School Bans On Chocolate Milk May Backfire

isn't that supposed to be a parents job not the schools?

yea.. disliking sugar and calories =/= physical child abuse. Nice deflection tho'

Typically school boards who make the rules are made of local parents.

THURSDAY, April 17, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Banning chocolate milk from schools may sound like a good move for kids' health, but efforts to do so haven't turned out that way, a small study found.

Bans on chocolate milk in 11 Oregon elementary schools were linked to a big drop in the amount of healthy, fat-free white milk students drank, a team of Cornell University researchers reports.

Nicole Zammit, former assistant director of nutrition services at the Eugene School District in Oregon, wasn't surprised by the findings.

"Given that the role of the federal school meal program is to provide nutritious meals to students who may otherwise have no access to healthy foods, I wouldn't recommend banning flavored milk unless you have a comprehensive plan in place to compensate for the lost nutrients when kids stop drinking milk altogether," she said in a Cornell news release.

In the study, researchers analyzed data from 11 Oregon elementary schools that outlawed chocolate milk and replaced it with skim milk. While the bans meant children could no longer get the added sugar found in chocolate milk, there were unexpected consequences.

Total milk sales at the schools fell by 10 percent, the study showed, and students ended up wasting 29 percent more milk than before. And while the students consumed less sugar and fewer calories, their intake of calcium and protein also fell.

After the chocolate milk bans took effect, there was a also 7 percent decrease in the number of students taking part in the Eugene School District's lunch program, according to the researchers at Cornell University's Center for Behavioral Economics in Child Nutrition Programs.

"There are other ways to encourage kids to select white milk without banning the chocolate," study co-author Brian Wansink, director of the Cornell Food and Brand Lab, said in the news release.

"Make white milk appear more convenient and more normal to select," he said. "Two quick and easy solutions are: Put the white milk in the front of the cooler and make sure that at least 1/3 to 1/2 of all the milk is white."

Source

well if those 'local parents' are anything like the ones here in NJ, then rule #1 should be 'don't listen to a word they say'. Parents that think they are (dare i say) god sends and mental geniuses, and there children are incapable of doing wrong...

That aside, its single vs the group. What might be helpful for one kid, does not mean its the same for everyone. And most certainly, what u think is good for your kid, should not be forced upon all kids.

Its one thing to say a school shouldn't serve greasy pizza, deep fried french fries and a soda to all the kids. Its another to go to the just as far but opposite end, and ban products because they have sugar and calories in them.

Niece is hyper enough after school...

Im saying there is a reason for variety. Even if it is only milk and chocolate milk. If you dont want one, then have the other. A parents personal dislike over chocolate shouldn't be forced on everyone.

Whole milk (which I assume was the kind of milk used in the chocolate milk) contains quite alot of calories. For a nation trying to lower it's obesity rate, it just surprised me they would even serve this, let alone chocolate milk. I'm aware of the nutritional values, but they're likely having a good amount for breakfast anyway.

Milk was never served in any school I went to, and money wasn't the reason.

The argument was that it was less healthy than the regular milk and there was really no reason to offer it, that is all.