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BaconToes

Should the school serve students fast-food that is cheap, quick, and consumed more often than healthier food, or should school serve time consuming, expensive, less consumed healthier food that is beneficial to the student's health?

Nope

Healthy foods are better. Although if one thinks school food are unhealthy they can bring a healthy home lunch some kids really on school foods for their income of food because if you are really poor or homeless you can still go to school and they will make the food free. So for those people who main source of food is school food it should be healthy. This is the main reason I think school food should be healthier. : )

Grenache

My issue with this topic is always how poorly fast food is defined.  People will just blindly say burgers and fries and pizza, etc.  But let's test that...
A salad may be healthy - but it also may be pretty much iceberg lettuce which is then slathered with a dressing with more fat than Big Mac.
Kale and other greens may be healthy - but if 3 out of 4 kids simply won't eat them then you just wasted an enormous amount of kale and you have a pack of hungry kids making trouble in school.
Whole grains may be healthy - unless you believe in the Atkins school of dieting.  A segment of society now considers carbs no better than poison.
Fish may be healthy - unless it has mercury.
There are many more.

Now let's test the junk food - 
A burger or pizza may be junk food - but then again it's protein, grains, dairy, maybe some veg on top.  Really?  That's junk?
Fries or chips may be junk food - but they also may be just one part of a meal which otherwise is pretty healthy.
Soda may be junk food - but depending on which soda it may still be better for you than all the sugar in orange juice or all the hormones in non-organic milk.
Candy probably is junk food - unless it's dark chocolate, or more than half nuts.

And neither of these food categories take into account the exercise or lifestyle of the person eating them.  The captain of the football team may eat tons of what you consider junk food but still burn it off on the field.  The captain of the chess club may eat nothing but healthy foods but still be pasty with no muscle tone.

And then finally, there is a cost to putting the food choices out there.  If a school offers more from the junk food side I listed than the health food side but by doing so they have enough funds to offer lunches to their poorest students free of charge then that's pretty good.  But if instead it's all first rate organic healthy food but if you can't pay up you don't get to eat then you've basically put your richer kids on a weight loss diet and your poorer kids on a starvation diet.  Then thanks for nothing.

Fredsnephew

Pizza, burgers and fries are absolutely fine if eaten within the context of a balanced diet.
This type of food only becomes detrimental to health when eaten as a staple.
Of course regular exercise is also key to a healthy lifestyle.
Schools should definitely be promoting healthy lifestyle choices, but I firmly believe that the onus is on parents to instil into their children, a common sense approach to diet and fitness.

joecavalry

I believe that healthy food should be served in food and the food that they currently serve may be a large cause of childhood obesity.

MayCaesar

I would prefer the students to have a menu to choose from according to their own desires, and the payment for those meals to be their families' burden and not the general taxpayer's. Forcing people to eat something for whatever reason is not the best way to cultivate a culture of healthy eating.

BaconToes

@MayCaesar
What about low-income students? 
If the school serve healthy food, they aren't forcing them to eat, they are presenting a choice.

MayCaesar

@BaconToes
I would say these matters should be solved outside the school environment. For example, the government could issue food stamps for school students from families with income below a certain value. But even in this case, it is my firm belief that it should be up to the student what food to buy with those stamps. For example, the government could issue daily stamps worth $15, and the student would but whatever food he/she wants from the available menu with the stamps.

I understand the notion that it is better for the students to eat healthy food, and I understand that the taxpayers want their money to be used with the highest effectiveness - but at the same time, as a libertarian, I am strongly against such explicit incentivizing of the desired action.

BaconToes

@MayCaesar
So your point is that we shouldn't have school lunches?

MayCaesar

@BaconToes
No, my idea is that the school lunches are offered for sale, as in any conventional cafe or restaurant, and when needed, the government provides coverage for those lunches to the students from poor families. The advantage of the system I am suggesting is that the freedom of choice is not taken away from the students, while the needing students still receive the help they need.

On the other hand, forcing all students to eat healthy food only, whether at the taxpayer's or their families' expense, is contrary to the spirit of this country, in my opinion.

CYDdharta

The survey doesn't make much sense, as schools can serve both healthy and fast foods and let students decide what they want to eat.

cheesycheese

CYDdharta said:

The survey doesn't make much sense, as schools can serve both healthy and fast foods and let students decide what they want to eat.

students can't be trusted to make the better choice

AmericanFurryBoy

In my school district, we get sh*t fast food that lasts in your stomach for probably about five minutes. A few years back we did in fact have healthy food and though it was more expensive it did taste better and lasted longer in our stomachs. Then Trump came. I am indeed a supporter but not of everything he does. He repealed Obama era legislation that had requirements on what the districts could and couldn’t serve. And since we have budget cuts every few days our district was like “hey, lets serve cheap food.” Healthy food in our schools would also combat our current obesity epedemic. We hear every day about eating right and then we enter the cafeteria and it’s the complete opposite of what we are told to eat.

WordsMatter

It's cheaper to force all students to eat healthy lunches in public school. It will save money down the line when tax payers are covering their medical costs or productivity is lost due to preventable illness or death. Yes these things can still easily happen but I prefer tax payer money to be used in a preventative way here rather than a reactive way farther down the line. Private schools could of course do whatever they want.