School meal waivers that started with the COVID-19 pandemic stopped with the end of the public health emergency.
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Since nutrition standards were strengthened in 2010, eating at school provides many students with healthier food than is available cheaply elsewhere. Plus, reducing stigma increases the number of kids getting fed.
Eating well makes it easier to concentrate on learning.
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An expert on food policy explains how the end of COVID-19 waivers will impact children’s access to food, as well as the importance of food banks and pantries.
About 30 million students eat school lunches daily.
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It helped that school food service staff quickly changed their preparation, packaging and distribution methods to feed students who were no longer eating in cafeterias.
The White House is threatening to cut funds to school districts that don’t resume daily in-person instruction.
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Thurston Domina, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
The millions of US children whose parents can’t always afford enough nutritious food for their families get about a quarter of their calories from what they eat at school.
The front gate of New Rochelle High School in New Rochelle, N.Y. The school was closed March 11, 2020 as part of efforts to contain spread of coronavirus.
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So far, children have not been as sickened by the coronavirus as adults. So why do officials talk about closing schools? And what does this mean for you as a parent? A public health expert explains.
Assembling backpacks of food for students to take home in Flint, Mich.
Kathleen Payton/Food Bank of Eastern Michigan
Backpack programs that give students easily prepared foods, like boxed macaroni and cheese and canned beans, can make a difference.
In Rome, 70 per cent of ingredients in school meals are required by law to be organic. In Brazil, food is a constitutional right for children. Canada lags shamefully behind.
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There would be many benefits from a national school food program, including a chance to teach children healthy eating habits that could last a lifetime. Why can’t it happen?
Elementary schools provide excellent targets for interventions to prevent obesity as children spend much of their day and consume many of their calories at school.
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Research shows that children attending schools with low-quality food environments, in poorer neighborhoods, gain more central body fat – putting them at risk of obesity and cardiometabolic disease.
Canada is one of very few industrialized countries not to have a national school food program.
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As Canadian kids head back to school this week, many will be hungry. Lacking fruits, vegetables and other nutritious foods, they will suffer mood problems, disease and low academic performance.
All students deserve a healthy lunch when they go to school.
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Students with unpaid meal debts have been experiencing some shaming policies at school. New rules are aimed at protecting these children, but the real solution may lie in free meals for all.
Nutritious meal inside? Maybe, maybe not.
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Ravenous students, busy parents, nutrition professionals and school officials all have their own ideas about what belongs on the school lunch table. Plenty of criticism centers on the unhealthiness of…
Canada Research Chair in Digital Media Use by Children and Its Implications for Promoting Togetherness: An Ecosystemic Approach, Université de Sherbrooke