As a farm boy from Oregon, I have always been aware of city people who try to do country things ? and look, well, ungainly in the process.? I think of Bill Clinton and Al Gore pounding nails at a Habitat for Humanity event. (The word sissy came to mind.) ?And last summer it was Michelle Obama, Southside Chicago city girl, gardening on the South Lawn of the White House. Sorry, Michelle, but you ain't hoed a patch of weeds like I've hoed.
But it's the thought that counts and in this case, the First Lady is on to something very important. ?For years our nation has been struggling with an epidemic of childhood obesity,? she wrote earlier in the week in the Washington Post.
We've all heard the statistics: how one in three children in this country are either overweight or obese, with even higher rates among African Americans, Hispanics and Native Americans. We know that one in three kids will suffer from diabetes at some point in their lives. We've seen the cost to our economy ? how we're spending almost $150 billion every year to treat obesity-related conditions. And we know that if we don't act now, those costs will just keep rising.
I must admit to some very mixed feelings about nation's approach to feeding school children.? And I recommend Ron Haskin's The School Lunch Lobby in Education Next for a primer on the subject. We actually started feeding schools kids in 1946. But as one reader of that story noted, ?the well-intended program to feed poor kids has morphed into an untouchable universal entitlement with a powerful school lunch lobbying coalition of Department of Agriculture bureaucrats, food-service industry executives, and union bosses.?
A federal entitlement program of staggering proportions and unintendent negative consequences.? What else is new?
Only that kids are fatter and more unhealthy than ever, as Ms. Obama is pointing out.? Like everything else, it's a cultural and countrywide problem, but it is also a school problem: Lunchrooms pretending to serve food and kids pretending to eat it. ?(See What's for Lunch? A restaurant critic goes to the school cafeteria in the same Ed Next issue as Haskin's story.)
And then there's exercise.? Not. In P.E. classes I've seen, one would think that someone has done something to the kids' sweat glands.
There are hopeful signs and the First Lady should be applauded for her Let's Move initiative, which is promoting healthy eating and exercise.? As Jamie Davies O'Leary reported on Flypaper last February there is evidence that the nation's principals understand ?recess has a positive impact on student achievement.? That's a start. ?And another Jamie ? Oliver ? has started a Food Revolution that he has brought to television and is trying to bring to school. ?I caught part of the Brit's televised visit to a West Virginia school district that looked all too familiar:? fat.? And his struggle to get school bureaucrats to blink at the idea of healthy food was also uncomfortably familiar.
Still, gardens are popping up at schools all over the country.? (There is still the big problem of ?Who's going to water it in the summer??) And farm to school programs need to be encouraged and can easily be integrated into a biology class.
I'm not sure I want to jump on the Child Nutrition Bill bandwagon quite yet ? if the first lady is right that it will ?set higher nutritional standards for school meals by requiring more fruits, vegetables and whole grains while reducing fat and salt? and ?help eliminate junk food from vending machines and a la carte lines,? I'll have one foot on the ladder ? but her ?simple steps to success? tips for parents, kids, community leaders, schools, chefs, and elected officials are worth looking at ? and acting on.
?Peter Meyer
