Students enjoy more lunch choices

Airius Trice, left, adds a yogurt cup to his lunch tray at Learning Way Elementary as manager Julie Compton rings up his meal. (T-G Photo by Mary Reeves) [Order this photo]

Those buying lunches had few choices -- they could either get a paper cup of applesauce to go with their hamburger-and-biscuit-dough pizza, two carrot sticks and green beans, or a hard oatmeal cookie that was guaranteed to chip a tooth unless you dunked it in milk first.

My, how things have changed. School children today are still seeing many of the same things their parents did when they stood in line at the cafeteria, such as mashed potatoes and, yes, applesauce, but this generation has been given a lot more choices.

"Sometimes I get a bag lunch, but sometimes I get a salad," said Samantha Carter, a third grader at Learning Way Elementary.

"We have bad luck on salad days," said her classmate, Buddy Buckingham. "The days we order salads, it's a regular salad. When we don't order salads, it's always a fruit salad."

That day was a fruit salad day, with some students carrying clear plastic clamshell containers filled with cantaloupe, watermelon, honeydew and strawberries. The tray lunch was popcorn chicken, fries and green beans. If neither one was to his liking, a student could order a more familiar meal -- one his mom or dad probably brought to school when they were his age in a brown paper bag.

"It's peanut butter and jelly," said another third graders sitting at their table. The rest of the brown baggers jumped in.

"And a banana!"

"And chips!"

"And cheese!"

This week was National School Lunch Week, a campaign sponsored this year by the NBA, and promoted by the non-profit School Nutrition Association and the Milk Processors Education Program, to teach students the importance of eating a healthy school lunch.

Bedford County School's didn't plan anything special to observe the week, though. They didn't have to.

"All of our meals are special," said Julie Compton, who runs the kitchen at Learning Way Elementary.

The kids seem to agree, and their favorites reflect a changing attitude toward nutrition. While a few claimed the old standards -- hamburgers and pizza-- as their favorite lunches, there were more who like the chicken, as well as those die-hard fruit salad fans like Buddy and Samantha.

"I really like chicken," said Jackson Cantrell as he popped another chicken nugget into his mouth. "I usually get a bag lunch, but today I got this."

The School Nutrition Association has found that nationwide nearly every school district offers students fresh fruits and vegetables, whole grains, fat-free milk and salad bars or pre-packaged salads. Most schools still bake items from scratch in their kitchens and school districts are offering more vegetarian meals and locally sourced foods.