U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. visited Cunningham Elementary on Friday to learn how Austin ISD promotes healthy eating at its campuses. Kennedy toured the kitchen, spoke with staff and sat down with students, while community members protested outside.
During his visit, Kennedy asked questions about the kind of protein kids are served, how fresh food, such as peppers, made it to the table and how popular these choices are among students.
He said the Trump administration is focusing on making sure schools and military programs offer good and healthy food.
“The biggest thing is cutting down the amount of ultra-processed food, refined carbohydrates, and getting them on real food diets,” Kennedy said. “That is going to dramatically reduce chronic disease.”
Earlier this year, Kennedy presented new dietary guidelines for Americans, along with a new food pyramid. He has long called for a reduction in the consumption of highly processed foods and added sugars. The new guidelines are instrumental in determining school meals across the country and put red meat, cheese, vegetables and fruits at the top of an inverted pyramid.
“With the new guidelines, there could be some challenges [in] eating real food because there’s a cost associated [with] it,” said Ryan Mikolaycik, AISD’s executive director of food service and warehouse operations.
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. talks with a student during his visit to Cunningham Elementary.
Mikolaycik said the district has focused on using high quality ingredients and serving fresh fruits and vegetables for more than 10 years. Now, he said, staff will have to shop for more expensive proteins, like whole muscle products, and farm fresh ingredients.
“All school meals are federally funded,” he said. “So we will always continue to look for ways to get additional funds through the federal government.”
Mikolaycik said he hopes new congressional bills will help increase funding for school meals.
Mikolaycik said the district has a budget of $4.50 per meal, per student, but after labor and other expenses, such as compostable trays and cutlery, less than a third of that goes to the food. Each meal must include a protein, a vegetable, a fruit and dairy. Mikolaycik said the district is trying to find ways to save money while also introducing kids to different foods that meet the new guidelines.
“If we had two dollars more per meal, right now we are at $1.25, we could do a lot more,” he told Kennedy.
Seventy-six AISD schools offer free breakfast and lunch to all students as part of the federal funded Community Eligibility Provision program meant to help in low-income areas. Cunningham Elementary is one of those schools.
Kennedy’s visit did not go unnoticed by parents and community members, who gathered outside the school to protest. Carrie King, whose child attends fifth grade at Cunningham, said that while she is on board with Kennedy’s nutrition approach, she is against his stances on vaccination that often include promoting claims widely refuted by scientific research.
Michael Minasi
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KUT News
Carrie King said she’s on board with Kennedy’s take on food, but opposes his stance on vaccines. “I am not pleased at all that my daughter is breathing the same air as him today,” she said. “I do not feel comfortable with that at all.”
“This actually makes me even more upset, that he’s the ball of contradictions that he is,” King said. “That he can, out [of] one side of his mouth, want to protect children through diet, but then out the other side, be so flagrantly incorrect about vaccines.”
King said she was glad to know her kid’s school was an example of how to provide healthy meals, but was also upset that Kennedy had to be there during school hours and that the district didn’t ask for parents’ opinion. While King did send her daughter to school, she said other parents decided not to in protest.
“That’s not fair to those children,” she said. “Our Texas leadership is so concerned about every child being in school, every day for funding purposes. And now we have this going on, and I don’t blame any parent for not having their child here today.”