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Kids in the United States are smoking less, using fewer illegal drugs, and are less likely to give birth as teenagers. Sound good to you? Yep. But, the bad news is these healthy habits are being all but erased by the fact that 15 percent of children in the U.S. are overweight or obese, putting them at risk for severe health problems like high blood pressure and heart disease.
The annual report on U.S. child welfare from Duke University and the Foundation for Child Development, just released yesterday, found that the overall "Child Well-Being Index" has improved 4.5 percent for children since 1995, but overweight kids are developing type-2 diabetes, high blood cholesterol and even high blood pressure at rates that greatly raise their heart disease risk. Rising obesity has "completely obscured all progress made in the health category, dragging it 17 percent below 1975 levels," according to the report.
A Great Britain think tank funded by some leading food companies has suggested that all the talk of childhood obesity is overblown. The organization reported, "...there has been no 'epidemic weight gain in children' in the UK," despite reports childhood obesity has tripled in the last 20 years with one in ten six-year-olds classed as obese, rising to 17 percent of 15-year-olds. The debate, it seems, is centered on just how one measures "overweight" and "obese."
Corey Levesque and Morgayne Mulkern, students at
The Perkins School for the Blind, chat with a reporter
during a taste-test of healthy snack foods.
This week we're giving the idea of healthy snack foods in schools a great road test with the students of the Perkins School for the Blind in Watertown, Massachusetts. We've always felt that if "healthy" food tastes good, kids will eat it. While most kids can be swayed by cool-looking packaging, the students of Perkins are going on taste alone, and taste wins!
We've added the Stonyfield Farm Healthy Vending Machine at Perkins to support the school's efforts at making sure their students are as healthy as possible. Students with disabilities often have trouble getting enough exercise, which can contribute to adding on weight. Then there's the ever-present junk food opportunities in our culture.
But, Perkins officials like Steve Rothstein, president, and Margaret Vasquez, nutritionist, are now making sure healthy snacks are available, and they've also started a walking club for students. Vasquez points out that 26 percent of Perkins students are at risk or are overweight, higher than the national average of 15.3 percent of kids ages 6-11, and 15.5 percent of kids ages 12-19.
So, we'll stock our machines at Perkins with student-approved healthy snacks such as fruit leather, soy milk, and our own Smoothies, of course. And we'll check back with the Perkins students a little later and see how things are going.
Perkins is the nation's first school for the blind, founded in 1829, and is where Helen Keller was educated.
Last week, California's Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger seemed to indicate he'll seek an outright ban on junk food vending in California's public schools, as one means of fighting childhood obesity. After his public comments, however, his aides were quick to point out that the ban would, so far, only deal with soft drinks and that proposed legislation would likely seek a comprehensive legislative package" regarding snack foods. Banning all junk didn't seem in the cards.
"What you give a child or what you put in their body is exactly what we become. So the more garbage you put in there, the more you're going to look like a garbage disposal," he told the Los Angeles Times. [To which we reply: "Huh?"]
California certainly isn't the first state looking into legislating what can and can't be served in public school vending machines and/or cafeterias. We know that legislatures in Kentucky, Rhode Island, Florida, Georgia and Kentucky are all currently debating such things. We'll try to keep you up to date here. Check out more about our own Healthy Vending program.
Meanwhile, what do you think? Fill out our poll below. Or, just use the comment feature below and tell us what you think.
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Students at Textron in Providence, Rhode Island,
line up for breakfast, featuring Stonyfield
yogurts and a choice of healthy toppings,
after doing 30 minutes of physical activity yesterday.
Yesterday, we traveled from our Londonderry, New Hampshire offices down to Providence, Rhode Island, where we've just launched "Good2Go", a breakfast and exercise program, in three public schools. At one of the schools, Textron/Chamber of Commerce Academy, about 30 kids have signed up for the 6-week pilot program. The idea is to get kids up and moving before school, and then provide them with a healthy breakfast, or, as the Providence Journal put it: "Put down your super-sized doughnuts, your Egg McMuffins and your 64-ounce Big Gulps. Now get up and move."
