Healthy Schools Program
The American Heart Association and the Clinton Foundation recently announced the Healthy Schools Program initiative as part of their own Alliance for a Healthier Generation.
The program sets up a criteria-based recognition program that recognizes schools that adopt nutrition and exercise guidelines. The nutrition guidelines include calorie, fat, sugar, and salt content of foods sold in the schools and served in the schools’ cafeterias.
With 16% of all U.S. school children (11 million) overweight (and that’s a 2002 number), the program is an admirable effort to help improve the nutrition and overall health of children.
Changing the system in dramatic and significant ways, though, won’t be easy. As mentioned in this recent interesting article (”The School Lunch Test“) highlighting the efforts of one group to implement improvements to several school districts’ food offerings, such efforts face resistance from both school districts and the children.
Surprisingly, as the article notes, some of the biggest resistance to change comes from parents. Without the parents on-board and reinforcing the healthy habits at home, it’ll be difficult to see significant change.
