School may be back in session, but it looks a little different this year than it has in years past. A lot of students are learning virtually to try and stay safe from COVID-19, but virtual learning is not without its difficulties. We are only starting to learn the impacts that virtual learning is having on students and it goes beyond missing out on social interactions with peers.
According to Press Herald, virtual learning is having an impact on the food our children are consuming. The claim is that distance learning is making eating healthy a lot harder and that is because of an increase in digital junk food ads that are on educational platforms.
With out children spending most of their time online, they are being exposed to these ads at a higher rate. The pandemic has already had a negative impact on the way we are eating, especially to those families who are living in low-income situations. Since these students are all working remotely from home, they are also missing out on the healthy school meal they would normally be getting every day.
Press Herald also did some investigations of their own after they read about some parents’ concerns about online educational platforms. They went on and reviewed some of them, and they were met with bright and colorful ads for some food choices that are not really healthy.
They found ads for sugary cereals, processed-meat snacks and no shortages of ads for McDonald’s and other fast-food chains, there have been problems with these types of ads for a while and some countries have gone as far as to ban them from airing.
Another alarming concern with these ads, is it appears to be aide in the idea that unhealthy eating is affecting the lower income families the most. That is because the educational platform does offer a substitute where you can pay a fee to have all ads disappear from your child’s computer. However, this puts low-income families at a disadvantage because they can not afford this fee.
The fight is now on to help fix this marketing problem, and they have called on the U.S. Department of Agriculture to help schools fight what is being promoted to children on their educational platform. It looks like positive change is coming, because Kellogg’s, McDonald’s and Kraft Heinz have already stepped up and agreed to remove their ads from the platform.
Source: Press Herald