The Problem
In addition to eating unhealthily in school, many students go home and they and their families eat out for dinner rather than cooking. Reasons for this may vary by family, but the most significant reason for this, in terms of obesity, is that people do not know how to cook in general, or within their budgets and time constraints because they have not been taught. According to The United States Healthful Food Council (USHFC), “the average American adult buys a meal or snack from a restaurant 5.8 times a week, and more than 30 percent of children eat fast food on any given day." Restaurants and fast-food places generally provide food that has an outrageous amount of excessive calories, fats, and salt. Most of these same foods that many people eat when they go eat at these restaurants and fast food places could easily be made at home for a fraction of the price and in a much healthier manner. Essentially, this means that, through their actions, the average American is teaching the American youth that it is better to go out and buy their food rather than cooking it themselves, regardless of the health implications. This also means that
The Solution
It is debatable whose role it is to teach the youth how to cook or whether or not everyone should have to learn to cook, but, it is undeniable that everyone should know how to provide for themselves. Not everyone has someone who knows how to cook in their lives, thus, a cooking class should be implemented in school’s curriculum so that students will know how to cook good and nutritious foods with whatever they can afford. If these kids and young adults can learn to cook well, they will be more likely to cook at their homes and their future homes. Therefore, teaching one generation to cook makes it more likely that they will cook in their future and pass it on to their offspring and that these generations will eat out less because they have the proper skills to make the same food at restaurants, except better for their health.