"Nutrition wise, it is better for the children to eat at the school," [school principal Elsa] Carmona said. "It's about the nutrition and the excellent quality food that they are able to serve (in the lunchroom). It's milk versus a Coke. But with allergies and any medical issue, of course, we would make an exception."So is it for the benefit of the children or somebody else? Note that the kids think the food is bad, and the competition is crushed, so there's no pressure on the food service to make something the kids would prefer to whatever is they bring from home. But the schools' providers are required to present healthful foods, and maybe it's not fair for them to have to compete with whatever enticing treats the kids get bring in from the outside.
Carmona said she created the policy six years ago after watching students bring "bottles of soda and flaming hot chips" on field trips for their lunch. Although she would not name any other schools that employ such practices, she said it was fairly common....
Any school that bans homemade lunches also puts more money in the pockets of the district's food provider, Chartwells-Thompson. The federal government pays the district for each free or reduced-price lunch taken, and the caterer receives a set fee from the district per lunch.
April 11, 2011
Some Chicago public schools ban bringing your own lunch to school.
The Chicago Tribune reports:
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107 comments:
(The Crypto Jew)
Sounds more like it’s about control and making more money for kitchen staff and more money from state and Federal coffers as the lunch/dinner budgets mushroom.
Disneyland has a similar policy. link
Orthodox Jews don't think milk with a hamburger, or a ham sandwich is an appropriate meal. They and all Americans should be allowed to feed their children as they think appropriate. The principal should be fired.
I would accept fewer discretionary funds and the freedom/quality of life that brings to send my kid to private school over something as "nanny" as this. Ridiculous. My wife and I have been and are perfectly capable of providing healthy lunches for our school-aged child.
It's not rocket science and, frankly, it's bad parenting to send your kid to school every day with "coke and chips" lunch. But, then, I personally feel a child abuse argument could be made when fat parents fatten up their kids into obesity health problems.
It's laziness and apathy, pure and simple. Even a poor parent can knock out a PB&J-based lunch instead of coke and junk food.
Given the widely reported epidemic of obesity in school age children, government programs to provide food to school children should be ended.
"Carmona said she created the policy six years ago after watching students bring "bottles of soda and flaming hot chips" on field trips for their lunch."
So how many field trips do these students go on?
Fieldtrips were always an excuse to pack some junk food for lunch, but I had all of three during my school years.
Left to their druthers, my kids would eat pop and chips too. So what's up with the parents who pack those lunches?
Those cafeteria meals are so well-rounded, nutritious and delicious the way the curriculum is challenging, well-rounded and prepares students for a "lifetime of learning."
So are the Pepsi/Coke vending machines not present in these schools, btw?
In any event: why the devil shouldn't they bring what they want to eat (or mom makes for them?) And what do field trips-- an exceptional circumstance-- have to do with anything?
Don't the fieldtrips usually stop over somewhere for lunch/dinner? Aren't the sodas and chips just a *snack*?!
This would never pass muster in my urban Seattle district. Seattle sancti-moms won't tolerate gluten, high fructose corn syrup, white flours, anything processed, inorganic, or locally-sourced.
I can rest easy!
Whoops! Of course I mean *not* locally-sourced.
Paying to feed the dependents a daily meal is the oldest rip off known for favored politicians friends. The food is usually cheap and small but the $$$ received for is always expensive and large.
Milton Friedman wondered if a basic minimum subsidy should be given to every American. He thought that might eliminate the hundreds of govt programs we had back then. I think he had a good idea.
This is bullshit. How dare they tell a parent what their child can eat. This is liberal fascism, as predicted.
If I was a parent I'd raise hell - if for nothing else but the insult.
I remember school lunches. Nasty green pizza too greesy for a 9 year old, broccoli (my favorite vegetable as a kid) that had been mutilated beyond recognition and came as this wierd, wilted, mushy mass. There was the mashed potatoes where you could taste the preservative, and not much else (I grew up in the heart of potato-growing country). The chicken was usually so fatty and rubbery as to be completely inedible.
I do hope, for these kid's sake, that my experiances were atypical.
