Running head: FIGHT FOR HEALTH 1

Fighting a Battle Against Obesity in SchoolsTyler J. DeBeauclair

Saginaw Valley State University

Opening
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One of the biggest issues in the United States today is the rising obesity rate and general

unhealthy population. Many people have different reasons for this, but one that is rarely thought

of is the unhealthy food fed to students. Most would immediately think of colleges and high

schools, but the problem is related to all educational levels. The problem with unhealthy

atmospheres in schools of all levels is that students are being raised from a young age to be

unhealthy. Some students are eating at school two times a day and these food options are

influencing what they eat at home. This applies to a college level in which students already have

developed unhealthy dietary habits and in addition to this, the college food is also very

unhealthy, so they are becoming even more unhealthy. This is adding to the obesity rate and

making America unhealthier every day. The real underlying issue is the forming of many

student’s dietary habits which translate into later in life. The plan to improve student’s health,

which is being affected by GMOs, Sugars, and fats, is to introduce a healthier meal plan to a few

schools in hopes to make that trend spread throughout America.

Correlation and Causation

Now the list of causes for schools to be serving unhealthy foods to students is very long

but the main reasons are lack of funding, poor government regulation, and a general lack of

knowledge of nutrition. For lack of funding it is very expensive for the government to fund all

public schools to serve healthier food. Private schools are the only exception to this, and these

institutions seem to also fall into the lack of funding category, but this lack is not a lack from the

government as the government does not fund a private school. It seems be the trend for schools

to be underfunded many times when schools are the backbone to America’s healthy future.

The second reason for this is poor government regulation. The United States government

had passed a bill in 2013 that passed healthier regulations on school food but as author Haskins
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wrote in his article “On May 1, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue announced that

USDA would relax school nutrition requirements related to whole grains, sodium and milk.

Under the new rules, schools are only required to make 50 percent of their grain products whole-

grain rich, as opposed to 100 percent, for the 2017-18.” (Haskins, 2017). This new regulations

made it so that the cheaper unhealthy food went right back into schools. The government does

not seem well informed on what actual nutrition looks like and also seems to simply not know

how to promote it in schools.

The third cause is a general lack of nutritional knowledge. Leaders of public schools and

government leaders seem to simply lack the knowledge to provide students with the correct food

to grow a healthy society. This lack of knowledge shows because despite school leaders knowing

the current state of Americas’ youth, many schools still decide to serve unhealthy food to its’

students. The school’s leadership lacks the knowledge to be able to come up with a healthy

alternative to the unhealthy food being served.

The list of effects due to unhealthy school food is very lengthy but a few of the main

points are unhealthy futures, high sugar diets, shorter life expectancies, and lower immune

systems. The first is an unhealthy future. This means that by students are developing bad habits

when it comes to their nutritional health and this is largely attributed to the schools these students

attend. Haskins introduced a quote by Steven Adams who is the chair of the American Academy

of Pediatrics’ Committee on Nutrition, that read “When we serve kids unhealthy school meals,

that sets the standard for what the kids expect, what the parents expect and what the community

expects of meals.” (Haskins, 2017). This quote really reveals how students are developing these

bad food habits which are affecting their health and nutritional lives at home.
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In addition to this, the government is allowing schools to feed students with very high

sugar diets which in the end is very bad for one's health. In Jamie Oliver’s Ted Talk titled “Teach

Every Child About Food” he says that “any judge would look at the statistics and find any

government guilty of child abuse.” (Oliver, 2010). This is in response to how much sugar

students are consuming in each day. Students are being fed with a substantial amount of sugar

which really is not healthy on a regular basis. In Silden’s article she reveals that “more than one-

third of adolescents (age 13–18 years old) currently classify as overweight or even obese.”

(Silden, 2018). This given fact is largely due to the high sugar and fat diet many students are

exposed to in their academic career.

Another large effect on students is shorter life expectancy. Often when kids are

overweight or just generally unhealthy, they have weaker immune systems which makes one’s

life expectancy go down significantly. When a child has not laid the groundworks for a healthy

body disease can easily set in and cause damage to the child. Students are blind to what these

sugars are truly doing to them and often times these students simply don’t know due to their age

or limited exposure to the world.

