1. Farris, A. R. (n.d.). Nutritional Comparison of Packed and School Lunches in Pre-Kindergarten and Kindergarten Children Following the Implementation of the 2012–2013 National School Lunch Program Standards.

Background: This study focuses on the nutritional quality of home packed lunches compared to school lunches. Of the results collected it shows that components like energy, fat, saturated fat, sugar, vitamin C, and iron were significantly higher whereas protein, sodium, fiber, vitamin A, and calcium were significantly lower for packed lunches than in school lunches.

How Its Used: This article will help me prove the reasoning behind school lunches being more nutritionally valuable to students than home packed lunches. I used it to demonstrate the categories of nutrition in which school lunches out perform the home packed. 

2. USDA. (2017, November). The National School Lunch Program.

Background: This fact sheet details what exactly the National School Lunch Program does  and how it supports students in need of assistance with lunch. It provides a baseline to how the NSLP works and who it can benefit. It also adds statistics to how much it has increased in the past decades.

How Its Used: This fact will be crucial in my rebuttal aspect as it introduces possibilities for students that aren’t under the best financial circumstances. The fact sheet will show readers how the NSLP is beneficial to those in need and I will use it as a strong backbone for the argument of students not being able to afford the school lunches. 

3. Home-made packed lunches slip through nutrition net. (2010). Nursing Standard (through 2013), 24(25), 16.

Background: This article focuses on the lack of nutritional standards inside of home packed lunches. Researchers studied multiple students from multiple schools to determine if the food brought from home could match the ones from school. This came to a result in which only 1.1 percent of home lunches met the requirements for school lunches.

How Its Used: This article will tremendously help my argument that school lunches are way more nutritional than home packed lunches in many ways. Showing the reader that school lunches are overall much more balanced and healthier then almost 99% of home lunches provides a strong standing point. 

4. Comparison of Nutrient Content and Cost of Home-Packed Lunches to Reimbursable School Lunch Nutrient Standards and Prices. (n.d.). Retrieved April 20, 2020, from https://schoolnutrition.org/5–News-and-Publications/4–The-Journal-of-Child-Nutrition-and-Management/Fall-2009/Volume-33,-Issue-2,-Fall-2009—Johnson;-Bednar;-Kwon;-Gustof/

Background: This study focuses on the comparison of both home packed and school lunches and their nutrients. Of the schools tested on the study researchers found home packed lunches contained fewer vitamins, minerals, calories, fiber and more sodium than needed. The study provides sample tests to how they received this data and what exactly the home packed lunches are overfilled with and lacking of and why the NSLP lunches are better for students everyday.

How It’s Used: I did not use this article in my research paper. I used it as extra information for my argument and used it to understand school lunches more statistically.

5. Au, L. E. (n.d.). Eating School Lunch Is Associated with Higher Diet Quality among Elementary School Students. Retrieved April 27, 2020

Background: This article focuses on a study of fourth and fifth graders in which they tested the healthy eating index scores of lots of students and compared them when they ate school lunches vs home packed lunches. The study was conducted from 43 different schools and multiple students from each. They found that the healthy eating index of students who ate lunch from school had an overall higher mean and deviation which meant their diets were much better.

How It’s Used: This article will help me prove that the diets and health of students is truly being affected by these lunches even though they are only 1 meal of the day and 5 times a week. These meals can have a huge impact on students’ diets and health in which you can tell from there healthy eating index scores. Having higher eating index scores for students will make the readers want to personally or have their kids eat school lunches more.

6. Wilder Research. (2014, January). Nutrition and Students’ Academic Performance.

Background: This research paper done by wilder focuses on the performance of students who ate the different lunches. They discovered that student academic performance is indirectly affected by the nutrition of students. When students ate poorly they were more susceptible to illness and getting headaches while at school. These headaches and illnesses end up resulting in absences for students and disturbances to their grades. 

How It’s Used: This research paper provides me with the indirect impact not all students and parents know about. The impact on their academics and well being is one not understood by every person and they may not think that they could be doing better academically, but they could. Understanding that you’re overall safer when eating a school lunch in more ways than just nutrition wise can very much alter the opinions of the readers.

