Junk Food Article #4

SUMMARY:  This article talks about students at Naperville Community Unit School District 203 not allowed to have any soda from the vending machines during the school day.  The reason for just opening the vending machines after school is because they want to decrease obesity and improper eating from the students.  Instead of junk food in the vending machines District 203 is banning drinks with high fructose corn syrup and they are not being sold at elementary schools and middle schools.

OPINION:  I think that what elementary and middle schools are doing is good becaue they are shaping the way of eating junk food for these students so by the time that they get to highschool they would know how to eat properly.  I believe that what District 203 is doing is also good because if the students or parents students dont do anything to help the school has to do what is has to do to get the students in a good habit to eating so it can decrease obesity or other illness from eating too much sugar.

Book Talk

The Daughters of Juarez by Maria Theresa Rodriguez

The Daughters of Juarez is a non-fiction book that talks about the violence towards women occuring in the border between Mexico and the USA in the small city of Juarez.  Many women are tortured, raped, killed, then abandoned in a desserted area in Juarez by a serial killer.  The women killed have the similar characteristics, black long hair, full lips, ages ten to late twenties and all were last seen at their job that requires packaging. The issue about all these women killed is that they are not receiving any justice by the police of Juarez.  Everytime a girl in Juarez dissappered and then appear dead and tortured the police insists that those women were living a double life selling their bodies for profit or ran away with the boyfriend. Mothers of these women know that is not the case because they know their daughters well enough and many women are being killed maybe twice a week and the police still insists that they are all living a double life. 

People who are trying to help and actually solve the case and have justice for those who are dead are always bribed to put evidence in the cadavers that may blame someone or make the murder seem like an accident, if not willing to do so they are threatened to death and others end up with no family because some are being killed.  Those who are the alleged murders have nothing in common with the victim and the evidence shows that they were not the killers but still the police insists that they have the murderes in jail while there still others murders occuring on the outside.  When the bodies are found the police "accidently" contaminates the evidence and that is one of the reasons why forensics cant find the real murderer. Many conclusions have came from those who were trying to help but then threatened that the murderer is not one person but many and that the person protecting them comes from a high rank position that controlls the justice of Juarez. 

MY OPINION
This book was really interesting because I always wondered what happened or killed these women everytime I saw what was going on, on the news.  This book is scary but it opens your eyes on all the injustice that is occuring in Juarez and all the things that bad people are capable of doing.  I do recommend this book because it makes you understand and have a look of what is going on in the other countries other than the USA and how bad it is for people living there especially women having insecurities everytime they walk alone, thinking everyday if they are going  to be killed or not.

Junk Food Article #3

Summary: School principles in the District of Cloumbia are running out of money for extra programs their school offers so the only choice to get the money needed is for them to sign a contract with coca cola in order to get the money needed for things like prom, replacement books, etc.  Many people have opposed to it and others have favored it.  People who oppose it say this generation is drinking more soda than milk and it is a risk to their health causing them osteoporosis or obesity in their future.  They argue that by letting the vending machines in the schools would be a danger because the school is not teaching students about nutrition.  Those who favor it say that either or the students would buy soda from the corner store because the students cannot get it at the school.  They argue that it would benefit the school if they sell the soda because students wont buy it at the corner store but at the school and that it would only be offered at certain times during the day.

Opinion:  I believe that soda should be offered in the school because students should get the option and choice of what they eat.  It is the parents responsibility to teach students the way to eat healthy and have moderation. If they parents cant teach them about nutrition the school should take the money benefiting from the vending machines to have a fun non boring class about heatlhy eating and moderation.

Argument #6

6.  Claim:  The ingredients in candy bars are unhealthy and do not make it hard for students to concentrate and sit still during class.

Evidence:  One popular candy bar is made from water, corn syrup, butter, vanilla extract, peanut butter, salt, sugar, caramel, peanuts, and chocolate chips.

Warrant:  The ingrendient on candy bars are always going to be unhealthy or else they would be called healthy bars. The reason that candy bars are always going to be unhealthy is because they have so much sugar in everything that has been added and there is no real healthy ingredients put in them because they are put in large quantaties and there is no moderation.  Eventhough the ingredients in them are not healthy they do not make it hard for students to concentrate during class because for some it doesnt do anything because their body is so used to them or for others it makes them concentrate more because of all the sugar that a candy bar has because the sugar makes them be more attentive.

Argument #5

5.  Claim:  When healthy choices are available along with junk food, students will not tend to select the healthy options.

Evidence:  On a typical day at River Grove High School, the lunch featured grilled chicken breasts, rice, steamed broccoli, and a fruit cup of fresh watermelon cubes.  The cafeteria reported that 819 out of 1,120 students purchased this lunch selection, while the rest selected less healthy options.

Warrant: Students always tend to buy what to them looks appetizing.  Sometimes the healthy food in the cafeteria is way to healthy that it does not have any taste to them and it just does nto taste good at all.  If students do want to choose the healthy food they might not buy it just because the food is healthy it becomes very expensive for students to buy it everyday.  At River Grove High School it did show that many people chose the healthy food but for most people eating healthy is nasty because they dont like certaing vegetables, fruit, or the food just doesnt fill them up.  Unfortunately many students choose the junk food because it tastes better and they are not going to eat something that has no taste just because its healthy.  That is why even though they are some healthy options many students will choose the ones that are not healthy because they are cheeper, better taste, and fill them up.

Argument 10

10.  Claim:  Focusing gym classes on physical fitness and good health is a better solution than eliminating all junk food from schools.

Evidence:  A school district in Naperville, Illinois, that focused gym classes on teaching students physical fitness, health, and wellness instead of sports skills found that only three percent of its ninth graders were overweight. 

Warrant: Some students surprisingly do not know how to eat healthy and others do but are really not aware of the danger it has for their future.  Some people find gym unncessary because they have not seen any progress in the way students eat and try to exercise their body.  By focusing in good health is better.

Argument #4

4.  Claim:  Removing junk food in vending machines will significantly reduce funds for important school programs.

Evidence:  According to one principal, her school now receives nearly $100,000 a year from vending machines.  That money is used to pay for girls’ and boys’ volleyball teams, boys’ and girls’ cross country track teams, and girls’ and boys’ gymnastics teams.

Warrant:

 Eventhough students know that the vending machines are all junk food and not healthy they still buy from it, others may buy more or less a month.  By removing the junk food from the vending machines and replacing it with "healthy food" would make a significant difference because by having an apple that someone can bring from home at a cheeper price wont attract the students more than having a special type of candy that maybe they can just find it at the school.  If the school were to offer healthier food it would be more expensive and people would not buy from it thus it willreduce funds for important school programs causing the students a harder work to get that program back.