Sport Outrageous Nutrition Reform

Sport Fitness
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I currently attend public highschool in Washington state. A legislation passes (last year, I believe) to have a nutrition reform within public school systems. I danced with joy, because this FINALLY meant they'd serve something at our school that was better, or at least make better foods available for purchase. My mistake, of course. This past [school] year the new nutrition program was absolutely ridiculous. They served hamburgers, pizza and processed crap. The salad/vegan bar was extremely feeble and almost sad. They only thing they removed/changed about the nutrition program was they removed soda from vending machines and offered "a healthy alternative," and a sad one at that. So I complained to the school board, protesting that these foods were inadequate and they concurred, saying that a recent study proved that obesity rates in the school distric had escalated. So they said they would revise the nutrition program and I suggested that they make no "alternatives" and make the offered foods 100% healthy and organic.


They didn't listen. Not only are they removing the salad bars because they're making a "budget cut" but they're removing water from the vending machines because (and I quote...) "WATER IS BAD FOR YOU". I almost died of laughter.
Instead they're offering flavored water, loaded with sugars and crap.

Is it just me, or is this absolutely ridiculous? (I already take my own foods, but I think this is just ludicrous)
 
First let me say that you write much better than the average 15 year old. When I started school in 1970 they would not have dreamed of giving us access to soda's. I remember in first grade we had a lunch room monitor. This one particular day the "monitor" would not let me go out to the playground until I finished my peas. Now then and even to this day I despise canned peas. I spooned them under the table while she wasn't looking and got to go outside. Damn, 34 years later and I still remember that like it was yesterday. :D

By the time I was in high school we had a soda machine (Coke) in the gym and an "al la carte" line that served pizza and burgers. I usually took my lunch or mom would give me lunch money. We tried the lunch ticket but I usually lost mine by the end of the week. If a student did not like Coke products there was a Pepsi machine in the "teacher's lounge" and you could get a teacher to purchase you something from there although it was off limits to students. Now in 2006 my 16 y. o. son's school serves Pizza Hut so you can kind of see the direction this is going.

As you get older you will find it's all about the money. In Indiana our kids are falling farther behind students all over the world and even behind the U.S. but we still spend millions on football fields and basketball courts that only a privileged few will ever really benefit from.

Back when I was in school the question was why Johnny couldn't read. Now it's not only why he can't read but why he is illiterate and obese?
 
Yes, thank you. I was raised to know proper grammar...just something I'm picky about :)

That's definitely a problem. People are selling out. We have the whole "a la carte" thing going on at our school because I live in a small community. They promote sports and physical fitness like no other school on the peninsula I live on, but they have a huge problem with the lunch programs. It's good to know that they made an effort, but sometimes people are so bull-headed about simple things. I think I may ask the principle if I could make a movement towards eating and living healthier for High School students. I'm sure I could make some sort of difference in my community in that sense. I just hope that some day teenagers understand more about their bodies and the foods they eat, and that the adults that influence their lives do the same thing.
 
I wish you luck and I will do my part but I am afraid of one thing I had to learn along the way. I was a young child in the age of aquarius. I was a kid during the Vietnam war but I watched the fall of Saigon and the helicopters off the roof of the embassy in 1975 and as 2 million inocent civilions were slaughtered in the killing fields of Cambodia and Laos because we cut an ran but did not understand becaus I was only a child, I watched as president Nixon resigned over the Watergate scandal and we aquired our one and only president (Ford) that had not been elected president or vice president. I seen how miserably a good man like Jimmy Carter failed as president as the Shah fell and our embassy personel where held for 444 days during the Iran Hostage Crisis. I turned 16 the year president Regan was shot during an assasination attempt by a fellow who just wanted a movie actress to notice him. I seen the fall of the Soviet Union and the rise of the Chi-Coms. At 36 I watched with millions as the Twin Towers came crashing down and the first sucessfull attack on U.S. soil in 60 years and the first real successful attack on the continental US since 1812 dragged us back once again into the real world where we mighty Americans and our haughty way of life were very much vunerable.

When you are young you are ten feet tall and bullet proof. That's why so many of you are killed in dumb ass driving accidents. In your twenties and thirties there always seems to be plenty of time left. (This perhaps will seem like I am going off subject but bear with me.) At fourty I just felt different and went looking for some answers. I went looking for a way to tell if you were middle aged. Now I knew that the average life expecancy in the US is 78 y.o. so at fourty I definately qualified for being half way through my life exectancy. I finally came across the answer I had been looking for - "middle age is the age at which you quit counting how many years you have been alive and start counting how many years you have left". Now this may not sound very important at 15 but in 25 short years you will know exactly what I mean. She47441 says that at 27 she is (my mid life crisis). I told her she was wrong Ashley the 5 y.o. is. :D

I probably have only served to confuse you but I believe if you think on it a while you will understand what I am trying to say. For now nutrition in public schools seems important and it kind of is. As you age you will see many more stings that tie it together with other things. Just as poor nutrition and a sedintary lifestyle may tie with obesity and childhood onset of type II diabeties it will cross reference with illiteracy and poverty. Complex ties that bind and not always in so very coherent ways. I think you are a soldier. Pick your battles carefully and fight the good fight.
 
Wow. I certainly do understand what you're saying and I thank you for giving me some wonderful advice. I will certainly do my best to imply it to the way I live and act throughout my years.
 
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