The wonders of mystery meat.
These children are the prisoners of the State. The Parents can get visiting hours if they behave and don't complain.
My son in 6th grade is incensed at the nanny state intrusion over school lunches at his elementary school. This year, the school decided not to sell chocolate milk any more, yet the children are required to buy regular milk.
He likes milk, but says the milk in cartons tastes bad, is not cold enough, and the cartons leak. He looked forward to the chocolate milk every day.
Today he said they are bringing back chocolate milk because of all the unopened milk cartons they are finding every day in the trash. You can lead a horse to water.... Also, he heard this story reported on Fox, and the reporter said they observed many students throwing away their entire lunch.
He says most of the kids at his school like Obama, but are furious with Michelle Obama for interfering with their food.
Not to worry. I am sure every last munchkin at this particular school reads at or above grade-level. Or else they wouldn't be worried about this, right?
Is there any food better than tater tots?
Sounds like good preparation for life in a free country like America. The kids learn that they are free to eat whatever the government wants them to eat, just as, when they're adults, they'll be free to say and do whatever the government wants them to say and do.
I just don't understand these people bitterly clinging to their cokes and chips..... and their happiness. Damn them. Damn them all!
Funny how all of the moral scolds are on the left now. No smoking, no sweets, no driving, no sexual innuendo at work.
Yep, it's been very enlightening -- they get their own "we're from the government, and we're here to help" reality check.
That's why he was outraged hearing about the ban of home foods -- I've been packing him frozen cartons of chocolate milk in his lunch.
All the arguments against liberal fascism have been made, but still the people comply when they are told what their betters want them to do.
Only 49% resist.
Is it enough?.
I see a "Nanny of the Month" award coming.
These kids should organize and demand their rights collectively. That's probably the real lesson trying to be taught.
Because teachers and administrators are for that, right?
Is there anything they don't feel the need to control?
Is there anything they don't feel the need to control?
I could probably think of one given my IQ, but they broadcast a loud, random sound into my head every 30 seconds.
"Is there anything they don't feel the need to control?"
No.
Well, they do seem to favor fairly free genital stimulation and abortions.
Just in case you DIDN'T realize that public school was institutionalization . . .
Well, they do seem to favor fairly free genital stimulation and abortions.
Panem et circenses.
My children always preferred their own lunches from home. My son, while in elementary school, told me that if he got a school lunch, the lunch ladies made him eat the whole tray, whether he was hungry or not. In middle school he took a can of soda every day. The Authorities turned off the vending machines at lunch, and my son would sell his soda to Tommy for a dollar.
Many schools have free or reduced lunch, breakfast, and after school meals. Further, students can get backpacks of food to last them through the weekend. If their parents aren't feeding them, isn't that child neglect and cause for removing them from the home? Why are we giving such parents so much welfare money if they aren't using it to feed their children?
Please don't consider these last questions rhetorical. I think they deserve answers.
But the schools' providers are required to present healthful foods, and maybe it's not fair for them to have to compete with whatever enticing treats the kids get bring in from the outside.
Say what?! Maybe it's not fair that the local supermarket isn't allowed to sell parents the bread, peanut butter, fruit, and juice that most of them would put in their kids' lunches.
You cannot cross the government industrial-education complex.
School lunches, SOS: S____ on a Shingle
Say what?!
Just for the record, I took the "not fair" statement as ironic. It's quite possible that...
...hmm...screeching car crash that time...
...what was I saying?
Why do the letters S, E, I, and U swirl through my head, along with the word, kickback?
As Paul Harvey used to say, "This is Chicago".
WV "inedeauc" Same one I had when last I commented here. I don't even want to think of the odds.
I'd look it up, but I have the feeling the word portent would be associated with its meaning.
And this when I'm working out my husband's box lunches for the week. (Our theme song is My lunch is an AWESOME lunch, though admittedly we do have to take some care who we sing that around.)
