Healthy Food on College Campuses, Essay Example

It is hard to underestimate the importance of healthy eating in colleges and other institutions of learning. Healthy food is essential for one to live a healthy life. However, it is a challenge to eat healthy food even if all the resources are available. What matters is the way by which an individual goes about the matter. Many students in colleges and their constituent campuses face the problem of healthy eating and leading a healthy lifestyle. The primary reason behind the trend is that students are eating a lot of unnecessary food in their schools. Poor eating habits are the cause behind the increasing problem of obesity in the United States of America. Therefore, it is a concern and a challenge for colleges to promote healthy eating habits among the students.

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It is hard to expect students lead a healthy lifestyle if he/she is not consuming a balanced diet. Many shops/canteens located inside colleges offer snacks and junk food that is not healthy at all. The students feed on the junk food and snacks day after day and year after year. The snacks/junk food contains excess amounts of sugar and artificial flavors that are harmful to their bodies. Therefore, many students suffer from the lack of a balanced diet. The result is the increasing cases of diseases arising from the lack of healthy food. College shops/canteens play a major role in offering additional types of food that may not be available in the dining halls. However, the shops should also make sure they sell fruits and other healthy foods to the students. Students should have an option of adding vital nutrients to their bodies from the food they get from the vendors in the school canteens.

The shop vendors are not the only ones to blame. College dining halls do not offer a variety of foods to the students. It is the reason they go to the canteens to get additional types of food. Most dining halls in the colleges do not even have a vegetarian section/meal as an extra variety of food. Some students may wish to consume vegetables as a supplementary diet to obtain crucial nutrients and minerals, but many colleges do not offer that. Many college dining halls do not offer fruits too. Therefore, many students lack a balanced diet on a daily basis.

Campus administrators are playing a significant role in the lack of healthy food in the colleges. Healthy food is expensive to provide to students. However, the government makes sure there are enough funds to provide healthy food to college students. However, the food funds serve as a revenue stream rather than a means of improving health. The government should make sure there is an adequate audit of school funds. It should check that money provided for healthy food is channeled towards providing the healthy food.

Conclusion

Colleges and their respective campuses can take several steps to ensure they provide a balanced diet to the students. They should make sure that tap water is freely and readily available to the students. They should also implement regulations to reduce the junk food offered in the canteens and cafeterias in the learning institutions. The colleges can also partner with local communitys farmers who can provide healthy food options to the schools. Access to healthy food is a right of every student.