What Changes are Needed

This crisis is an urgent matter and needs to be looked at very closely. One plan that could

be devised to bring about a large change in these schools’ nutritional practices would include two

stages. This could be like the USDA’s plan which included “availability of healthy snack foods

with whole grains, low fat dairy, fruits, vegetables or protein foods as their main ingredients”

(USDA Proposes Healthy options in schools). The first stage is testing a more thought out,

healthy food plan in a few schools in hopes of bringing about changes in other schools. The

second part is educating students on nutrition so they will be able to stay healthy post education.
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The Plan for Action

For stage one individuals would need to find three private schools, one from each

education level from elementary to the college level. They would need to be private because the

government does not have strict control over the lunch program at these specific institutions. One

could obtain a government grant or raise money in order to fund this switch. A specific plan that

follows specific healthy standards would have to be created and then implemented into these

select schools. The specifics could be like the USDA’s plan which included overall lower sugar

content and an increase in foods such as fruits and veggies. This plan would then have to be in

place for some time before one could get any concrete results.

Data would have to be taken before the plan was put into place on the health of the

students as well as food habits at home. The same data would have to be taken after some time to

find if the plan truly did help improve the health and habits of the examined students. After

positive results were found the results could be shared with the government and other schools,

both public and private, in hopes that more schools would implement this plan. The current

situation as Haskins communicates is that “When we serve kids unhealthy school meals, that sets

the standard for what the kids expect, what the parents expect and what the community expects

of meals.” (Haskins, 2017). If this was changed the families of the students would change their

own dietary habits and this plan would also touch on the adult population.

Next for the actual education side of this operation one would need to create material for

nutritional classes to be taught at these select schools. The majority of students do not know how

to be healthy and how to eat right. These classes would help students watch their own health and

would also equip them to be able to build healthy habits. This would especially help high school

students that are planning on going off to college as many students’ health and habits decline in
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college. In addition to educating schools these courses also need to be introduced to government

officials so that those officials have a larger knowledge to be able to pass healthy legislation for

students in all levels of the education pyramid.

Economic Plan and Benefits

Firstly, this plan would reverse the current state of students throughout America by

improving individual health. Secondly, it would cause students to develop better health habits to

be able to go into the adult years with habits that will not cause harm to the individuals. And

lastly, it would give students a base knowledge of nutrition and health. Now for the main cost of

this plan that would be an increase in funding to schools because healthier foods seem to cost

more, and the research would cost money. This increase in needed funds would be a drawback to

helping improve the food quality in schools today. More money would need to be budgeted for

the education fund of the government for the use in public schools. Private schools would need

to either apply for grants from the government or raise tuition if applicable. One is putting up

student health versus money and with an increase in funds for schools the health of students

could be improved.

Closing Points

The rising rate of unhealthy students due to school food needs to be changed by the

implementation of a healthier meal plan as well as nutrition classes to inform students. By

implementing the plan outlined the health of students of all education levels will be improved.

In addition, the future habits and health of todays’ youth will ultimately be improved thus

improving the health of America. This issue is a huge factor in the rising obesity rate and by

changing the food in schools around the country this rate will ultimately go down. The current

generations should be worrying about the future generations health because that will affect how
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this country and world will look when that time comes. America should be kept healthy and well

in hopes that the future America is ultimately in good shape to continue to be the land of dreams.

References
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Haskins, J. (2017, September). Rollbacks to school meal nutrition threatening health. Nation’s

Health, p. 1. Retrieved from

http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=sch&AN=125053124&site=eds-

live

Kirsten E Silden. (2018). Impact of competitive food in public schools on child nutrition: effects

on adolescent obesity in the United States an integrative systematic literature review.

Global Health Action, (1). https://doi.org/10.1080/16549716.2018.1477492

Oliver J. ( 2010, February). Teach Every Child About Food. Retrieved from

https://www.ted.com/talks/jamie_oliver#t-822776

USDA.gov (n.d.) USDA Proposes Standards to Provide Healthy Food Options in Schools:

USDA-FNS. Retrieved from https://www.fns.usda.gov/pressrelease/2013/001913.