With the steady increase of obesity in America, and fast food chains exponentially growing per year, we students should be more careful of what we eat rather than worrying about where to go off campus for lunch.
As a senior in high school, having to deal with the stress of school, sports, homework, and other extracurricular activities, eating healthy isn’t always constantly on my mind. In fact, eating out is what relieves some of that stress.
San Rafael High School is close to a variety of different places where students are able to eat lunch, such as Whole Foods, Chipotle, Best Burger, Puentez Taqueria, Trader Joes, etc. With plenty of these options outside of school, the school’s cafeteria lunch isn’t as appealing to eat.
“[School lunch] is not that appetizing,” says junior Maddison Lopez.
When comparing the regular school lunch to the tasty-looking burrito bowl from Chipotle with more options, the choice is clear on where students should head off to lunch. Spending $14.95 on a burrito bowl from Chipotle every now and then doesn’t seem so bad if it means eating what you love.
Senior Angeline Phan states, “I do not trust the [school] food. If it’s free, you know something is wrong with it.”
These concerns are some of the reasons why students go off campus for lunch and have a hard time seeing how anyone would want to eat cafeteria school lunch.
“Maybe if they had bigger portions of food, and a different variety of new foods per week, people would like to eat it,” says senior Faith Pu’u.
While these improvements would have a big impact on students wanting to eat more school lunch, they are difficult to make.
“We have to meet the requirements of the school program,” says Alan Downing, Director of nutrition of San Rafael City Schools.
These requirements that the SRCS needs to meet are based on the USDA guidelines. When it comes to sodium, there is a certain amount that should be concentrated in the food per week. Specifically for high school students, they are only allowed to get less than or equal to 1,280mg of sodium per week. As a result, there is less sodium in the food per day which sometimes might make the food taste bland.
The expensive calorie-dense food options from outside of the school cafeteria don’t provide a balanced nutritional meal to students compared with the free lunch served at school. Regardless of the financial state of a student, the lunch provided at school ensures that all students have the opportunity to consume meals that are rich in nutrients for free.
Even though food outside of school may taste really good, the food being served in the SRHS cafeteria is nutritionally healthy compared with fast food chains like Chipotle. A burrito being served at Chipotle may have about 740–1210 calories and is concentrated in high fat content and high sodium content. On the other hand, the chicken burrito that the SRHS cafeteria serves is made from scratch, which has around 500 calories with very low fat and in a much smaller portion.
Despite school lunch being free, students prefer to eat off campus for lunch, which leads to high school students consuming fast food frequently. According to the article Ultra-Processed Food Intake and Increased Risk of Obesity, “[This] unconscious consumption alters neural and digestive functions, which dysregulate hunger perception and satiety levels, which in turn leads to excessive consumption.” Constantly consuming processed foods without moderation could lead to internal and external dysfunctions in the human body. Because how tasteful and appealing fast food is, it becomes very addicting, which leads to your health quality decreasing over time unconsciously.
The regularity of consumption of fast food can lead to weight gain and increase risk of obesity among students. Obesity is associated with numerous health issues, including diabetes, heart disease, and joint problems, which can severely affect the quality of life of the student and academic performance.
The same article reveals that, “currently [obesity] represents one of the main causes of preventable death: approximately 100,000-400,000 deaths have been estimated every year in the United States.”
The increase of obesity cases rises throughout the years, and a way to decrease these cases is by informing the youth about their eating lifestyle. Because eating habits develop at an early age, instilling students with reliable information can better their chances of consuming nutritious meals later on in life.
“I haven’t eaten school lunches in years because of how processed it is, and I’m not sure how nutritious it is as well,” says Phan.
SRHS students have little to no knowledge about the healthier benefits our school lunches provide towards them. Around 3 weeks ago, our cafeteria brought out homemade pico-de-gallo to eat with the chicken burrito as a way to provide more healthier and appealing options towards the students.
“[It’s all about] finding that in between… [and providing] the best tasting food that fits under the traditional guidelines that’s good for students,” says Brandon Pulzer, the food production manager of San Rafael High School.
Even though eating out helps students either de-stress from their normal daily routine in high school, or helps students find joy eating and hanging out with friends, it’s important to still be aware of what you consume.
Research found in Ultra-Processed Food Intake and Increased Risk of Obesity demonstrates that in the long term, eating ultra processed foods damages your health when eating these types of products entirely.
Continuing to eat out not only bleeds your bank account, but also affects your own health long-term. Which is why it is important to be aware of what you eat, how much you eat, in order to live a good quality life. Eating school lunch helps you achieve that good quality way of living.
“Eating school lunch is convenient, and the food is pretty decent,” says senior Bradly Mazariegos.
The amount of money the average SRHS student spends per week on lunch is approximately $45. Since in one school year there are 36 weeks, the average students who eat off campus spend is approximately $1.6k a school year. That’s how much students would be saving if they got school lunch instead of eating out.
Packing your own homemade lunch is another option some students prefer to do compared to eating school lunch. “I stopped enjoying school lunch, and preferred to pack my own sandwich,” says sophomore Katie Hernandes. Students who pack their own lunch mainly make a sandwich like Hernandes, or pack some over there left over dinner.
Even though a sandwich may be a healthier and better option compared to school lunch, buying the ingredients to make it every single day for a whole school year could be relatively costly. Not only does school lunch provide a healthy variety of options for students to consume, it’s free, which saves the time and money in packing your own homemade lunch.
With the high consumption of processed foods, the cycle of unhealthy eating habits gets harder to break. Encouraging students to eat school lunches not only supports them by saving money, it supports their immediate health. School lunches play an important role in combating obesity, and spreading awareness on this topic helps the younger generation be informed on what they consume and how it affects them in the long run.
