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California High Schools Scrap 'Plastic Foods' in Favor of Real Nutrition

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In Escondido, school chefs are now cooking 10,000 meals a day from scratch, and seeing academic and behavioral improvement as a result.

It’s lunchtime at San Pasqual High, and students file out of the cafeteria carrying trays of food laden with items that would have made First Lady Michelle Obama proud: a southwestern salad of black beans, salsa, mixed green lettuce, corn, shredded chicken, a carton of milk and baked corn chips. Those who had opted for the oriental salad had pieces of fresh mandarin oranges, rice noodles and shredded chicken. Most every tray contained a green organic apple, as well.

“I’ve been eating this kind of food in school since I’ve been a freshman,” said San Pascal High junior student Angel Bravo, 18, during an Oct. 23 ethnic media briefing here sponsored by The California Endowment and organized by New America Media. “And the food [becomes] the energy that I need to be a football player.”

Menus vary each day, but students in the five high schools in the Escondido Union High School District (EUHSD), which includes San Pasqual High, Valley High, Orange Glen High, Escondido High and Escondido Adult High, get lunches and breakfasts that are packed with nutrition, low in salt and sugar and free of trans fat, meeting federal nutritional requirements.

The EUHSD serves a total of 10,000 meals each day, the bulk of which are free or at a reduced price. Orange Glen High and Valley High, both of which have a high Hispanic and African American student population, have between 80 and 85 percent participation in the free or reduced-price meals program, while only 40 percent of students at San Pasqual qualify.

But the district is proud that the overall participation in its breakfast and lunch programs is 77 percent, compared to the 20 percent participation rate of most California high school districts, said Pamela Lambert, the EUHSD’s nutrition services director, citing a California Department of Education figure. The reason for the discrepancy?

“Our food is so good,” Lambert asserted proudly.

Most school districts nationwide are now making sure their students get nutritional meals, thanks to the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 championed by the First Lady. Of the 6.2 million students enrolled in California public schools in the 2010-2011 school year, 3.47 million were eligible for free or reduced price meals, according to the California Department of Education [3].

http://www.alternet....-real-nutrition

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