Would you like to wait in line for 20 minutes just to get something you wouldn’t like and only have 8 minutes to eat it? Or would you get the same simple and consistent meal for a full week? This year lunch bars are no longer an option for students, they must choose from 2 lines and only 3 lunches a day, with pizza being one of them. Some say they should come back, some say they shouldn’t. There are many reasons for both sides of the argument on if the revival of lunch bars is beneficial to the students and the school.

Some students say the lunch bars should return. An 8th grader, Brandon Logan, made his comment on this topic, “I think that bringing back the lunch bars would be a benefit for lunch. Bringing the lunch bars back would be good because it would bring more variety to lunch. This expanse of different food options would benefit kids that may not like the other three options for lunch. I feel that it may also offer a couple more jobs for people in need so they could prepare those lunch options. So, I think that the school should bring back the lunch bars.” As he said, lunch bars give a more wide variety of meals and if they dislike the set three meals then they can choose the bars. If hungry students just want to eat food and don’t want to wait in an extended line, they can just enter the bars for a quick and simple meal. New jobs could be created out of it. Having lunch bars gives everyone a choice to eat. It also helps get rid of wasted food that wasn’t given out.

However, there are some problems with bringing back lunch bars. First, some students may never eat the lunch bar depending on what they’re serving that week. It could be a waste of food in return if students don’t eat the bars. There’s the possibility where there aren’t enough staff members to work the bars, the lunch bars create more work to set up and clean. Having more food equals more cost, it may be too expensive to keep the bars open for a full year. All of these are economically worse for the school specifically. According to an editorial created by educationdive.com, it states, “A new World Wildlife Fund report estimates U.S. school food waste totals 530,000 tons per year and costs as much as $9.7 million a day to manage, which breaks down to about 39.2 pounds of food waste and 19.4 gallons of milk thrown out per school per year, based on the results from 46-school samples across nine cities.” Removing unneeded lunches gives schools the money to afford more supplies, technology, and extra education for students in need. If schools could reduce food waste by 3% it would save them $52 million dollars. Some say that schools just send out the waste to be composted, however most of the time this does not happen. According to an article by grist.org, it shows that, “Across the country, school trash cans full of edible food are the norm. Fewer than 5 percent of K-12 schools send food out to be composted.”

The benefits of returning the lunch bars could affect mostly the students in a positive way, to variety, simplicity, and consistency. Although the students may enjoy the lunch bar, the school may have to face the consequences for serving more food. They may be unable to compensate for the waste, cost, and manpower. It could be too much for the schools to handle and which is probably why the lunch bars this year aren’t open.