwalt was able to save $40,000.00 (about 3 month’s produce) per year by participating in a Federal produce program.
Unfortunately, funding for the produce program has been eliminated for the 2009-2010 school year, says Hills. The district is still formulating a plan that will keep the cost of feeding students under $1.00 per student and provide healthy choices, says Granicke. The current student price for a conventional lunch is $2.05.
Feedback from the students on the changes has been mixed. Students say they would buy healthier drinks if they were cheaper, according to a recent survey. However, they thought too many fried foods were still being offered at lunch, and healthier choices should go into the vending machines. As a result, sodas were removed from the vending machines in 2007, many of the snacks are now baked and have reduced fat and calorie content, says Bob Hiles, Assistant Principal at Fort Zumwalt North High.
Despite the challenges, the District says it is committed to the healthy lunch program. The next step is to discontinue the use of deep-fat fryers district wide, says Hills. L. Gaither
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License
I think this article was very informational. If healthy luch was cheeper I would buy it also. I that healthier snacks should be put in the vending machines because for kids in highschool alot of times that is the only thing they eat, if they do eat at all.