School Lunch

The First Lady usually takes up some sort of cause, and Michelle Obama certainly found hers. She has been on a healthy kids kick, which involved making changes to school lunches. While I know her intentions are nothing but good, her changes have fallen short in many ways.

First off, the milk. The new policy is to serve only 1% and fat free milk. Naturally, the 1% milk goes quickly, and the kids who eat last are stuck with fat free milk. Maybe you think that's a good thing. Actually, research proves that kids who drink fattier milk are actually skinnier. One of the reasons for this is that whole milk causes people to feel fuller and therefore eat less. Especially for active kids, milk fat is a good thing.

Second, Michelle Obama decided that kids shouldn't be served seconds. For some kids, this is no big deal; certainly for me, this would have been a non-issue in my school days. However, for active kids, this is rough. Obviously kids who play sports require many more calories each day. Moreover, this doesn't take a kid's age into consideration. Kindergartners might be fine without seconds, but a growing middle-schooler needs more food. I had middle school kids come to me after eating lunch, asking for food (I kept a drawer with snacks for them) because they were still hungry. Though I've only experienced it a few times, eating a meal and still being hungry SUCKS.

Third, the quality of school food leaves MUCH to be desired. Almost everything comes in a can (BPA, anyone?), bag, or frozen. One day, I saw "waffles" on the school lunch menu. I decided to get it, and was blown away to find these waffles came individually wrapped, heated in their plastic packaging. Of the dozen or so school meals I purchased, most of them seemed to have been heated in a microwave, as much of the food was soggy.

Forth, the serving size for those canned fruits and vegetables was increased so that kids would eat more of these important food groups. Well, if a kid didn't like the small portion previously provided, they probably aren't going to like the new increased portion size. Plus, without a parent to encourage trying a food, or taking just a bite, many kids won't touch their veggies. Soooooo, now you have even more wasted food.

Finally, the time allotted for lunch is ever-decreasing in this age of standardized test prep. My school's lunch periods were 25 minutes. This of course was supposed to include recess. Nothing like encouraging kids to scarf down their food in order to go play. Or, if they did take their time eating, they didn't get recess.

The Cantankerous Common Core Monster

I had a three-hour Common Core training that left me so completely disheartened and frustrated by our public education system. Since discovering unschooling a year ago, I can't believe how counter-intuitive so much of what we do in public school actually is. I am adamantly opposed to the Common Core, which has been adopted by 46 states due to federal funding pressure. The Common Core, it turns out, was designed primarily by Pearson, the biggest education company in the US. While schools are laying off vice principals, school counselors, librarians, and running at minimum staff, education companies are making millions. Today the middle school SPED department asked the middle school team if we have any extra supplies. They are scrounging for pencils, pens, paper, expo markers, and other basic supplies. They've been using scrap paper because they have nothing else. To be clear, it's not Pearson that is at fault; rather, our system is backwards and Pearson happens to be the one profiting.

For me, standards go against my fundamental belief that students learn at different paces. Standards go against so much of what the research says and so much of what I know to be true!

Standardized testing takes up so much time. My school uses a system to test the kids four to five times a year to see where they're at. Kids are so tired of bubble sheets. I have articles galore on standardized testing, almost all of them viewing it unfavorably. I have articles on brain research which somehow never get applied to education.

Thankfully, there is a new degree that combines neuroscience with education. Finally! I hope to get my master's in that cross-field one day.