School lunches under microscope as obesity takes center stage

Michelle Obama, celebrity chef Jamie Oliver and U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack have all lit a fire under school lunches.

The first lady is pushing for healthier school food as part of her “Let's Move” campaign, “Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution” ABC-TV show takes on processed foods in schools and former Iowa Gov. Vilsack plugged a “Too Fat to Fight” military readiness report that focused heavily on school cafeterias as a source of the problem.

Those top-flight efforts to target childhood obesity are bringing closer scrutiny to school meals at the local level.

Critics say school lunches are laden with unhealthy fat, salt and sugar and too many processed foods that contribute to the growing obesity problem.

Not all the criticism is

warranted, said Julie Hauser, College Community director of nutritional services and president of School Nutrition Association Iowa.

“Personally, I think we're a scapegoat,” Hauser said. “I take it personal when people say we're the reason our country can't be defended.”

The report touted by Vilsack said almost 40 percent of Iowa's 18- to 24-year-olds are too fat to fight in the armed forces.

College Community cafeteria workers add fresh spinach to salads and offer other fresh vegetables and fruits daily, Hauser said, citing examples of healthful efforts.

Parents and Linn County Public Health staff are joining forces to examine what can be done to make lunches healthier in the Cedar Rapids area. Johnson County's Obesity Task Force has already looked at school lunches, and the Iowa Department of Public Health collaborated on the state's Healthy Kids Act.

The part of the act that goes into effect in July will use a nutritional calculator to ensure guidelines are met for food in vending machines, a la carte and other items sold on school grounds, but not meals.

Health departments are involved because obesity has led to an epidemic of diabetes and other conditions, with costly consequences. According to the state health department, more than 80 percent of adult Iowa men ages 35 and older are

overweight or obese and 30 percent of third-graders are already overweight or obese.

Hauser asked if part of the problem is lack of physical activity, rather than lunches, and said schools can do a better job of making people aware of foods they offer. For example, she said, College Community's french fries are baked, not fried, and most of the milk is skim.

School lunches must meet recommendations of the 2000 Dietary Guidelines for Americans, which recommend no more than 30 percent of calories come from fat and less than 10 percent from saturated fat, said Jean Daniel, spokeswoman for the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Daniel said 32 million children participate in USDA's National School Lunch Program.

While those lunches must meet federal nutrition requirements, she said, decisions about specific foods to serve and how they are prepared are made by local school authorities.

Suzy Ketelsen, manager of the Cedar Rapids district's food and nutrition department, pointed to gradual improvements in school lunches.

Those include gradually switching to whole-grain pasta, switching from 2 percent to 1 percent milk, gradually switching from canned to frozen vegetables, and using only low-fat dressings and no fried foods.

Pizza - offered as a daily alternative for Cedar Rapids elementary students - meets nutritional goals with low-fat cheese/protein and whole-grain crust, she noted.

This summer, all Cedar Rapids school kitchens will receive a steamer, so vegetables can be steamed.

In the Iowa City school district, elementary students receive fresh fruits or vegetables every day and students at the secondary level do on most days, said food service director Diane Duncan-Goldsmith.

She said the district conducted a pilot program with a Vinton apple orchard this year. Costs were higher - $100 for each of the 12 orders - but Duncan-Goldsmith said she hopes to add the local grower to formal bids in the future.

“I don't think everything on the school menu is bad, but I think some changes could be made,” said Laura Saylor, 41, who has a son at Erskine Elementary and a daughter at Franklin Middle School in Cedar Rapids.

Saylor, who works in health care, was less than impressed when she has eaten with her children at school. So she and other parents met earlier this month with Linn County Public Health staff and school workers to discuss possible changes.

“It's really about how can we help the schools and how can the schools help us,” Saylor said.

Foremost among those efforts is providing more fresh fruits and vegetables.

Ketelsen noted that in Cedar Rapids elementary schools, the goal is to offer fresh fruits and vegetables three to four times a week at lunch. She said by e-mail that the department purchases as much fresh produce as possible and has joined with Linn-Mar, Marion, Metro Area Catholic Schools and College Community for certain vendors, to increase buying power.

Still, she noted that fresh produce can be expensive during winter months.

A Department of Defense produce program allows the district to use $70,000 annually to purchase domestically grown fresh produce.

“Because produce prices are typically lower in August and September, we delayed the start of the program until October,” Ketelsen wrote. Funds were depleted by March.

The same was true in the Linn-Mar district, where nutrition services manager Susan Knight said the district went through its $31,000 in federal funding for fresh fruits and vegetables by Nov. 30 of this school year.

Fresh doesn't have to cost more, said Sue Freeman, program director for the Neighborhood Centers of Johnson County. The organization serves meals to 150 children from birth to preschool age, as well as 500 to 600 in kindergarten through age 18.

Cooks at the centers began creating meals a few years ago that children will eat and that include beans for protein and more fresh fruits and vegetables. They completely cut out chicken nuggets and french fries.

“A plant-based diet is cheaper than a non-plant-based diet,” Freeman said.

The challenges schools face in purchasing locally produced foods were addressed in a recent report by the Linn/Johnson Local Food Task Force. The group noted that food-processing infrastructure is limited in this area, so schools would have to buy raw food and prep it themselves.

Many schools do not have the equipment to process the quantities of food needed, however, and insufficient state and federal funding prevents schools from upgrading facilities and paying for extra labor, the report said.

A federal child nutrition bill would increase funding for healthier food, stronger nutrition standards and grants for Farm to School programs. The bill passed a Senate committee.

Don't tell the kids, but good stuff is hidden in there

Do you think the pizza on your child's school lunch menu is unhealthy?

Think again.

The crust is whole-grain, the cheese low-fat and the sauce loaded with vegetables.

“It is not what you buy in the commercial market,” said Nancy Christensen, a consultant with the Iowa Department of Education's Nutrition, Health and Transportation Services. “It is designed and overseen by the United States Department of Agriculture to ensure that it meets nutritional guidelines.”

The National School Lunch Act mandates that school meals “safeguard the health and well-being of the nation's children.”

Schools that participate in the National School Lunch Program are required to serve lunches that are consistent with dietary guideline recommendations and provide at least one-third of the recommended weekly dietary allowances for protein, iron, calcium and vitamins A and C.

The USDA provides multiple menu-planning approaches to help schools prepare nutritious and appealing meals. Each approach mandates that specific component and quantity requirements be met. Minimum portion sizes are established by ages and food groups.

This means the chicken nuggets your child scarfs down do more than fill his stomach. They provide the nutrients to keep mind and body healthy, while appealing to students more concerned with how food tastes.

Of course, not everyone sees it that way.

Christensen receives complaints regularly regarding the quality of food served in Iowa's schools. Usually the caller - a parent, concerned citizen, coach, teacher, school nurse, guidance counselor or even a student - is concerned about the foods they see listed on the menu. What they don't realize is that a cookie is made with wheat flour or that vegetables are included in the spaghetti sauce, hidden by the tomato taste.

“The corn dog looks like what you would eat at the state fair, but it isn't,” Christensen said. “It's baked, not fried. The hot dog is made with low-fat poultry meat. The batter is whole-grain meal, and the sodium level is about half the level of regular corn dogs.”

School-made items are healthier than prepared foods, but many schools are operating with limited labor and facilities.

A USDA grant provided training for Iowa schools to use lower fat, lower sodium, higher fiber foods made from scratch in ways that were appealing to kids and could be produced within school resources.

“It is part of the resources we and USDA are doing to help schools get to the place we all want them to be,” Christensen said.