Mrs. Obama's school lunch changes = Gross!

    

     Most of you have noticed that school lunch is nastier than usual. Thanks to Mrs. Obama, all schools were required to make these changes in order to "prevent childhood obesity". After doing quite a bit of research on the matter, I have not been able to find a single benefit in the "new and improved" lunch program. Healthy food is beneficial, but you have to actually eat it to get any benefits.

     Before I go into all the details, I want you to take note that Nicholas County has an amazing cafeteria staff. It's not how the food is prepared, but rather what the food is. Let's get real. Nobody - not even the top chef in the world - could make a meal consisting of nothing but whole wheats and grain even half decent. Mrs. Obama's new changes state that all wheat and grains served must be whole, all milk must be nonfat, and double the amount of fruit must be served. Then there's the worst part: no salt. We can all live with more fruit, but seriously? Who wants to eat whole wheat biscuits first thing in the morning?

     Now that you have been informed on the policy changes, lets discuss the problems. To start with, how many people actually eat their lunch because it's good? Looking around the cafeteria today, I saw many students eating an apple. That's it. Everything else was still sitting there on their tray, lonely and cold. When discussing this with the students sitting near me, any of them who actually ate their food said they only ate it because they were starving. So, if you do eat the school's lunch and think this article is pointless or inaccurate, ask yourself this: Do you eat the food because you want to, or only because you're starving?

     In my opinion, the biggest issue with this policy isn't the food, but rather the cost. According to the New York Times, the new school lunch program has added an estimated amount of $3.2 billion to the already $11 billion cost.  This clearly means that the school will be paying more for the lunch program, resulting in the cost for students also rising. For many students that can't afford the increased price, free or reduced lunch is available. However, there is a limit on who can and can't get free or reduced lunch. Think about it this way. A family may make one hundred dollars too much to qualify for the free or reduced program. During any given school year, that family will pay much more than one hundred dollars for their child's lunch, so they're actually worse off than a family receiving the free or reduced lunch. With bills, gas, and other expenses, many people can simply not afford this.

     As I previously stated, there are no benefits that I have found in the new lunch program policies. Everyone knows that healthy food is good for us, but that only applies if you eat it. Clearly, staring at a tray full of healthy food isn't going to make us healthy, unless we have some sort of super power. The school and government is simply wasting billions of dollars on this new lunch menu. Why spend $3.2 billion more on food that is headed straight to the trashcan? Besides, the only thing this is creating is having hungry students running straight for a bag of greasy potato chips when they get home. Where's the health in that?