So, riiiight .... tomorrow we have a sort of Indian fried rice that's mostly not rice but rather cauliflower, onion, cilantro, and spices; some seasoned chicken breast marinated and then broiled; a spiced lentil-and-tomato broth; a pear; and some Sun Chips. Oh, and the Thermos full of coffee. First things first ;-)
You get the idea. I don't know how much of this you could get away with with children -- the soup (rasam) might be troublesome -- but when I think what my own parents sent me to middle school with ... grated mozzarella, bean sprout, and grated carrot sandwiches are not edible except under conditions of extreme duress.
wv: monal: That'd be me in the bean-sprout phase. Thankfully it lasted only a year or two.
> "It's about the nutrition..."
I had some experience with Aramark, another one of these giant institutional food providers, and I can guarantee you, it's all about the kickbacks the institution gets, and nothing about nutrition.
If there's an ambitious investigative reporter out there (are there any left?), look into the food service contracts at your local colleges and universities. You might be surprised by what you find. And don't believe the first round of answers you get; keep digging.
I can damned well make my kids a better lunch than they're going to get in a school cafeteria. (This I know: I just went to an information session on public pre-K for my twins. I asked to see a menu. Yuck.)
Bob,
I had some slight acquaintance with Aramark, back when I was working for Borders, and so far as I could see they were sticking then to cleaning carpets and linens.
... Hmmm. I see. Food services and cleaning &c.
wv: misciti. That would be Detroit crossed with Seattle, crossed with Houston, crossed with Boston.
The problem is that there is no objective authority on what is the best healthy meal for a kid.
I recall my school cafeteria. Sure, they had milk and veggies, but out of cans. The meals were extremely low in fiber, and extremely starchy. They were low quality.
All parents can do a lot better for their kids, and some would, and some wouldn't.
Should we force all kids to be screwed over by school cafeteria quality food, in order to protect the victims of crappy parents?
Maybe a better solution is to make cafeteria lunches free, and then allow kids to bring a lunch if they want, anyway. I'd still pack a great lunch for my kid, and I'd sign a permission note or whatever. The lazy parents wouldn't.
And the parents who want their kids to have cokes and chips aren't going to take them away at home, so there's no harm done there.
I'm not getting to the motives of the school, which is probably just graft.
Also, my mama was fastidious about my diet, but if I were going on a field trip, it was a special fun thing, and she'd often give me treats in my lunch.
It's really stupid to judge the entire project of moms feeding kids based on a couple of field trip lunches. On the other hand, it's fair to judge this principal's failure to think fairly, based on her reasoning inability.
Let's see some damn vouchers, please.
PB&Js have been banned for a long time. Peanuts are more deadly than meth.
Yet another reason to get rid of public schools and replace them with universal vouchers, so parents have much more choice in such things.
Grand Inquisitor,
No, that wouldn't work; the cooks would have to assume as a default that everyone needed the free lunch unless they allowed you and others like you to opt out, and then they'd be forced to make (and throw out) a pile of extra food.
wv: eureade. Don't drink the eureade!
My kids starting bringing their own lunch when I found out the school lunch menu routinely included "walking tacos" (greasy taco meat dumped into a bag of Fritos).
Pogo said:
"All the arguments against liberal fascism have been made, but still the people comply when they are told what their betters want them to do."
I wish the chain restaurants would rebel and tell Obama & the FDA to cram their newest requirement that they put calories on menus.
I think it's absolutely ridiculous and a usurpation of parental rights. Of course, if there weren't a financial benefit in it for the school, this wouldn't even have occurred to them. Think of all the possibilities, though:
Parent dresses kid the wrong way --> School sells its OWN uniforms for profit
Parent doesn't properly bathe kid --> School charges $$ for mandatory morning showers every day before school
Parent doesn't discipline kid "properly" at home --> School charges $$ for after-school detention
Parent allows kid to listen to "inappropriate" music --> School charges $$ to have "good" music put on little Johnny's iPod
...The possibilities are endless!
What pray-tell is so wrong with "flaming hot chips"?
Our daughter is partial to a lunch composed of a sandwich, a piece of fruit, a bottle of water, some kind of salty snack (flaming hot chips) and a couple of cookies.
She calls it a "welly-packed lunch".
