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You've got to be kidding, Mr. McGuinty.
Oct. 1st, 2010 03:24 pmInanity of bureaucracy, example #56 439: In its infinite wisdom, the government of Ontario set out to put a law in place that would provide students with only healthy food at school, to give them good role models for healthy eating in general.
Sounds okay, right? Here's what's happened:
1) The school and school board aren't allowed to provide any unhealthy foods at in-services for teachers, or staff meetings. On their list of unhealthy foods: anything with caffeine. Someone please explain to me how serving coffee and tea to teachers at an in-service, where the kids aren't present, is setting a bad example for the kids? Because I'm not seeing it.
2) A whole bunch of small pizza places are going to have trouble surviving if they previously relied on the school market. The regulations require them to print every ingredient on the box, and only a couple of chains are big enough to be able to afford to specially-print their boxes with that information. While they're looking for allergens of course, they're focusing more on fat content and empty calories, so regular mozzarella has been replaced with a low-fat version and the crust is now whole wheat, and something was done to the sauce, too. Even if the small places could comply with the ingredients, they can't comply with the labeling so they're out of luck. All this from preventing a slice of pizza with regular mozzarella and white flour from getting into kids' stomachs at school once or twice a month. It seems like overkill to me, too.
3) Parents aren't allowed to bring in snacks for birthday parties anymore, not even if they're labeled, because they break the 80/20 rule of 80% healthy food to 20% treats.
4) Teachers aren't allowed to use candy or other treats as an incentive in class. This is the only one of the whole thing that I can get behind, and even this is taken to an unreasonable extreme: you mean I'm not allowed to hand out freezies to the cross-country team as they finish a race? Really?
5) We get a certain number of "free days" when the rules temporarily disappear, and we have to decide in September which days they will be. There will still be a Halloween party, and a Christmas party, but no, we can't hold anything a day before the rest of the school because it fits our schedule better as a class, because then it wouldn't be on the "free day."
6) Their list of healthy foods is weird. Diet caffeine-free pop seems to be fine. I'm confused; all the research is suggesting diet pop is at least as bad, or worse, than regular pop. (Yes, I drink it anyway.)
I am truly annoyed. I think I'll take a six-pack of Coke Zero (with caffeine!) to the in-service on Tuesday to share with people who don't realize they can't get coffee when they get there.
Sounds okay, right? Here's what's happened:
1) The school and school board aren't allowed to provide any unhealthy foods at in-services for teachers, or staff meetings. On their list of unhealthy foods: anything with caffeine. Someone please explain to me how serving coffee and tea to teachers at an in-service, where the kids aren't present, is setting a bad example for the kids? Because I'm not seeing it.
2) A whole bunch of small pizza places are going to have trouble surviving if they previously relied on the school market. The regulations require them to print every ingredient on the box, and only a couple of chains are big enough to be able to afford to specially-print their boxes with that information. While they're looking for allergens of course, they're focusing more on fat content and empty calories, so regular mozzarella has been replaced with a low-fat version and the crust is now whole wheat, and something was done to the sauce, too. Even if the small places could comply with the ingredients, they can't comply with the labeling so they're out of luck. All this from preventing a slice of pizza with regular mozzarella and white flour from getting into kids' stomachs at school once or twice a month. It seems like overkill to me, too.
3) Parents aren't allowed to bring in snacks for birthday parties anymore, not even if they're labeled, because they break the 80/20 rule of 80% healthy food to 20% treats.
4) Teachers aren't allowed to use candy or other treats as an incentive in class. This is the only one of the whole thing that I can get behind, and even this is taken to an unreasonable extreme: you mean I'm not allowed to hand out freezies to the cross-country team as they finish a race? Really?
5) We get a certain number of "free days" when the rules temporarily disappear, and we have to decide in September which days they will be. There will still be a Halloween party, and a Christmas party, but no, we can't hold anything a day before the rest of the school because it fits our schedule better as a class, because then it wouldn't be on the "free day."
6) Their list of healthy foods is weird. Diet caffeine-free pop seems to be fine. I'm confused; all the research is suggesting diet pop is at least as bad, or worse, than regular pop. (Yes, I drink it anyway.)
I am truly annoyed. I think I'll take a six-pack of Coke Zero (with caffeine!) to the in-service on Tuesday to share with people who don't realize they can't get coffee when they get there.