School Lunch Should be Free - Free Essay Sample

Introduction

School meals represent a vital source of consistent nutritious food to many children. Most families in the United States belong to the middle and low-class levels and do not access healthy food. According to Davis and Musaddiq (2018) in one academic year, children eat between one-third and one-half of their daily calories in school. Moreover, children at risk are saved from hunger and food associated disorders, such as obesity. A significant portion of food provided in schools is provided through the School Food Programs (SFPs) like the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) and the School Breakfast Program (SBP). The lunch program has a direct relationship with children's health and performance. However, the lunch program is biased and does include all students, increasing stigma connected with a subsided mean.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Order now

Problems Associated

The National School Lunch Program under the Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) provides free lunch to eligible students in high-poverty schools. The students must prove their illegibility to access free lunch, increasing the burden of paperwork. Some eligible students may not benefit from the program because the school administration may provide incomplete or inadequate data. Moreover, students who are not fully subsidized meals because families are sensitive to the price of school lunch (Hoffman, 2012).

Another issue with the current program is non-participation associated with stigma. Students are reluctant to enroll in the subsidized meal because of the misleading perception that it belongs to poor children (Leos-Urbel et al., 2013). Another reason why students fail to participate in the free meals is of low quality due to high nutritional standards. The main aim of the free lunch program is to provide a healthy meal to improve students’ health. However, the meal may be unappealing to students who are attracted to snacks, home food, and other food offered in vending machines.

The Benefits

The primary advantage of free lunch is to offer food security. Lack of healthy nutrition affects children's and adolescents' health outcomes, including malnutrition risk, mental health disorders, and low child weight. A study conducted by Davis and Musaddiq (2018) showed participation in NSLP reduced the risk of food insecurity by 14%. Although the risk differed according to age and location, the study found that food insufficiency is higher during summer when children do not receive meals from schools. Children from lower-income families are at a higher risk of food insecurity, and offering free lunch is one of the significant approaches the government can implement to prevent insufficiency.

The second of free providing free lunch to all is diet quality. Numerous studies conducted on the diet effect of subsidized meals showed that the outcome depends on the quality of school food compared to what students consume meals from home (Davis & Musaddiq, 2018). School meals have a positive effect on students who consume low quality processed food and snacks. In a study of the effects of subsidized breakfast and lunch programs on diet, the investigator found that positive outcomes on students, but the distribution varied across grade and location. However, there was no significant diet effect on students from high-income households (Davis & Musaddiq, 2018).

Improved children's health is the third positive effect of universal free lunch programs in primary and secondary schools. Providing a healthy school meal is a tool to reduce the rising childhood obesity rate. Davis and Musaddiq (2018) found that Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) involvement rises the percentage of healthy weight learners in a school and decreases average BMI. Moreover, they did not find significant proof to support a harmful effect from either the CEP or school food on child health outcomes.

Medical and nutrition experts argue that a healthy diet improves cognitive function. Anderson et al. (2017) conducted a study to determine the effect of healthy lunch on students’ academic achievements. Data was collected over five years in all California public schools. They found that students that established contracts with healthy lunch vendor scored highest, with an increase in scores for those that benefited from free or reduced-price lunches. However, the results failed to statistically prove that healthy lunches reduce the rates of obesity. Similarly, in another study by Leos-Urbel et al. (2013), the results demonstrated that free universal school meals improve participation, attendance, and academic achievements.

Cons of Free Lunch Program

The government will spend a lot of money to provide free lunch to all K-12 students. For instance, the government spends over $13.6 billion on the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) to provide free or reduced-price meals in over 95% of all public schools. In 2016, more than 30.4 million students participated in the program, and 21.6 million received free or subsidized lunch because they were from low-income families (Davis & Musaddiq, 2018). The cost of implementing the policy will be double because the national bureau of statistics estimates that 50.7 million will attend public schools in the US (National Center for Education Statistics, 2020).

Most students consume half of the food served in schools, wasting substantial that that leads to health and financial losses. The increasing waste is contributed by food-related issues, such as accessibility and palatability, students’ tastes preferences and satiation, and the coordination of the program. Schools incur financial loss cleaning wasted food; hence the program may be ineffective in schools with children from high economic status. Another issue associated with the program is that it does not significantly improve health in children. The free healthy school meal aims to reduce the rising childhood obesity rate. However, the results from various failed to statistically prove that healthy lunches reduce the rates of obesity (Leos-Urbel et al., 2013).

Estimated Outcomes

Although the program will cost a future from the government, among other mentions limitations, it should be implemented because it will yield significant benefits to both the states and children's wellbeing. First, it will help the government to fight against food insufficiency. Most poor families in the United States do not afford three meals per day. Teachers have been noting that some students did not bring lunch from home. Second, it will improve the physical and mental wellbeing of children. Children from low-income households may not afford a balanced diet meal, providing free lunch will supply the required nutrients for growth and development. The free lunch program will, in turn, improve academic performance in students, who cannot afford to pay reduced-price school meals.

The implementation of the program will alter students’ misconceptions and increase participation using strategies that would improve the current subsidized program. For instance, according to economic theory reducing or eliminating the price of schools meals will increase students’ participation in other meals, such as breakfast. Prices influence the participation rates in breakfast and lunch for students who are not fully subsisted. Most families cannot afford to buy breakfast and lunch at school, making the children to forgo one. The provision of free lunch will allow students to participate in breakfast. Universal free lunch may eliminate the stigma connected with participating in school means. It will alter students’ perception that free meals belong to children low-income households (Leos-Urbel et al., 2013). The program will help schools enjoy economies of scale and improve the quality of meals. Lastly, the free lunch program will eliminate paperwork and administrative burden associated with the semi-subsidized meal initiatives. Schools will not require assessing students’ eligibility to determine where or not they can befit from the program.

Conclusion

The implementation of a universal free lunch program to all K-12 students will not only help the government fight against food insecurity but also improve the wellbeing and academic performance of students. The lunch program offered to certain students is perceived to be for poor children. It creates is the need for policymakers to provide free lunch to all students not only as a source of food security to dependent students but also to promote the health and equality of students. Although providing free lunch to all K-12 students in the US will be associated with some drawbacks, the benefits outwit the costs.

References

Anderson, M. L., Gallagher, J., & Ritchie, E. R. (2017). School lunch quality and academic performance (No. w23218). National Bureau of Economic Research.
https://www.nber.org/papers/w23218.pdf

Davis, W., & Musaddiq, T. (2018). Estimating the effects of subsidized school meals on child health: evidence from the community eligibility Provision in Georgia schools. SSRN.
http://dx.DOI.org/10.2139/ssrn, 3155354.

Hoffman, L. (2012). Free and Reduced-Price Lunch Eligibility Data in Ed" Facts": A White Paper on Current Status and Potential Changes. Office of Planning, Evaluation and Policy Development, US Department of Education.
https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED556048.pdf

Leos-Urbel, J., Schwartz, A. E., Weinstein, M., & Corcoran, S. (2013). Not just for poor kids: The impact of universal free school breakfast on meal participation and student outcomes. Economics of education review, 36, 88-107.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/pmc3900011/

National Center for Education Statistics. (2020). Back to School Statistics.
https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=372.