becky pope (Bpope)
Junior Member
Username: Bpope
Post Number: 8
Registered: 7-2005
| | Posted on Monday, September 07, 2009 - 10:12 am: |       |
I think you have to convince your admin that student health is integral to academic and personal achievement for the students, and that student health/wellness is an essential goal of a school district. In California the state has mandated changes to what can be served in cafeterias and in snack/beverage machines. Fortunately, our district decided to get ahead of those incoming changes and banned sodas, high sugar/fat content cafeteria/snack machine items and making money for various programs by selling candy/soda to students out of the classrooms or having those types of food items as rewards in the classroom. Our district created a Health Council comprised of teachers, Public Health personnel, our district nurse and a representative from administration who all have a vision of and a passion for what a healthy school and healthy students should be like. The creation of a District Health Master Plan that is much like the District Curriculum Master Plan with measurable goals is essential to effecting change in the district. The other essential piece of all this was getting the administration to support food services in making healthy changes because all those yummy foods and beverages that are not healthy for the students are BIG money-makers in the cafeteria. Our district had to be willing to let the cafeteria actually lose money in order to make these changes. With the huge budget crisis going on in our state right now, we've had to put some changes (such as a salad bar at each site) on hold, and we still have a ways to go in getting to where we want to be. However, we are light years ahead of where we used to be; it just took a while to get there. I'm not trying to impress anyone with how great we are (we're just a pretty average bunch with a desire to do better for our kids, and we aren't always perfect in meeting the goals we've set for ourselves), but I'm trying to make the point that it can be done if you can just get the right people on board to set the wheels in motion. |
