I’m a firm believer in community participation and education, and this belief has taken me in many different directions. One of the more recent examples is my involvement with the Michelle Obama initiative, Let’s Move, and the Chef’s Move To Schools movement. The Chefs Move to Schools effort founded in May 2010, is an integral part of First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! initiative and its goal of solving the childhood obesity epidemic within a generation.
When my children were in elementary school, I visited their classrooms and did cooking programs with the kids on a regular basis. Like most parents, I found this very gratifying and had fun doing it – young children are easy to please! As they got older, and the average weight of school-aged children crept higher and higher, I was determined to continue my involvement.
Over the past 20 years, obesity rates among children have more than doubled, resulting in one-third of children and adolescents in the Unites States classified as overweight or obese. The U.S. Surgeon General estimates that 70% of these obese children will grow to become obese adults and will be susceptible to serious health. Here are a couple of other surprising statistics gleaned from the School Health Policies and Practices Study conducted by the CDC in 2012:
On the nutrition front:
· Only 14.8% of school districts required that schools offer a self-serve salad bar.
· Just 38.3% of districts required that schools prohibit advertisements for junk foods or fast-food restaurants on school property.
And on the Physical Education front:
· 58.9% of districts required that elementary schools provide students with regularly scheduled recess.
· 10.8% of districts required that middle schools provide physical activity breaks outside of physical education class, and 2.0% of districts required that high schools do so.
There are also a number of School Garden programs popping up all over the country, but we’re especially lucky here in California because our climate is so conducive to outdoor gardening. Why have school gardens? Again the CDC gives us this startling statistic: The majority of America’s children go without eating one serving of fruits and vegetables each day. So while our schools are not the only place that kids eat, our schools can help with this challenge.
http://www.letsmove.gov/