Scott M:
At the private school my child attended (prior to our homeschooling), there were some restrictions as to what you could send in. Private schools don't always mean absolute freedom for parents.
---
Of course I think the brought-in lunch ban is BS. I suspect part of the reason it's possible at the Chicago schools is that so many of the kids' meals are subsidized. It's hard to imagine there wouldn't be a revolt if a strong majority of parents were forced to pay full price for their kids' daily lunches. At the price of school lunches today, and depending on the number of kids one has, that could number could really add up! I for one am absolutely certain I could come up with better, more healthful lunches for my child at far cheaper a price than what we would have to pay for a school lunch.
(As it is, I can feed him anything I want, at any time I want. Another homeschooling perq.)
...Well, heck, at that point you might as well call it boarding school and be done with it!
Children are not in school for the competitive advantage of some company. That thought shouldn't even occur.
In other news, Chicago school officials announced today that, due to concerns that children were not moving their bowels with sufficient regularity, starting next month all school children will be required to have a bowel movement each day when the first bell rings, supervised by the teaching staff to ensure that each child is learning the proper method for evacuation.
Dewey, like Stalin and Mao and Pol Pot and Alinsky, knew that once the children were taken from their parents, and educated and fed and clothed by the State, that their greatest threat, that wholly subversive organization called 'the fammily' can be completely and utterly crushed.
But unlike Mao and Pol Pot, it is done with their consent.
In further news, as many parents have failed to teach their male children proper aiming techniques, all male schoolchildren will be required to urinate only under supervision from a qualified instructor in urination technique. The new policy is opposed by the Janitors' Union, who fear a loss of jobs, but supported by the Union of Certified Government Urination Instructors Local 451, whose members have been suffering severely as a result of the economic crisis.
"walking tacos" (greasy taco meat dumped into a bag of Fritos).
Hey hey hey! Don't be dissing my Frito Pie!
If the lunches served at the schools are so great, why don’t they make their employees eat them?
Can we fire all the obese teachers, for setting a bad example for the impressionable children?
This is bullshit. How dare they tell a parent what their child can eat. This is liberal fascism, as predicted.
If I was a parent I'd raise hell - if for nothing else but the insult.
On this The Crack Emcee has said it all.
you know what they say: if you can't beat 'em, ban 'em.
Seriously why should the ban on bringing in outside food be limited to students? If a school can ban alcohol or tobacco products or firearms (all of which most adults are legally allowed to own and possess) – why should it not it do the same for non-cafeteria food? Make the administrators who created and enforce these rules follow them the same as the students.
Given that the food police in my lifetime have flip flopped all over the place, I don't have any trust in their ability to determine what is good or healthy food.
First butter was good, then bad and margarine was good, then margarine is bad and now butter is better. Coffee, good -->bad-->good.
High carb good---> high carb bad----> high protien good or is it bad now . Who the eff knows.
NOW we hear that it is better to drink a beer after hard exercise :-D Good news!!
They make the food without salt so that it is tasteless. Our bodies NEED some salt.
The parents who do take the time to make their children a lunch should be insulted by this ruling.
Besides.....if I want to give my kid a treat of a Twinkie or Ho Ho once in a while for lunch, that is my choice.
There was a recent newspaper article (might have been in the Chicago Tribune) about how the Chicago school system was unable to make appetizing meals mainly because of their food ideology. No added salt, so any fresh vegetables had no salt. So kids would only eat the pre-processed foods that had salt, so they removed pre-processed foods.
Their solution was to name the inedible dishes something festive and fun sounding.
Remember, liberals want the government out of our bedroom.
Kitchen, bathroom, car, workplace, all good places for government to be though.
Ha, and people thought they gave birth to their own children. Breeders are livestock for the State, creating future taxpayers and voters that will be raised by State employees with State nutrition of the body and mind. Now get back in bed and make some more for us, there's a tax money and Dem vote deficit dammit!
