School is now in full swing -- bring on the chicken nuggets, pizza dippers and hot dogs with tri tators! My son entered first grade this year and it's hard to shield him from the real world of school lunch junk.

Our district's new food service provider says they strive to provide a wholesome, nutritious lunch with 2 ozs of meat/meat alternative, 2 servings of fruit and/or vegetable, 1-2 servings of grains and 8 ozs of milk. After reviewing September's menu, I'm not that impressed:

• Only 8 out of 21 lunches offer a vegetable that isn't potatoes or corn.
  
• Only 7 out of 21 lunches offer a fresh fruit -- the rest offer sugar-filled juices/juice bars and packaged fruit cups. No fresh berries, grapes or melon either.
  
• Only 2 out of 21 lunches offer a fresh fruit and a vegetable -- that's pathetic!
• Processed meats abound -- hot dogs, burgers, corn dogs, chicken nuggets.
• Eight ozs of milk sounds good, but it turns out kids can choose between white milk or sugar-loaded chocolate milk. Which carton do you think most kids will grab?
• I was pleasantly surprised to see multigrain pretzels and whole grain bread/bun options.

So I'm now packing my son's lunch four days a week. It always includes a fresh vegetable, a fruit and a small treat. A rotating mix of half sandwiches on whole grain bread, yogurt, low-fat cheese sticks, hard-boiled eggs and baked chips or pretzels round out the rest. He's agreed to choose white milk. The remaining day? School lunch junk complete with chocolate milk.

Do kids play less and eat more junk food during the summer? If so, it's likely they'd pack on more pounds, too. I'm a big supporter of solid school nutrition programs, but what happens to kids when the bell rings and they're back home for the summer?

A New York Times article explored this question just the other day. There's not much research on the subject, but one study from 1998-99 revealed body mass index for kindergarteners and 1st graders increased two to three times as fast in the summer as during the regular school year. Minority and already overweight kids were even more at risk for summertime weight gain. While school nutrition might not be the best, this study suggests the school year does deliver structured eating times and guaranteed movement if kids are lucky enough to have gym and recess every day.

However not every kid heads to an activity-filled summer day camp with a healthy-packed lunch and snacks in hand. Also, for kids privileged to attend an extended away camp, is camp nutrition necessarily any better than many of our nation's fat-filled school nutrition programs? What about kids hanging out at home, are they eating more and moving less? As the article points out, children staying at home don't run from one activity to another like a day camper. Even worse, kids from low-income families often spend summer at home unsupervised. Personally, I'm a stay-at-home mom and our oldest is just entering 1st grade, so I have no perspective. My kids pretty much eat the same year-round. Any parents with school-age children have thoughts to share?

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I'm halfway finished with a masters in education, so anytime I read about new research on fitness and nutrition programs in schools, I get excited! Here's an intriguing new study out of Canada that reveals test scores rise when schools incorporate daily fitness and healthy eating campaigns.

Thirty-three Ontario schools participated in the Living Schools health drive where students exercised for 20 minutes daily, played extra sports and were discouraged from consuming junk food. Over two years, these schools saw their overall test scores rise by 18 percent in reading, writing and math, compared to around 4 percent for similar schools not in the program. Amazingly, scores in Grade 3 reading and Grade 3 math rose by as much as 50 percent and 39 percent, respectively. Fewer fights and better attendance, too.

No doubt, daily exercise and apples are investments in learning. School districts need to incorporate daily exercise, toss a la junk choices out of cafeteria lines and motivate students with health and fitness, not candy and pizza parties. Parents need to back up healthy school policies by preparing nutritional dinners, packing fruits/veggies for snacks and making time to regularly move with their kids. If we want childhood obesity rates to not only halt, but start lowering, it requires a dedicated, multi-pronged approach.

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Nutritionally investing in your child's school performance is more than offering a healthy breakfast, says one new Canadian study. Well-rounded nutrition throughout the day boosts literacy.

Canadian researchers examined 4,589 fifth-graders involved in the Children's Lifestyle and School-performance Study. Nearly 20 percent of the students had flunked an elementary literacy assessment. Turns out the better a child's nutritional habits, the less likely students failed the test. Even after adjusting for the effects of family income, education, school and sex, a quality diet's positive impact on literacy held firm.

Keep buying those carrot sticks. Pack a healthy lunch and snack. Make a goal to prepare double the number of home-cooked meals next month and see how your family responds. Step forward and guide positive choices whenever you can. This morning, our son scored a juice box (too much sugar) and a low-fat granola bar (better) as a team snack following his soccer game. Our younger daughter wanted something special from the concession stand, too. So we guided her purchase toward the 60 percent less fat Chex Mix, even though it would have been easier to just buy the Laffy Taffy candy. Schools can make all the healthy food policies they want, but parental modeling of healthy eating matters most.

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What would happen if a public school was to drop junk foods from the menu completely and started serving fresh grains, fruits and vegetables to students? Would they like the change or demand their junk food back?

A town in Massachusetts did something similar to this, as the goal of helping kids eat better made for an interesting experiment indeed. Some kids even ate broccoli if you can believe that.

Experiments like these need to increase in schools across the country. Fast (cold turkey) changes and slow/gradual menu changes could all be part of experiments to see if kids would choose healthier food over junk food. If you're a parent concerned about what your kids may be eating at school, are you for these kinds of experiments?

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Would it be a good idea to rid public schools of soft drinks, candy and salty snacks? Millions of school kids will possibly face that if the U.S. Congress pushes a set of standards for school nutrition into the public limelight.

Does there need to be a nutrition standard for food served in public schools these days? Congress is looking at a two-tier system designed to encourage youngsters to eat more fruits, vegetables and whole grains.

On the other side of the coin, the standard would act to make products like added sugars, salt and saturated fats very easy to avoid.

What do you think? Are you satisfied with the nutrition level in your child's public school?

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Are you concerned about what your school-age kids may be eating at school? Many parents are, and the focus on trying to make sure young ones eat right at school has seen renewed focus in the last year I think.

I'm not sure providing caffeine-filled drinks as all that great an idea when kids are expected to be paying attention in class, but I digress. Some experts believe that healthier food and drinks are slowly finding their way into U.S. school lunchrooms. I just hope that finding has a hint of truth to it.

Most likely, the impetus for this stems from the fact that 17% of Americans between the ages of 2 and 19 are overweight. That's 12 million kids folks. The fight to get healthier foods into schools all the time is worth it, right?

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