No this isn’t explicitly about sports nutrition but, it is about developing food habits in young kids. And when I get 30-something year old clients who stutter when I ask them what carbohydrate they eat, I know there is something wrong with how we are teaching, or rather, not teaching, kids in America.

In the past few weeks I’ve seen people either praising Jamie Oliver or up in arms about the fact that he is shedding light on what goes on inside school cafeterias. Jamie is a London-based chef who is clearly passionate about teaching kids of all ages how to cook and eat healthy food. Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution is a series about how families eat, school food, obesity and health issues. His premise is simple – we feed our kids a bunch of junk food and that’s why they are obese with a multitude of health problems.

This TV series is based in Huntington, West Virginia, a small city about 6-7 hours west of our Nation’s Capital. On show #1 I saw a scene where I admit, I cringed a little. He came in and criticized the school lunch ladies and the food they were serving. I’ve been in schools, I’ve talked to lunch ladies and they are working under a constrained budget and dietary guidelines (can you serve a meal to hundreds of kids for $2.36 and then do that all over again every 45 minutes for a span of a few hours?) – these are not the people to blame for school food. However, I still respected what Jamie was trying to do.

By episode 2, I liked Jamie a lot. The kids were clinging on to him for signs of hope. These HS kids included a young girl who lost one parent early due to obesity, a morbidly obese teenager who felt she had no where else to turn and broke down crying while telling her story, an extremely poised young man who had been in and out of rehab units for anger management, a football player so dedicated he came before and after practice to help out in the kitchen and more. My heart when out to these teenagers because Jamie brought something to them that no one else has done: an opportunity for change in their city, an opportunity to affect their health and the health of their peers and family members.

Despite the fact that I am sitting here cheering Jamie on, many people are staging an uproar and fighting back about the benefits of school nutrition and how good the meals are. But, I’m not universally convinced and I think the system needs fixing. The nutrition guidelines should be updated, the way schools are reimbursed with taxpayer money should be changed (parents are encouraged to fill out free/reduced forms even if their children clearly will not qualify because they get your taxpayer money back from the feds for each form filled out), families that are not U.S. citizens and do not pay taxes can get their kids free meals (on your taxpayer dime) and the Farm Bill needs an overhaul (wheat, corn and soy crops are subsidized making the production of junk food pretty darn cheap).

School meals are tough to change and keep at a reasonable cost but a few things are crystal clear to me. First, the women (and men) working in the cafeteria are passionate, caring people doing their best in a tough job. Secondly, I commend Jamie Oliver and our First Lady, Mrs. Obama, for bringing the issue of childhood obesity to the attention of all of America. Both Jamie and Mrs. Obama are clearly passionate about trying to curb these issues and help the kids because, these children didn’t do this to themselves. Third, whether or not your child is served what you consider a nutritious meal really depends on your school district. I’ve seen districts like the one’s my nephews are in that do what I’d consider a fantastic job. Others just do what they are told, encourage kids to get food and throw it out so the meal is reimbursable (so they get money from feds) and nudge all parents to fill out those free/reduced forms without trying to think of better, cost-saving ways to approach school nutrition without wasting taxpayer money. And given our country’s deficit, I think that is irresponsible.

For more about Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution, click here. If you are a parent reading this and concerned about school food, get involved and get to know the system. For change to occur it needs to happen at a higher level.

View Original Post at atlantasportsnutrition.com

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