To expand on Don M. First of all, not Kosher. Second of all, not lactose free. Third of all, contains various meat products that the children either do not tolerate, or whose parents do not let them eat. Fourth of all, it sucks. I went through high school on a steady diet of various sandwiches. Since they are unable to provide reasonable options for teh many kids with special needs, they cannot properly have this requirement. I would walk my child into school with the bag lunch and inform the teacher that that is lunch. Period. Any attempt to prevent my child from eating said lunch will be met by a lawsuit. The school couldn't possibly win.
Freedom is only for your genitals.
All else, the state demands for itself.
Well there were times in my life (pre food stamp days) when the state paid for school lunch was one of the two meals I had every day. At least on the days when there was school. Just sayin'
PatHMV,
In further news, as many parents have failed to teach their male children proper aiming techniques, all male schoolchildren will be required to urinate only under supervision from a qualified instructor in urination technique. The new policy is opposed by the Janitors' Union, who fear a loss of jobs, but supported by the Union of Certified Government Urination Instructors Local 451, whose members have been suffering severely as a result of the economic crisis.
Ah. CGUIL 451 must have been behind the furious opposition of various politicians to the introduction of the Super Pii Pii Brothers.
wv: copyesse.
No argument with need, Ken.
But why forbid everyone else from bringing food?
Such a ban would be simple to defeat.
Just refuse to give your kid lunch money. It would only take a few cranky-hungry kids before the administration caved.
Enh. In which I discover I don't actually know how to a do a "this post has been removed by the author." Poop.
Actual Super Pii Pii Brothers link here. With luck.
But with allergies and any medical issue, of course, we would make an exception
I suspect any parent who cared to make a fuss could have their child be one of the exceptions. The school has learned to count on parental docility/apathy.
wv:amica. No, not really.
But parent Miguel Medina said he thinks the “no home lunch policy” is a good one. “The school food is very healthy,” he said, “and when they bring the food from home, there is no control over the food.”
Sorry Mr. Medina, but there is control over the food from home. That’s YOUR job.
Here in the far northern exurbs of Chicago it also costs $2.25 a day for unsubsidized lunch. I usually fill up The Little Guy's meal card because he can have milk to drink and hot lunch during the winter. Also, he doesn't mind the lunches and, I'll be honest, I'm a bit lazy and don't want to make a lunch every day. Of course, he's getting old enough now to make his own with Mom provided components.
During the summer I make lunch for him three days a week for camp. He gets a PBJ (no refrigeration), a Capri-Sun, fruit (apple, banana, orange, or stone fruit - maybe a snack bag of grapes), and another snack for "snack" at camp. This is generally a small bag of PF Goldfish, or graham crackers. For a "treat" it's a 1 ounce bag of chips or Doritos or Fritos.
wv: hesdoc
All this is academic, so to speak. As wholesale food prices skyrocket - believe me, they are. I provision my restaurant - it's going to be interesting to see how increasingly pinched municipalities are going to be able to afford free lunch programs anymore. Even crap food is going to get real expensive. Think about it; pork belly prices have have increased increased 150% in the last 3 years.
The ethanol scam and rising fuel prices are going to come to a head when those corporate ag combines need to be gassed up for the wheat harvests. Then you're going to see some food price shock and awe. Inflated corn prices due to fuel conversion causing shortages of food and feed corn, coupled with very expensive wheat is going to bring a lot of people to their knees in the best case. In the worse case? You figure it out.
Back in the day parents were asked not to include inappropriate items such as candy in bagged lunches and few would, so it wasn't a big deal.
As I recall the brown bag norm was a pbj or cheese sandwich, carrot sticks and a couple homemade cookies or a brownie.
The PTA provided a pint of milk and a piece of fresh fruit for every student, so a lot of parents just packed a sandwich and carrot or celery sticks.
Kids who lived within a few blocks of school were allowed to go home for lunch. I brought lunch money on Sloppy Joe day, otherwise I walked two blocks to my Gran's house.
Yes Virginia, we walked or biked to & from school *Gasp* alone!
However the cafeteria food was so tasty that not many kids brown bagged until junior high, when brown baggers were allowed to eat outside on the quad where we could listen to transistor radios and the hip younger male teacher monitoring...way cooler than the pokey old cafeteria with VP Mrs. McGrouchy.
