Quote of the Day
  • Despite the forecast, live like it's spring. — Lilly Pulitzer
The student news site of Milwaukee Area Technical College

MATC Times

The student news site of Milwaukee Area Technical College

MATC Times

The student news site of Milwaukee Area Technical College

MATC Times

Healthy foods in our school

Here at MATC we all feed our brains with knowledge and are moving ourselves in a positive direction in life by being in school. I would like to know why then we allow ourselves to fuel our bodies with junk food. After a full morning or afternoon of classes as a student I am hungry and MATC has many options for us. They provide microwaves for us to use if we choose to bring something from home.

The thing that struck me was that most of the food choices that are at our disposal are actually very unhealthy. I was taken aback by the fact that the healthier choices for food are virtually hidden from view and are really few and far between. This raised the question in my mind, “Why don’t we have healthy food options?”

In a world where we are in a battle everyday to live healthy and be better to our bodies, where mass media pushes images of stick thin models and body builders that look like something out of the movie “300” don’t we owe it to ourselves to at least have better options available to us as students and the future of our country?  

I took a good look at what was available in the cafeteria. I was shocked to see that of the five vending machines available that there are two snack machines with nothing but chips, cookies and candy in them. No crackers or low cal snacks. In the water machine there is no water only energy drinks, juice cocktail, Sobe and of all things Mountain Dew, I had to laugh out loud a water machine with no water!

In the Pepsi machine there are only two slots for water on the bottom shelf in the lower right hand corner. Though there were ten choices for caffeinated beverage in the Nescafe machine.

I turned the corner to try to find real food, or something substantial to get me through the long evening of classes and found the only healthy option, a salad bar empty and shut down at 3:30.

This left me with the option of going to the Stormers grill. Where I was met with the choice of greasy or deep fried foods. The fruit cart had about three bananas in it, a couple oranges that were green and apples that looked terrible. There were yogurt parfaits that were packed with sugary fillers and wraps in the grab and go that cost $4.99 a piece. I am very saddened by this. We are bombarded with the option of healthy and poor quality or greasy and horrible food for you.  So what do we do?

I propose that we move healthy options to the front of the cafeteria line put fruit out that is of good quality offer the salad bar to be right where you walk into the cafeteria line and put water and teas on the top shelves.

MATC should offer fresh smoothies as an option and for heavens’ sake put water in the water vending machine. They should aslo lower the price of wraps and fresh options and instead of chicken wings; offer deli sandwiches and hoagies with soup and a drink as opposed to a combo of french-fries and deep fried chicken.

We have to be the change we want to see in the world. So as a school let’s give healthy living a try.

More to Discover