I didn't encounter school lunches until junior high. At my elementary school kids brought their own lunches. If they had something to bring. Not everyone did. I remember coveting the snack cakes some of my peers brought in. My lunch was nutritionally balanced. Never a Ring Ding or a Twinkie.
When I did finally get to stand in line with my tray it was love at first sight and smell. The lunch ladies were serving something I'd Never tasted before: American chop suey. I asked the woman serving if I could please have a big serving. And at the end of the line there was dessert, which was served only on special occasions at the Seibert house. I made sure to tell the lunch ladies how much I enjoyed the meal. By the end of the week I was getting not only only large servings, but extra desserts. I was trying to get my mother to try their recipes with the fervor of a born again evangelical.
I think most of experienced school lunches as kids and teens. Some of us have experienced them vicariously through our children's narratives. I like to think that most of you want all kids to receive tasty, nutritious meals that help them enjoy good health and do well academically.
But unfortunately all too often school lunches and breakfasts serve as a political football, a way for legislators to score points and win votes. Remember the pink slime scare? How about pizza being considered a vegetable because tomato sauce? How about the cruel practice of lunch shaming in which little kids are humiliated in an attempt to get their parents to pay overdue balances on their accounts? Well get in line cause Marcus B. Weaver-Hightower is serving up the scoop on the viscisitudes of school meal programs in his Unpacking School Lunches. It's the result of almost fifteen years of research.
Weaver-Hightower provides readers with a rich description of the history of American school lunches, considered to be one of the most successful social welfare programs in this nation's history, the complex roles and relationships of the adults involved from legislators including the prez, through corporations producing lots of the food or food adjacent substances, to the front line servers, and how the end products of their labor may or may not meet the needs of the consumers, our nation's children.
"Discussions of "conservative" and "liberal" (hereafter "progressive" for the latter, to avoid confusion with other terms I'm using) can destroy the nuances and complexities of any debate (Jost et al., 2009). Yet sorting arguments over school food into these camps helps illuminate a central dynamic (Lusk, 2012). Put simply, school food in the United States and many other countries has been characterized by conservative resistance to food provision and regulation alongside progressive incrementalism towards healthier, more just food provision. Thus far, neither ideological position has completely gotten its way, but not for a lack of trying."
Weaver-Hightower describes this dynamic in great detail, both in America and across the pond in England. In his grand finale he describes some schools that have created outstanding school feeding programs and lists fifteen maxims that describe progressive school feeding values.
I know I learned a lot. I believe that whether you're a parent or grand, a professional or professional in training, or someone who recognizes school feeding as the crucial social justice issue that it is you'll find Unpacking School Lunches to be in excellent taste.
On a purrrsonal note, yesterday was a lot of fun. Catherine and her crew were serving up delicious grilled cheese sandwiches. I was paparazzi. Bailey had really neat prizes from the SWell stash people could take. People loved them. I saw lots of good friends. I didn't have to bus in the cold because Bailey gave me a ride both ways. Today I stayed home to read and review Unpacking School Lunches so Bailey who reads everything social work and social justice related because she's awesome like that can read the book before it's due. I'm also decorating our HUGE Christmas 🎄 tree. It'll look SO AWESOME when I'm done.
A great big shout out goes out to school lunch professionals past, present, and future and to Bailey who is going to give me a ride to campus tomorrow when we get more yucky weather.
Jules Hathaway
Sent from my U.S.Cellular© Smartphone
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