Boston's half baked ideas

[Gob]

Bake sales, the calorie-laden standby cash-strapped classrooms, PTAs and booster clubs rely on, will be outlawed from public schools as of Aug. 1 as part of new no-nonsense nutrition standards, forcing fundraisers back to the blackboard to cook up alternative ways to raise money for kids.

At a minimum, the nosh clampdown targets so-called “competitive” foods — those sold or served during the school day in hallways, cafeterias, stores and vending machines outside the regular lunch program, including bake sales, holiday parties and treats dished out to reward academic achievement. But state officials are pushing schools to expand the ban 24/7 to include evening, weekend and community events such as banquets, door-to-door candy sales and football games.

The Departments of Public Health and Education contend clearing tables of even whole milk and white bread is necessary to combat an obesity epidemic affecting a third of the state’s 1.5 million students. But parents argue crudites won’t cut it when the bills come due on athletic equipment and band trips.

“If you want to make a quick $250, you hold a bake sale,” said Sandy Malec, vice president of the Horace Mann Elementary School PTO in Newtonville.

Maura Dawley of Scituate said the candy bars her 15-year-old son brought to school to help pay for a youth group trip to Guatemala “sold like wildfire.” She worries the ban “would seriously affect the bottom line of the PTOs.

“The goal is to raise money,” Dawley said. “You’re going to be able to sell pizza. You’re not going to get that selling apples and bananas. It’s silly.”

Food fundraisers have helped send the renowned Danvers High School Falcon Band to the Rose Bowl Parade in California and the 70th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor in Honolulu. Danvers Parents for Music Education sell fudge because “it still works,” said the group’s president, Matthew Desmond. “Even my wife will buy it.”

Middleboro School Committeeman Brian Giovanoni, whose board will discuss the mandatory meal makeover Thursday night, said, “My concern is we’re regulating what people can eat, and I have a problem with that. I respect the state for what they’re trying to do, but I think they’ve gone off the deep end. I don’t want someone telling me how to do my job as a parent. ... Is the commonwealth of Massachusetts saying our parents are bad parents?”

No, insists Dr. Lauren Smith, DPH’s medical director.

“We’re not trying to get into anyone’s lunch box,” Smith told the Herald. “We know that schools need those clubs and resources. We want them to be sure and have them, but to do them a different way. We have some incredibly innovative, talented folks in schools who are already doing some impressive things, who serve as incontrovertible evidence that, yes, you can do this, and be successful at it.”

State Sen. Susan Fargo (D-Lincoln), chairwoman of the Joint Committee on Public Health, said the problem of overweight children has reached “crisis” proportions.

“If we didn’t have so many kids that were obese, we could have let things go,” Fargo said.

“But,” she added, “this is a major public health problem and these kids deserve a chance at a good, long healthy life.”
-— laurel.sweet@bostonherald.com

[Lord Jim]

[oldr_n_wsr]

Let them sell celery and carrot sticks. That shold bring in a bundle for the PTA's.

[Lord Jim]

Four words:

Broccoli-on-a-stick!

[MajGenl.Meade]

And what is the school policy on compulsory physical education?

Ours (good old days, horses, steam radio and so forth) was four periods of Phys Ed (gym, track, long distance running) PLUS two double periods of Games (cricket, football, rugby according to season) every week.

[Guinevere]

Don't be laughing so hard, folks, this may be coming to a bake sale near you....

1. Nit pick - this is a state issue, not the City of Boston, so no, it's not Boston's "idea."

2. Oh, and the feds got there first: The Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010, will let the USDA issues rules about "competitive" food, which is targetted at bake sales and other food-based fund raisers. http://www.fns.usda.gov/cnd/governance/ ... r_2010.htm

3. And so did lots of other places, like California, Conencticut, and New York City:http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/0 ... 78571.html

Now excuse my while I run to the bank for cash so I can stock up at the Class of 2012 bake sale at Town Meeting tonight!

[BoSoxGal]

Meade, most school districts in this country have eliminated compulsory physical education, and many have done away with recess, too.

[Big RR]

BSG--do you have a cite for that factoid? I was not able to find anything that said most (or even a large number) of districts don't require physical education in their schools. Further, unless phys ed has changed a lot from when I was in school, I honestly wonder how much these classes contribute to overall physical health of students.

[oldr_n_wsr]

I think Phys Ed is mandated in NY state. If not, I don't know of any schools here on Long Island that do not have Phys Ed.

[Guinevere]

Massachusetts -- the state referenced in the OP -- requires physical education for all students in all grades, as a matter of state law. MGL c. 71, section 3.

