The Jag Wire

First Lady's campaign targets school system

Monday, November 15, 2010 By Keely Fortin, Staff Writer

With the rising national obesity rate, decreasing nutrition has been a continuous topic among many of our nation’s nutritionists for quite some time now. Recently, however, this issue has reached the ears of our First Lady, Michele Obama. She heard how much our schools were lacking proper nutrition and decided to help out. She founded a campaign against childhood obesity which she called "Let’s Move". The campaign is dedicated to bringing healthier foods into our school systems, starting with changing from the foods that have been previously cooked and stuffed with additives and preservatives to keep it fresh and give it flavor. Food distribution companies freeze the food and ship it to the schools where it sits in the freezer until the day it is on the menu. It is then taken out and warmed up or deep fried in order to make it suitable to eat. This method is not only unappetizing to think about, but it is also not very nutritional. The whole point of "Let’s Move" is to get rid typical cafeterias and move towards ones that prepare their food from scratch using natural, whole ingredients, wheat breads and pastas instead of processed white bread, less sodium, fats, and also lean towards foods that incorporate fresh vegetables. Michele Obama said, "What we don’t want is a situation where parents are taking all the right steps at home—and then their kids undo all the work with salty, fatty food in the school cafeteria. So let’s move to get healthier food into our nation’s schools." So far she has gotten Chartwells, an education dining service, to embrace new standards that call for more fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and also less salt and sugar in the food they provide for schools around the country. But probably the most influential thing our First Lady has done is sent the Healthy Schools Act pending to the D.C. council which calls for healthier foods to be served as well as a serving of vegetables with every meal and not just potatoes.