One reason Stonyfield partnered with Kids First, Blue Cross & Blue Shield and Sodexho School Services to put on this program is that studies have shown too many children are skipping breakfast, but arriving early to school, where they often indulge in poor food choices while they wait for classes to begin. Children who skip breakfast have trouble staying alert in morning classes. Studies show exercise helps with memory, and lower rates of tardiness and absenteeism.
We're exited abou the program, and about Brown University researchers who will be evaluating student response to Good2Go. They'll be looking to see if the students change their behavior, eat less and/or exercise more, and whether they have more energy at the end of the program. Students fill out activity reports each week. We'll give you periodic reports about Good2Go here as the weeks go by. Good2Go is part of Stonyfield's Menu for Change initiative.
Left: Christian Morales tells a group of visiting dignitaries about why he likes the Good2Go program and says it makes him look forward to coming to school in the mornings.
Below: Christian and fellow Good2Go students demonstrate a dance routine they've been choreographing for their morning activity this week.
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This week is national School Breakfast Week and we here at Stonyfield are celebrating with a brand new program that is part of our Menu for Change initiatives.
"Good 2 Go" is a new before-school breakfast and exercise program being offered for the first time in three Rhode Island schools. The six-week pilot program offers students who sign up a chance to start their day with physical activity and a nutritious breakfast--making them "Good 2 Go" for the rest of the day.
In addition to the participating schools, we've hooked up with Kids First, a non-profit organization; Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Rhode Island; and Sodexho School Services, the food service company, to put on this program.
The exercise and breakfast program began Monday of this week. Students arrive for 30 minutes before classes start and do something physical---martial arts, dancing, ball games, aerobic exercise--then have a nutritious breakfast including yogurt (Stonyfield's, of course) and a choice of toppings such as granola and fresh fruit.
Look for an up-close report on how Good 2 Go is...well...going later this week in Creating Heatlhy Kids.
Meanwhile, here are some fun facts about school breakfasts:
o Studies have shown that children who skip breakfast can have trouble staying alert and concentrating during the first hours of the school day. (Source: American Academy of Pediatrics)
o Children and adolescents who eat breakfast perform better in school through:
*Increased problem-solving ability
*Memory
*Verbal fluency
*Creativity
*Reduced absenteeism and tardiness
(Source: American Dietetic Association)
o A 2004 study funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the National Institute for Child Health and Development found that students participating in school breakfast programs build good eating habits. Preschool children and adults have healthier diets and consume less fat when breakfast programs are available. These results suggest that school nutrition programs may be an effective way to combat both nutritional deficiencies and excess consumption among children and their families.
ABOUT CREATING HEALTHY KIDS
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Just an addendum to our ealier post (see next entry below) about Kentucky's defense of deep fried foods in public school cafeterias. Here's the reason "nutritionists" there don't wish to ban the deep fryer, as some have proposed:
"We have worked tirelessly to try to change our products so they're not only nutritious but acceptable to kids," said Janie Thornton, Hardin County Schools' food service director and vice president of the national School Nutrition Association. "If kids won't eat it, we haven't accomplished a thing.'"
"Thornton said she and her colleagues aren't quarreling with the goal or with the extra work that counting calories in school menus brings. But she said she's concerned that the "deep-fried food" provision would wreak havoc on food service directors' menu planning by preventing them from serving food that is "flash fried" by distributors, such as chicken nuggets." Get the full story here.
And, this person is the vice president of the national School Nutrition Association? Hmmm.....
Somebody write me please and tell me why chicken nuggets should stay in schools! Use the comment box below. There's a slight delay as we check for SPAM--the kind which is NOT served in public schools, or is it?
You gotta give the folks in Kentucky points for trying--and a few others get demerits for standing in the way of healthier options for kids in public schools.
The Kentucky legislature is currently debating a proposal that would require 30 minutes of physical education a day for elementary students, and would ban the sale of deep fried foods in the school cafeteria. Some school officials and the workers in the cafeteria don't like the ideas. The proposals don't sound that radical, do they? While one can almost see a rhetorical argument about the p.e. requirement (it costs too much; we don't have enough time in the day; we have a shortage of teachers...whatever), but what could possibly be the argument in favor of deep fried foods?
ABOUT CREATING HEALTHY KIDS
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