7. Ralston, Treen, & Coleman-Jensen. (2017, June). Children’s Food Security and USDA Child Nutrition Programs.

Background: This USDA study focuses on students overall stability outside of school unlike the other studies. The study came to show that 16.6 percent of families with children in them are food insecure. 

How It’s Used:  This article helps show that category of students who don’t get the daily needs they should be from food. 16.6 percent doesn’t seem like a huge number, but that’s about 1 in every 6 households being food insecure. With school lunches packing with good calories it helps students achieve their daily goals while also not overeating or eating too much. These families without the income to support their whole family will most likely meet the requirements for free or reduced lunch so that these students living in food insecure homes can still be healthy and well.

8. Graves, G. (2019, June 25). Getting a Better School Lunch.

Background: This article focuses on the adding of multiple healthy ideas for cafeterias. Margaret Brown who thrives for healthy foods and ideas for schools give the idea for salad bars as they are huge hits for students. The goal of this article is to give overall support to schools for what they should do for the wellness of students because they have already been proven to work. 

How It’s Used: This article helps my argument by showing what school lunch programs are continuing to do for the best of their students. Incorporating salad bars in cafeterias is perfect for students since they can choose whatever they want to customize it, but still are choosing a healthy option.

9. Mathematica Policy Research . (2019, April). School Nutrition and Meal Cost Study Summary of Findings.

Background: This article focuses on the studies of the NSLP and the amount of meals presented that meet the requirements. Practically all lunches require a fruit, meat and most contain a vegetable and grain. All required a diary in which milk is usually applied for every student’s lunch.

How It’s Used: This article helps my argument in the way of showing all the requirements for the school lunches. Since most of the meals for lunches have high percentages for meeting these requirements it shows the effectiveness of these meals on student nutrition. When more than 80% of school menus reach the standards for the NSLP it shows how effective the program is on the school lunch programs and that’s not including the ones that reach most of the standards of NSLP.

10. Cuninggim, P. (2014, May 6). The Impact of Nutrition on Learning and Behavior.

Background: This article focuses on the impact of nutrition on behavior and learning. The ingredients in lots of the snacks and foods students love to pack make it harder for the brain to perform at its best. In the article they incorporate findings from the book Teaching With the Brain in Mind and shows the nutrients that help with focus and behavior. 

How It’s Used: This article helps my argument because when these nutrients are the main factor affecting your brain when it comes to behavior and learning and these school lunches focus on adding these nutrients then that means they play a huge role in your behavior and learning. Thinking about nutrition being a major role in your learning you wouldn’t think about a huge comparison, but this article could be my backup for how it is. 

11. Anderson, M. L., Gallagher, J., & Ritchie, E. R. (2017, May 3). How the quality of school lunch affects students’ academic performance.

Background: The article focuses on the increase of student testing grades when the school is paired in a healthy contract with a school lunch company. Students, on average, received .03 to .04 standard deviations higher which is a great improvement.

How It’s Used: I did not use this article in my final paper. I used it as an extra source for evidence of the increase of students’ academics.

12.  School Meals Are Healthier After Major Nutrition Reforms. (n.d.).

Background: This article focuses on the increased scores of school lunches on the healthy eating index. Scores are much higher compared to where they were before 2010. Students who had bought school lunches were way more likely to consume milk, vegetables, and/or fruits at lunch than kids with lunches from home.

How It’s Used: I did not use this article for my final paper. I used it as extra knowledge of how school lunches benefit students.

13. Action For Healthy Kids. (2020, April 20). How Does School Lunch Work?

Background: This article focuses on the basis of how the NSLP works. This provides the overall idea of the NSLP and their different requirements by age difference. Kindergarteners are aimed to be given around 500-600 calories per lunch up to high schoolers when they recieve around 700-800 calories. 

How It’s Used: This article will help me show how the NSLP accommodates students of different ages. By having different accommodations for each age group it would be good for a counter acting point when someone argues that all ages don’t need the same nutrients and same amounts of foods.