Don't Deny Meals to Needy School Children
- av: Concerned Citizens
- mottagare: Arizona State Legislature
Arizona state Republicans are proposing an end to free lunches for needy children.
A senate panel has already voted, 6-1, to allow schools to opt out of a federal food program that has been in force since 1946.
State Republican Senator Rich Crandall says Arizona should not force schools to participate in the program. If needy children are attending schools that decide to opt out, he told the East Valley Tribune, they should find another school that does participate.
Crandall says new USDA regulations prompted the action, but student advocates say schools opting out of the federal program should at least be required to provide some form of meal assistance to needy students.
Crandall has refused to include any such requirement in the legislation. The Tribune says he's not worried about needy kids; the school boards will take care of them.
The full senate will vote next.
Tell Arizona Republicans: Don't Deny Meals to Needy Students.
A senate panel has already voted, 6-1, to allow schools to opt out of a federal food program that has been in force since 1946.
State Republican Senator Rich Crandall says Arizona should not force schools to participate in the program. If needy children are attending schools that decide to opt out, he told the East Valley Tribune, they should find another school that does participate.
Crandall says new USDA regulations prompted the action, but student advocates say schools opting out of the federal program should at least be required to provide some form of meal assistance to needy students.
Crandall has refused to include any such requirement in the legislation. The Tribune says he's not worried about needy kids; the school boards will take care of them.
The full senate will vote next.
Tell Arizona Republicans: Don't Deny Meals to Needy Students.
We, the undersigned, are very concerned about your legislation to end public schools' required participation in the federal meal program, without also requiring that schools provide replacement programs that will ensure that needy students are fed.
While we understand that USDA regulations can be overwhelming and restrictive, we see this as no excuse to scrap school meal programs in your state altogether.
We ask that you consider the history of the National School Lunch Program and why this measure began. Poverty, a 1904 book by Robert Hunter, was highly influential. Below is an excerpt discussing the effects of poverty on school children.
"Guidance and supervision of the parents are impossible because they must work; the nurture is insufficient because there are too many hungry mouths to feed; learning is difficult because hungry stomachs and languid bodies and thin blood are not able to feed the brain.... It is utter folly, from the point of view of learning, to have a compulsory school law which compels children, in that weak physical and mental state which results from poverty, to drag themselves to school and to sit at their desks, day in and day out, for several years, learning little or nothing. If it is a matter of principle in democratic America that every child shall be given a certain amount of instruction, let us render it possible for them to receive it, as monarchial countries have done, by making full and adequate provision for the physical needs of the children who come from the homes of poverty."
Though Republicans initiating this change in the school food program do not seem motivated by USDA's growing promotion of genetically-modified foods, this is indeed an issue of concern. Nevertheless USDA's and the federal food program's imperfections do not give the state justification for ending meal assistance altogether.
This issue, instead, presents a perfect opportunity for the state to become informed of initiatives like those including gardening and cooking in school curriculums, allowing schools to produce some of their own foods and teach about organic growing methods, cooking, math and other skills at the same time. For more on this issue, the legislature can contact Alice Waters with The Edible Schoolyard Project. http://www.edibleschoolyard.org/#
In the meantime, we insist Arizona should require some kind of program to ensure that needy school children do not go hungry
Thank you for your attention to this important matter.
Signera petitionenSignera petitionenWhile we understand that USDA regulations can be overwhelming and restrictive, we see this as no excuse to scrap school meal programs in your state altogether.
We ask that you consider the history of the National School Lunch Program and why this measure began. Poverty, a 1904 book by Robert Hunter, was highly influential. Below is an excerpt discussing the effects of poverty on school children.
"Guidance and supervision of the parents are impossible because they must work; the nurture is insufficient because there are too many hungry mouths to feed; learning is difficult because hungry stomachs and languid bodies and thin blood are not able to feed the brain.... It is utter folly, from the point of view of learning, to have a compulsory school law which compels children, in that weak physical and mental state which results from poverty, to drag themselves to school and to sit at their desks, day in and day out, for several years, learning little or nothing. If it is a matter of principle in democratic America that every child shall be given a certain amount of instruction, let us render it possible for them to receive it, as monarchial countries have done, by making full and adequate provision for the physical needs of the children who come from the homes of poverty."
Though Republicans initiating this change in the school food program do not seem motivated by USDA's growing promotion of genetically-modified foods, this is indeed an issue of concern. Nevertheless USDA's and the federal food program's imperfections do not give the state justification for ending meal assistance altogether.
This issue, instead, presents a perfect opportunity for the state to become informed of initiatives like those including gardening and cooking in school curriculums, allowing schools to produce some of their own foods and teach about organic growing methods, cooking, math and other skills at the same time. For more on this issue, the legislature can contact Alice Waters with The Edible Schoolyard Project. http://www.edibleschoolyard.org/#
In the meantime, we insist Arizona should require some kind of program to ensure that needy school children do not go hungry
Thank you for your attention to this important matter.
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