Photo: Cafeteria line
By Ching Yuen, staff writer
School lunches have been a point of contention for Galileo students who regularly eat in the cafeteria due to size and taste factors. As a person who eats school lunch every day, I feel that this issue needs to be investigated so the school district can take steps to address the issue. But to understand what students currently feel about school lunch, on March 23-24, I conducted a school wide survey asking student opinions on school lunch.
The survey included 249 students from all four grades. Of which, 65% of the respondents selected 3, 4, or 5 on the scale from 1-5 on the quality of school lunch. Meanwhile, a little less than a third of the respondents said that school lunch improved from last year. However, excluding the people who selected “Maybe”, more than half of the respondents feel that school lunch improved compared to last year.
What this means is that students mostly believe that school lunch at Galileo has improved from last year and the quality of the food is at least average or better. So, where is the conversation about school lunches at?
Looking at the data above, 57% of the student respondents expressed that school lunch portions are “Too little” while only 42.2% feel that lunches are “Just right”. The effects of undersized school lunches is reflected in the next question when 37.3% of the student respondents express that they are hungry by 3 pm or 6th period–just 2 hours after lunch ends. An additional 41.4% of students are hungry by 4 pm after school. Only 21.3% of students responded that they are hungry by 5 pm or at home.
An anonymous student wrote this on the survey: “Please just give us more portions. Why do they expect us to be full from one single hotdog.”
Another wrote, “There needs to be bigger portions or we should be able to get two.”
Others wrote, “They’re improved for sure, I don’t have many complaints.”
This one shares, “Cafeteria food did improve from last year but the portions can be a bit small.”
So, what is going on in school lunch portion sizes? How is it possible that school lunches taste better but are now smaller than before? Is the district compromising better taste for smaller portions? To answer these questions, I first asked Galileo’s cafeteria staff.
Jorge M., the cafeteria manager, is responsible for the daily operations of the cafeteria. He manages one of the lunch lines in the cafeteria. Jorge says that more than 600 students get lunch from the cafeteria each day and there are leftovers all the time. “We make everything here. We cook here. Before last year we used to get it from revolutionary food. Now, we cook with healthy ingredients from the kitchen,” Jorge says. Galileo’s afterschool program, Futurama, receives the leftovers as well. “About 60 for Futurama,” he says.
On the question of whether students can get seconds, Jorge says that students can get second lunches, but under a time condition. Jorge says, “Seconds are allowed at the end but not at the beginning. You don’t need to enter a pin for seconds. We offer and never refuse. We are supposed to get enough food for everybody.”
After my conversation with Jorge, I learned a few new things. First of all, students are actually allowed to get seconds close towards the end of lunch, or about 10 minutes before lunch ends. The lunch PINs that students enter are for recording which food option the student got. That’s why the cafeteria always offers pizza and fruit parfait on Fridays because the cafeteria makes food based on popularity.
In order to go more in depth on school lunches, I got in contact with Noelia Oropeza, Engagement Manager from the Student Nutrition Service, for more information. The SNS supplies school lunches to more than 100 schools in San Francisco.
On the size of lunch portions, Noelia wrote: “School meals follow regulations set at the federal (US Department of Agriculture) and state (California Department of Education) level. There are specific requirements for the amounts and types of foods we must offer, and there are calorie and certain nutrient maximums that we cannot exceed, which impact portion sizes.” In addition, “Students can take an entree and up to 2 fruits and 2 vegetables with every lunch + milk; for breakfast, students can take an entree and up to 2 fruits + milk,” Noelia recommends.
For students who want additional food resources after school, Galileo has a supper program which is offered through the Telegraph Hill Neighborhood Center. All students can participate in the supper program. Students can stop by the Telegraph Hill Neighborhood Center program and pick up a supper meal, but all meals must be consumed on site, Noelia states.
While students can get seconds, it is also important to point out that the main cause of students wanting to get seconds is because the main entrees are too small. According to the USDA guidelines from the National School Lunch Program, school lunch is required to have at least 750 calories and upwards to 850 calories. However, what most students get from a typical cafeteria lunch at Galileo do not meet the standard because most students do not get the recommended amount of 2 servings of vegetables and fruits. Looking at the menu for the week of April 24-28 on School Cafe, students are missing roughly 100 calories on every meal that does not get the full 2 servings of fruits and vegetables.
In response to this observation, Noelia O. states: “Calories across the week are calculated based on planned servings, which includes some students taking multiple servings of fruits and vegetables and some taking only one. Currently, the average for the lunch menu at Galileo for week one is 828 calories and for week two is 795 calories, which meets requirements (menus repeat every two weeks). We also want to share that increasing entree calories at lunch at our High Schools is a need, as we also acknowledge that not all students are taking advantage of selecting 2 servings of fruits and veggies and some individual entrees are lower in calories (such as the Hot Dog, Fiestada Stuffed Beef Sandwich, and Bean and Cheese Popusa).”
We also want to share that increasing entree calories at lunch at our high schools is a need
-Noelia Oropeza, Student Nutrition Services, 5/10/2023
Noelia also reassures that the kitchen does not have a shortage of ingredients. “The Lead Dining Staff, Jorge, is able to adjust his orders based on needs, so the site should not be missing the ingredients needed to develop the recipes as intended,” Noelia O. writes.
Students, though, don’t agree with the portion sizes served at lunch. Junior Wakun L. eats school lunch about three times a week. After showing Noelia O.’s response to Wakun, he says, “[the lack of entree calories] is stupid. Kids are almost adults and we need more food and calorie intake. I just get one serving. I sometimes get the fruit but I mostly eat the main course.”
Junior Nathan Ng., who eats school lunch everyday, criticizes the size of the main course. “It’s more of a snack than a lunch,” he says, “You are under-eating. You should be allowed to get two lunches or increase the volume. Another thing I noticed was that the lunch boxes got smaller over time.”
Nathan also says, “The lunches sometimes differ. They give you minimum meat but there should be a balance. When I am doing weight lifting and have to cut my calories, knowing the nutritional facts would definitely affect my choices. I just don’t want to guess. Just mention the general nutritional facts. I am sure others want it too.”
After surveying students about their opinions on school lunches and talking to professionals like Jorge and Noelia O., I have learned a lot about how school lunches are made and the underlying system that provides lunches to hundreds of Galileo students with freshly made ingredients every day. Although the taste of lunches improved, more and more students are becoming unsatisfied with the small portion sizes. As a student who eats school lunch every day myself, I hope to raise attention to this issue with pictures and data. Students deserve lunches that are more fulfilling than the ones that are currently being served.
