WCER Researcher Makes News on School Lunches

May 9, 2023   |   By WCER Communications

Andrew Ruis, a WCER research scientist and expert on the history of school lunches—he wrote the book Eating to Learn, Learning to Eat: The Origins of School Lunch in the United States—has done many interviews and media consults this year as the topic has been often in the news.

Most recently, he was featured in “Making All School Lunches Free in NC Will Cut Hunger, Stigma and Paperwork,” on March 19, in the News & Observer, and on March 2, in “America’s School Lunch Crisis,” by Vox.

His string of media hits continues with “What Stricter USDA Standards Would Mean for School Meals,” an episode of Wisconsin Public Radio’s “Central Time” on which Ruis was the sole guest on Feb. 20. You can listen to that here.

Before that, Ruis contributed to “What’s Wrong with School Lunch in the U.S.?” a Jan. 3 episode of the YouTube show, “Eat This with Yara,” an Al Jazeera-affiliated program.

And on the ongoing 2023 investigative podcast from LWC Studios, “Left Over: How Corporations and Politicians Are Milking the American School Lunch,” Ruis contributed to episode 2, “The Paradox of Plenty amid Hunger.”

No telling which media outlet might tap Ruis next, but if history is any guide, it won’t be long.