Santee School District Trying to Keep Up With the Food Revolution

A hot topic in popular culture made an appearance at Tuesday night's School District Board meeting- healthier student eating inspired by Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution.

The school district formed a Wellness Committee about five years ago in order to help the board decide on matters such as the nutritional health of students. That committee has been vigorously debating beneficial changes to student life on campus since then. Much of this debate has surrounded the nutritional value of the food that students are given.

District officials decided that a revision of the student wellness policy was needed in an effort to “curb the number of celebration activities during the school year that include food." The new policy put before the board would have limited rewards, celebrations or school sponsored activities that include food to five times per school year, amongst other changes.

Joe Spencer, parent of a second grade student at Rio Seco Elementary School, and member of the Communication and Wellness Committees for the Santee School District, gave a short speech before the board, imploring them to concentrate on making more affective healthy changes to the food that is given to Santee schoolchildren, and not nitpick on traditions like in-class birthday celebrations (see video of his speech in the media box).

Spencer said the Wellness Committee discussed making birthday treats be "healthy," not eliminate them altogether. He said this move is a show of support for Jamie Oliver's mission to get America to eat healthier, starting with kids. A couple members of the board also referenced Jamie Oliver's television show as enlightening them to certain aspects of student healthy eating.

Santee School District Superintendent Patrick Shaw indicated that part of the plan the board was deciding on included discontinuing "Boxed Lunch Socials" in the next couple years, a point that Boardmember Dustin Burns said would cause him to vote against the new rules. He said the socials were special to him, because he fondly remembers them when he went through the Santee School system.

Board President Barbara Ryan suggested that the district might eliminate food entirely from celebrations. A couple board members also expressed there belief that student obesity and health issues are equally attributable to lack of exercise as to sugar laden food.

"We are nitpicking at an issue that is very comprehensive," said Boardmember Dan Bartholomew.

"I don't know what the answer is. I've wrestled with cupcakes for years," said Boardmember and Diane El-Hajj, who has sat on the Wellness Committee and told tales of what amounted to years of endless back-and-forth between committee members.

As with members of the Wellness Committee, members of the board were against the proposed rules from each end of the spectrum, because the rules didn't go far enough, or they went too far. As El-Hajj put it, with compromise, no one is completely happy.

After much stymied debate the motion to adopt the District's plans failed to pass, with only Bartholomew and Ken Fox voting in favor.

According to Shaw, the intention was to get new rules in place and inform parents in the next two weeks, so they are aware of next year's rules for in-class celebrations. But, that won't be happening.

Shaw's only reaction to the no vote was to say that the District is attempting to get some sort of handle on this nutrition situation, and that all they could do now is discuss the issue further with the Wellness Committee.

Spencer left the meeting happy. He said he didn't want celebrations cut back so much and that the measures didn't address the main issues. So, he'll be back at the table with the Wellness Committee soon, to try and come to some resolution.

"I would further urge the School District and School Board to request that the wellness committee take a look into the menu for lunches provided to all the schools in the district and discuss alternatives," said Spencer. "While the District certainly meets the standards set forth by the federal government, there are huge issues as to the eating habits we are creating within our children."