HISD waited until the very last minute to get their new federally-mandated Wellness Policy in place before the start of the 2006-07 school year. We havent seen the ultimately approved document yet, but we do know that there were last minute changes made to the final draft attached below.
Even the draft falls prey to shortcomings pointed out by Action for Healthy Kids' review of a sampling from across the country. HISD's goals are general, without either measurable guidelines or penalties for lack of compliance. As always, the ultimate responsibility for vigilence lies with parents and the community and depends entirely upon the willingness of an individual school's administration.
RFS calls for the HISD School Board to not settle on this new Wellness Policy as final document, rather a work in progress that can be continually improved.
An analysis released last week by Action for Healthy Kids of newly-developed school wellness policies in 112 school districts in 42 states found that only half met all of the minimum guidelines for nutrition and physical education required by the federal government. The findings underscore the need for parental involvement to ensure wellness plans translate into real action in the coming school year.
Action for Healthy Kids, a public-private partnership of more than 50 national organizations, including Parents' Action for Children, and government agencies, collected and assessed wellness policies that were available shortly after the July 1, 2006 deadline mandated by the Child Nutrition and Special Supplemental Nutrition Program (WIC) Reauthorization Act of 2004.
The law requires every school district participating in the National School Lunch or School Breakfast Program to develop and launch a wellness policy by the start of this school year. Each school district's policy must include, among other things, nutrition guidelines for all foods sold on campus during the school day, goals for nutrition education and physical education, and a plan for implementation that includes naming a person or persons responsible for putting the policy in place.
The Action for Healthy Kids analysis shows that compliance varies dramatically among school districts, with only 54 percent of the districts meeting all of the minimum requirements. Other findings:
o 40 percent did not specify who was responsible for implementation
o 19 percent did not address implementation or evaluation
o 18 percent did not include goals for physical education
o 14 percent did not specify goals for nutrition education
Additionally, the research uncovered little evidence in the policies of measurable objectives, and very few included timeframes for implementation or indicate whether funding is available to support the policy.
Parents' Action members have reported similar problems in their school districts. Parents' Action Care Corps member Anita McLaughlin helped draft her Louisville, KY wellness policy last May, but discovered that major changes had been made by a few administrators without the wellness committee's knowledge. "They completely gutted it, making it meaningless," says McLaughlin.
Most notably, a provision extending the state's new nutrition standards to include after school programs had been altered. Rather than prohibiting the sale of soda, chips and candy during after school programs, the language in the wellness policy had been changed to say that schools "shall be encouraged" not to sell such items.
To convince administrators to put back the original language and set up guidelines for implementation of the policy, McLaughlin arranged for three pediatricians and two dieticians to speak at an August 14 school board meeting. After hearing these experts speak, the board voted to extend the nutrition standards to after school programs and set up a system of quarterly meetings and reports to the board on the wellness policy. "Before, the attitude was, we've written the policy, were done, there's nothing to do anymore. Now it has become a work in progress and we will continue to make improvements," says McLaughlin.
Alicia Moag-Stahlberg, executive director of Action for Healthy Kids, echoed that point, noting that the wellness policy analysis conducted by her organization "reminds us that many districts and schools need assistance so they can meet the general requirements and the spirit of the wellness policy mandate."
