My kids love tapioca
Papa John’s pizza, Blue Bell ice cream, and fluorescent-colored Slushies.
For some kids, those may be the ingredients of a perfect school lunch. But for at least one Houston school district trustee, they may be the makings for a food fight.
At a board meeting Monday, trustee Juliet Stipeche questioned the district’s request to spend as much as $3 million on pizza, ice cream, chips and juices.
“This really bothers me that so much money is going to things that are not healthy,” Stipeche said Tuesday. “We should be offering something that is healthier than ice cream.”
The district has proposed spending up to $750,000 on Blue Bell ice cream, up to $960,000 on Papa John’s pizza, and up to $800,000 on beverages from Sunny Sky Products, which supplies juices and Slushie-type drinks.
With childhood obesity affecting about 17 percent of the country’s children, Stipeche said she worries that the district is sending the wrong message.
“Is it wise to promote children to eat unhealthy food?” asked Stipeche. “I’m not someone who’s just being picky about pizza and ice cream. This is a health crisis and something we need to show leadership on.”
Advocates of free play on the school yard won an endorsement Thursday when the HISD Board unanimously adopted a resolution recommending daily recess in addition to physical education classes for all elementary students.
Though the measure doesn’t guarantee unstructured play on campus, supporters say the policy brings the youngest pupils closer to an opportunity every school day to blow off steam on their own terms.
“I think it is a great step in the right direction,” said Chrysi Polydoros, a member of the district’s school health advisory council – which made the recess proposal – and the mother of four HISD students. “They need to get their sillies out so that they can go refocus in the classroom. They are kids and we have them in schools like little business professionals. They need a little extra bit of free time to get themselves ready to go back in and do more hard work.”
I pretty much said all I have to say in the title of this post. Gotta take your silver linings where you can find them.