Chocolate Milk Stirs Debate in Schools
BY SHERRI ACKERMAN, The Tampa Tribune
TAMPA -- It's the latest public education controversy to sweep the nation, and it has nothing to do with high-stakes testing or graduation rates.
This debate is about chocolate milk, and it's coming soon to a cafeteria near you.
This summer, the Los Angeles Public School District banned chocolate milk from its lunchrooms. It joined a growing list of states, including Florida, that link the sugary beverage to childhood obesity.
One school nutrition manager in Colorado dubbed chocolate milk "soda in drag."
The Florida Board of Education tried to ban flavored milks last year, citing long-term health concerns for children and soaring health-care costs.
But the group met resistance from dairy farmers, politicians, parents and even some health advocates, who say flavored milk is better than no milk at all.
"It's certainly a passionate issue," said Florida Department of Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam, a father of four who added, "I don't want to be the Grinch who stole chocolate milk."
Putnam persuaded the education board to hold off until new federal rules governing student nutrition are in place. That could take as long as two years.
Meantime, Putnam's office is taking over student nutrition from the state Department of Education on Jan.1, expanding in the process the so-called farm-to-table movement -- a drive to use locally grown, preservative-free food at home and in restaurants.
Right now, he's working with dairies throughout the state to reduce the sugar in flavored milks.
So far, Putnam said, at least 17 of the state's 67 counties, including Hillsborough, serve students chocolate milk with less sugar and fat.
"We're giving kids healthier options while still giving them choices," he said, "and that's the right thing to do."
Dale McClellan pushed his dairy, M&B Products in Temple Terrace, to be the first in the state to decrease sugar in chocolate milk without losing its appeal to kids.
M&B Products, whose cows are in Citrus County, supplies milk to 19 school districts, including Pinellas, Polk and Sarasota.
"Chocolate milk makes up 75 percent of the business," said McClellan, a company co-owner.
When he started producing milk for schools about six years ago, the norm for 1 percent chocolate milk was 29 grams of sugar and about 160 to 170 calories, he said.
One percent milk is 1 percent of fat by volume compared with 2 percent milk, which, in turn, has about half the fat of whole milk.
Now, M&B produces a half-percent chocolate milk with 26 grams of sugar and 150 calories. Eventually, the company found a way to improve upon that, cutting the sugar to 22 grams for each 8-ounce carton and calories to 140.
With support from Beverly Girard, Sarasota County public schools food services director, McClellan tested the product last year in the district and met with success.
"It was seamless," Girard said recently. "We didn't have one complaint."
McClellan expanded production to the remaining 18 districts in January.
Today, M&B makes a fat-free version with 22 grams of sugar and 130 calories that's in all 19 school districts.
"We took the sugar down as far as we could go," said McClellan, who predicts sugar levels will drop again in a few years with help from school nutrition managers and the state agriculture department.
For the folks who blame chocolate milk for childhood obesity, "that's ridiculous," he said. "I think we do have a problem in our country. It's called TV. Kids need more exercise. Parents need to be parents."
For some kids, that brown-and-white carton they grab in the school lunch line will be the healthiest choice they make all day.
"It starts at home," said Lesley Jacobs-Keeler, Hillsborough County schools' new nutrition education manager. "Children develop a very sweet palette at home."
Letting them drink chocolate milk and other sugary drinks at home can train them to accept only sweet beverages, she said.
"People are afraid of chocolate milk? Me, personally, I'm more afraid of artificial flavoring," Jacobs-Keeler said.
As students made their way to the lunch tables at Valrico Elementary last week, nearly every tray carried a carton of Velda Farms low-fat chocolate milk. The 8-ounce carton has 140 calories and 24 grams of sugar.
Nationally, about 70 percent of the milk chosen in school is flavored, according to the Dairy Council of Florida.
In a few weeks, Hillsborough will test a nonfat version from another vendor that has about 20 grams of sugar.
"The taste is not as good, even for me, and I'm not a flavored milk drinker," said Hillsborough's student nutrition supervisor Mary Kate Harrison. "It's weaker."
But if it works and children drink it, the district will keep it, she said.
The concern is that if children don't like what's offered in the way of milk, they'll skip it altogether, leaving them short on daily nutritional needs.
And that's what's getting lost in the debate, says Jennifer Sills, a registered dietician with a master's degree in public health and the director of Dairy, Health and Wellness for the dairy council.
"Flavored milk has the same exact nutrient profile as white milk," Sills said. "The only difference is the added flavoring."
Both chocolate and white milk contain calcium, vitamin D, riboflavin, phosphorus, protein, potassium, vitamin A, vitamin B12 and niacin. But the flavoring, which blends cocoa and sugar, adds calories. On average, there's a 60-calorie difference between 1 percent white milk and 1 percent chocolate milk, Sills said. "If you're going to indulge, if you've got a little bit of a sweet tooth, chocolate milk is by far the most beneficial for your body."
Juice, on the other hand, has just as much sugar, but, for the most part, not the calcium or protein that chocolate milk provides, Sills said.
Nutritionists recommend children 2 years old and younger drink whole milk because their growing bodies and developing brains need the extra fat and cholesterol. But most older children and adults should probably avoid the unwanted calories and stick with 1 percent.
It's not just the dairy council touting the health benefits of flavored milk. The Institute of Medicine, American Academy of Pediatrics, American Dietetic Association, American Heart Association and National Medical Association support low-fat or nonfat flavored milks in schools.
A 2006 study by the International Journal of Sport Nutrition and Exercise Metabolism, featured in Men's Health magazine, found that chocolate milk was as good as or better than Gatorade at replacing glucose in fatigued muscles.
Bill Campbell, a sports nutrition researcher at the University of South Florida, just completed a study on chocolate milk consumption among St. Petersburg College softball players.
The 18- to 19-year-old women drank 16 ounces of fat-free chocolate milk after working out three times a week for eight weeks, each averaging about 80 extra calories a week.
"They did not gain any weight," said Campbell, whose study has not been published. "But they were physically active."
Denise Edwards, director of USF's Healthy Weight Clinic, said too much is being made ofthe connection between chocolate milk and childhood obesity.
"The added sugar is such a drop in the bucket when you are looking at nutrition," she said, turning to an adage: "Everything in moderation."
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(CHART) Comparing milk calories
Fat
Whole 2% 1% Free
Chocolate 208 190 158 -
White 150 120 105 90
