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Second-graders dig potatoes during a farm field trip.
EUGENE, OR – For children from low income homes, school lunch can be the only consistent source of nourishment in their lives. The Federal Nutrition Guidelines for the school lunch program is up for renewal in Congress this year. Correspondent Rachael McDonald takes a look at school lunch, its nutrition, its value and its future.
It’s lunchtime at Shasta Middle School
Sound: Cafeteria
Students crowd into the cafeteria and head for the hot food offerings.
Athey: “Today we’re serving cheese enchiladas, chicken alfredo, and pizza, chicken nuggets, quesadilla, yogurts with fresh fruit and deli sandwiches.”
Teresa Athey is the head cook at Shasta.
The kids call her “Mama T”.
Athey: “We have lots of fruits and vegetables. ”
Athey has been cooking at Shasta for more than 10 years. She says the meals have gotten healthier since Jennie Henchion was hired a couple of years ago. Henchion is Nutrition Services Director at Bethel School District.
Henchion: “I’m a dietician, so I approached this from a nutrition standpoint. But the district was very ready for it and the staff were very nutritionally aware.”
Henchion says for some children, school lunch is the only daily meal they can rely on—which makes nutrition even more crucial. 56 percent of students in the Bethel district are in the free and reduced lunch program. Henchion says the numbers have gone up since the recession.
Henchion: “Hunger is increasing in Lane County and school-aged children are particularly vulnerable to that and some of our schools, the free and reduced percentages is above 70 percent and its very obvious in these schools especially on Mondays. When they come back to school after the weekend that they’re hungry. They take a lot of food. I stroll through the cafeteria and I see them, literally licking their plates clean.”
13 percent of Oregonians experienced what’s called “food insecurity” in 2008. It’s when people are unsure of where their next meal is coming from. Jessica Chanay with Partners for a Hunger Free Oregon says studies show children from food insecure households are more likely to suffer from physical ailments, including iron deficiency.
Chanay: “But they’re also finding that they’re not doing as well in school both in math and reading. Some of the other indicators though is kind of their emotional health. There was a study that came out that showed that teens in food insecure households were 5 times more likely to attempt suicide.”
The recession has put people who were already on the edge closer to that precipice. According to the USDA, Oregon ranks 2nd in the nation for hunger, behind Mississippi. In April more than 800 thousand Oregonians were receiving food stamps. Nearly 900 thousand received emergency food boxes. Chanay’s goal is to fight hunger by focusing on prevention. That means working to affect public policy.
Chanay: “We really say it’s a public health concern. It affects their ability now, in terms of being in school and so forth, but it also affects their future productivity to really participate in society and to do well as a worker.”
Chanay says this year’s federal reauthorization of child nutrition guidelines for the school lunch program is crucial. The government spends 22 billion annually on school lunch, WIC, food stamps and other programs. Chanay would like 10 billion added over 10 years. But the latest bill which is in the Senate only adds 4.5 billion. Chanay says that’s a start.
Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley says the timeline for a full senate vote on the bill hasn’t been set.
Merkley: “We here in Oregon have one of the states most impacted by hunger. Unemployment puts an additional burden on the family and we have a very high unemployment rate. And so the discussion on reauthorizing this program will be a very important one and I expect to be fully engaged.”
Continue to read part two here.
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