Protection from...parents?

Megan sent me this great article.  It should provide a lot of conversation (in the comments section or in class).  You should read the article yourself, but the gist is that a Chicago school is now making rules stating that parents can not send lunches to school with their children.  In other words, the children "must" eat in the school cafeteria.  No more brown bag lunches.

This brings up a few issues - does the school provide as nutritious of a lunch as the parents would have?  Could the parents prepare a lunch for less money than the $2.25 they are required to pay for the cafeteria lunch? Might this force the schools to start to more closely examine their lunches and therefore provide more nutritious lunches?

There are also schools in other parts of the nation that are making similar rules.  For instance, a school in AZ allows home-packed lunches, but nothing that contains white flour, refined sugar or other processed foods.  Good-bye Lunchables!  A school in Alabama forbid any drinks in lunches since there was tap water available in the school.

Thoughts?

The Crime of McDonalds

Is it a crime that McDonald's sells unhealthy food to our kids?  Many people would argue, yes. After all, San Francisco city council recently (November 2010) voted to ban Happy Meals with toys unless McDonald's could bring the nutritional content of the meal within reason ("restaurants may include a toy with a meal if it contains fewer than 600 calories – food and drink combined -- and if less than 35% of the calories come from fat").
 

Perhaps even more interesting is this article by Michele Simon who explains that *any* advertising (not just those that contain toys in fat-laden meals) towards children is a crime.  Read the whole article and then let me know your take.