My elementary school didn't even have a lunchroom. We walked home and then back again at lunchtime. (Teachers didn't eat at the school, either.) I can think of only one or two fat kids in elementary school. Could have been the meals at home, but more likely it was all of the walking.
Michelle - there's a leetle tiny trash can next to the time of your comment (when viewed from the title link of the post, not the comments link). Click on that and you can delete your comment.
wv: trytogre
Reader,
We walked home for lunch too. My mom actually did some lunch time babysitting. We had a couple of kids that brought their lunches to our house to eat because their mom worked.
wv: spersen
It's all about the loveless horror of state control.
Don't get me wrong. I don't underestimate the strong possibilities for corruption in all this. But don't underestimate some of these parents ignorance, indifference either.
Then there's the Bento Box moms, they take the packed lunch to a whole new level, aesethically and nutritionally.
Google it, you'll be stunned at the creativity.
Jamie Oliver has already detailed the horror-story that are public-school lunches in "Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution". You can watch it for free on Hulu.com
Kimsch,
Thank you very much!
O Lord. wv= shrophro. That's almost Lovecraft or Clark Ashton Smith-worthy. It's gonna be Tsathoggua next.
And so the government continues to slowly take over all of the aspects of our life.
Single parent, or two parents both working? Use 4-year old "kindergarten", don't stay at home to raise your child.
Is it tough to talk about sex with your second grader? No problem, we've got that covered too.
Nutrition is SO confusing. Just let us feed your kids so you don't have to think about it. Breakfast, snack and lunch.
You can make a good argument for all of these types of programs in isolation.
The problem is that they are, in total, destroying the family unit. Take away responsibilities of the parents - either because we are "too busy", or "too dumb".
Eventually we'll raise a generation completely reliant on the government for everything, and incapable of caring for themselves...Katrina on a grand scale.
What happens when some kid drops over dead from peanuts? ...what about glutens? vegans? Is the school liable?
I'll bet that obesity is a problem in that school district as well.
Livin' in the USA....where the poor people are FAT!!
More idiocy from our friends on the left! Yay!
wv - reeld
RE: Bento Box moms,
@ BJM. Those are awesome.The kitty faced sandwiches made me laugh.
Part of the fun of packing a lunch for my daughter was to put a surprise in the lunch, just like my mother used to do: some special note, a small treat, a tiny toy, a flower or a joke.
For a while we would 'surprise' each other with a rubber spider. I would put it in her lunch in the fruit cup. Next time I would find it in the refigerator inside a bag of lettuce. Next...hang it from a door jam ....Yikes!... then she would retaliate by sneaking it into a glass of wine that I was drinking or on my pillow at night.
My daughter's friends thought we were nuts and they would laugh like crazy while they plotted with her on how to next 'surprise' Mom.
It was all part of the fun and looking forward to what weird strange funny thing would be in the lunch bag.
School and the government wants to suck all the joy out of life.
However, I do agree with KenK in that there are some children out there who are in need and don't have parents who are packing food for them at all. But that still doesn't justify, One Size Fits All.
@alex
"Jamie Oliver has already detailed the horror-story that are public-school lunches in "Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution"."
Saw that, extremely frightening. And nobody was willing to step up and help Jamie stop the flow of unhealthy chicken nuggets and other food horrors...
DBQ - I put drawings on each lunch bag for The Little Guy's camp lunches. It's different every day, most often related to that week's camp theme. He loves it.
wv: sessidu
VOUCHERS.
It's not rocket science and, frankly, it's bad parenting to send your kid to school every day with "coke and chips" lunch.
I doubt a coke and chips is any better than the two rolls with butter meals I remember many of my fellow students enjoying in high school from our school lunches. (homemade rolls and they were 15 cents a piece! Best thing in the cafeteria)
The local newspaper reported last week that our school board announced that the cost of school lunches will increase by $.55 each and breakfasts will increase by $1.40 each in September due to "healthy eating" initiatives.
