Hooked On Pepsi
Brett at DadTalk advocates the removal of vending machines that sell candy and soda from our public schools, as do I. However, it's not the students that are addicted... It's the school districts that have an unhealthy reliance upon the money they earn from those machines. The Salem-Keizer School District in Oregon received $413,000 from Pepsi in 2004. And that's just the beginning. Read more about the issue of vending machines in schools here.
Permalink posted by Phil at 7:12 PM
3 Comments:
I have a number of perspectives on soda/candy machines in public schools. First and foremost it is a public health issue. Our kids (and I point at myself first) are getting fat. Soda contributes to that in a bad bad way.
I also agree that school districts have developed a dangerous co-dependence on the junk food companies, particularly soda companies. The fault for that co-dependency, however, lies more in our laps than in district laps.
Districts are being asked, more and more, to take on additional responsibilities with fewer resources. Then they are being blamed for all our collective shortcomings when kids are not doing what we think they should be doing. For some districts, particularly less affluent ones, the money from soda machines mean an extra teacher, new textbooks, and paper for copies.
It's a vicious cycle.
At least the Los Angeles Unified is getting rid of the worst offending food products from their vending machines. But of any district, they do need money.
But then again, it's sad that the wealthiest nation in the world can't figure out a way to properly fund its schools.
exactly, brett. Why are schools having to go begging to corporations, having to sell off their students' health to the highest bidder?
Messed up priorities!
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