[BoSoxGal]

Let me clarify my earlier assertion:

Many states have mandatory PE on the books, but in practice a majority are not actually providing it or demanding it of kids. There are many resources out there easily Googled on this issue; I've heard about it repeatedly in various NPR pieces in recent years. Here are some sites with stats:

http://fitness.gov/about-us/council-mee ... -in-us.pdf

http://sitemaker.umich.edu/356.speregen ... erformance

http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5336a5.htm

The numbers are in variance, but note that the CDC indicates that fewer than 6% of high schools require PE of all students in all grades. It's also important to note that even where PE is required at any grade level, the stats indicate that the actual physical activity levels achieved fall far short of what is recommended by health/fitness experts.

My experience of PE from grade school through high school, in the 70s and 80s, bears that out. With NCLB requirements forcing schools to focus on testing performance, it's only logical that the situation has only worsened in recent years.

Giving lip service to PE is worse than not having it, because it lulls parents and the community overall into a false sense of security that kids are getting needs in this area met. They aren't.

[Joe Guy]

I remember the olden daze when PE & recess were mandatory at the schools I attended.

There were plenty of fat & out of shape kids then also.

Kids either kept active or not based on what they chose to do at the time.

Laws don't make children more active and/or healthy.

Children need to be inspired, not regulated.

[BoSoxGal]

Joe, the reality of how kids spend time today is very different from when you were a wee lad. And while it might have seemed like there were plenty of overweight kids then, today childhood obesity is RAMPANT.

This is a HUGE public health issue - pun intended.

Today's kids will face shorter life expectancies than their parents, given the rapidly increasing rates of 'adult onset' diabetes among kids. REALLY fat kids, who don't move around at school and don't move around at home.

How many kids do you see out running around in your neighborhood on a daily basis?

I live in a small, relatively safe city - kids don't walk to school or play in the streets and parks after school - they take buses or get rides with parents, and spend time after school on computer games and in front of TVs. Even the kids on school sports teams are chubby by comparison to ten or twenty years ago.

We are eating ourselves to death in the US.

[dales]

I remember the olden daze when PE & recess were mandatory at the schools I attended.

There were plenty of fat & out of shape kids then also.

Kids either kept active or not based on what they chose to do at the time.

Laws don't make children more active and/or healthy.

Children need to be inspired, not regulated.

Plus, during the 1950's and 1960's there were NO video games, computers, etc.

We played outdoors until dark or mom called us.

My kids DID NOT have a computer in the house (outside of an Apple ll) to waste away their time.

Very little junk food (my grandson eats very little sweets/junk food).

He's getting his first gun when he's turns 10 in a few years from grandpa!

[Guinevere]

I would suggest that there is some correlation between the fact that Massachusetts requires physical education in the schools --- and it is not a paper requirement --- and the fact that we have one of the least obese populations in the nation.

My boys (6 and 8) are incredibly active. They play baseball all year round and on a team from April-July. They both take karate, swimming, and tennis lessons throughout the year. They love to play outside and even inside they are still active. Wii is restricted to weekends only and they can't sit down to play. Other computer games are also similarly restricted, although there is more and more required computer time, even at their ages. But they both have incredible little six-packs and are super fit kids.

[Miles]

I was very active when I was a kid, I was also a digusting fat body and happy. We played all sports depending on the time of year. I played sports in school, basketball, football, ran track including cross country shot & discuss. Not everyone is designed to be slim and trim. It is not the business of government to dictate what when and where we eat.

[Big RR]

I played sports (football, soccer, and shotput) as well, but my memories of PE show very little real exercise. I recall marching in formations around the gym (I guess to get us ready for Vietnam (or maybe marching band) but not much exercise) and playing bombardment (consisting of throwing several balls as hard as you could at the target du jour)--easy for the coaches to set up, but not much exercise either (we also played softball with 12-15 people on a side, and outfields having around 8 people standing around in places where the balls rarely came). Checking off a box of having a PE program does not automatically promote fitness.

[oldr_n_wsr]

Bombardment and dodgeball are no longer allowed.

Although I did see an advertisement for an "over 18" dodgeball league at a local gym.
I wonder if Bill Shatner will give out the trophy?

[Scooter]

outfields having around 8 people standing around in places where the balls rarely came

That was me in elementary/middle school PE. I hated baseball/softball with a passion, but it seemed like every spring that was all we would do in PE.

[Gob]

I was a tall, very skinny, cowardly kid with thick glasses and buck teeth. Our main school sport was rugby, I was "sick" a great number of PE days.

It wasn't until I found marathon running in the late 70's, and adventure sports in the early 80's that I came to enjoy sports.