No different than how school in general works: Kid shows up, kid keeps a seat warm, they get paid. Kid doesn't, they don't.
another little freedom slipping away
We used to have the best damn fresh cooked lunches in the world in elementary/middle school. Of course we were stupid kids and didn't know what we were missing.
Spaghetti and Meatballs with homemade rolls the size of your head and salad with old-school oil & vinegar dressing.
Now, my kids (different state and district) get the walking tacos and chicken nuggets.
I don't know how to bring back the old days without re-bankrupting everyone.
WV: tatersi. Taters? Yes!
The Nanny State just keeps growing. Right up until it can't.
Spaghetti and Meatballs with homemade rolls the size of your head and salad with old-school oil & vinegar dressing.
But ...but...but....there was some salt, maybe some sugar, butter (OMG!!!) and I'm sure the meatballs must have had some fat!! AND the salad was probably not organic.
vw: spinal. Yes we are just about tapped out.
Oh....the inhumanity. Food that tasted good. That the kids wanted to eat and that didn't cost an arm and leg.
Sounds like they've established a no fry zone.
I ruv you rong time, Obama!
The lefties are very smart to take away our independence bit by bit. This has been building for decades, and where it ends nobody knows.
(If that lump of goo in the picture is an enchilada I'll eat my hat. With extra salt.)
I first hears about "walking tacos" from my daughter. I didn't believe her for a while -- they sounded too much like something you'd throw together in desperation in the depths of drug-induced attack of the munchies. Surely the school couldn't be sanctioning something as gross as that. But they were.
What they couldn't sanction, apparently, were baked goods -- all bake sales were outlawed, in the name of Nutrition. So the primary funding mechanism for most school clubs vanished. Oops!
My daughter, ever the enterprising young capitalist (and budding chef), took advantage of the situation by setting up a small but thriving business in black-market home baked cookies.
dbp said:
Such a ban would be simple to defeat.
Just refuse to give your kid lunch money. It would only take a few cranky-hungry kids before the administration caved.
My guess is that your suggestion is made in naive innocence. The school will happily supply your child with a lunch, and put it on your tab. At some point in time you will be made to pay it. Don't mess with bureaucracy.
As usual, the Onion got to this story some time ago: "Increasing Number Of Parents Opting To Have Children School-Homed", March 29, 2010 | ISSUE 46•13. More and more parents are opting to have schools give their children basic values and nurturing.
My earlier questions are unanswered: why are we giving welfare to parents who aren't feeding their children?
We had a couple of kids that brought their lunches to our house to eat because their mom worked.
You realize that that is now against the law in at least one place? They charged some lady with running an illegal child care service because a mom would leave her kids with the neighbor before they caught the bus.
We live in insane times.
Come 2012. Deliver us.
JAL - yep. The before school thing was in Michigan I think. Where SEIU was trying to unionize the home daycare workers...
wv: prime
This is only the beginning. When govt. is allowed to grow this big it must invent things to do, rules to impose, structures to be built to ensure compliance with the growing list. Worse, the compulsion to regulate spills over into the private sector and your neighborhood busy body now seeks support in determining the varieties of grass to be gown, the trees that must or mustn't be removed, the number of cars that can be parked on the street. The long chain swings are gone, replaced by chickenshit wooden "swings" with an arch of twenty feet and a maximum height of a parent's reach, the least talented kids are given trophies, competition is discouraged. This lunch thing is no surprise, only another example of how stupid the government is, how ponderous and slow witted to think it took them this long to adopt this regulation with its many hidden opportunities to control.
I wonder what the protester who had the sign the other day about ending the "fascist Republican reign of error" would have to say about this display of something actually resembling fascism?
E.M. Davis:
Run the numbers on the budget changes for classrooms & teachers vs. administration & support & "other facilities" since the 60's, and you'll easily see where that money went (along with buckets of other money).
I stopped voting for bond issues for local junior colleges decades ago when I saw what the local JC thought was "necessary" to spend on athletic facility upgrades. A veritable suite of palaces, they were (and the place ALREADY had an olympic pool, eight lighted tennis courts, a stadium, and I don't remember what all else.)
The JC near me now looks like bleed'n CalTech, FFS.
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