ESSAY: SHOULD TUCK SHOP STOP SELLING "JUNK FOOD"?

hi,could anyone give me some advice(logic,,idea,,etc) and indicate the grammetical mistakes??thanks a lot!!!!

Question:
Your school principal has told the tuck shop to stop selling 'junk food', such as fish balls and soft drinks, in response to the government's campaign to promote healthy eating. However, this policy has evoked a strong reaction from some students who insist on their right to exercise freedom of choice.

You are a reporter for the school newspaper and have just attended a meeting between the principal and representatives of parents, teachers and students. Write an article for the school newspaper describing the viewpoints and arguments of the different parties. Give your article a title.

The policy executed by the government that our school intended to follow so as to promote healthy eating has aroused a strong reaction from some students who insist on their right to exercise freedom of choice as the tuck shop in school would stop selling "junk food" such as soft drinks,fish ball and French fries.Therefore,a meeting was held to discuss the problems between the principal,representatives of parents,teachers and students.

In the meeting,plenty of viewpoints came up,but the ost concerned place of them is obesity problem.Especially for parents,"In general,almost all of my friends are worrying about their childs' health due to obesity problem",indicated respresentatives of parents.The main reason of causing overweighed students mentioned by them should be"Junk Food".Compared with other foods such as fruit,vegetable and rice,even though "junk food"are pretty relish,it is a kind of food without and nutritional value and has a terrible figure of high fats and calories within the "junk food".In addition,students are mostly lack of discipline of eating "junk food" among the overweighed students so they have become fatter and fatter.Moreover , A quite lot of students are required to stay in school for having lunch.According to the reflection of teachers,those students are always willing to choose buying "junk food" for lunch instead of the diet that the public prefers.It make parents ask for the help from the principal that the school has to stop "junk food" sold in Tuck shop.

However, the representatives of students brought out that the action has abridged the students' right of freedom of choice.Although it was not denied that it could be great to raise the awareness of the students' health,they would not take it seriously and provoke them to anger instead.Moreover, they could but the"junk food" outside the school.Therefore,it will have no usefulness with the policy.

For alll this,the principal think that the main reason of doing this because of promoting healthy eating.To make the students beware of controling their diet is necessary to be done.On the other hand,school is a place which has a high-standard requirement on student.Not only for learning academic subjects,but also have to learn about discipline.Hence,students should obey the policy which is whether good or not.

For students,it is not doubt that they should follow the policy when they are in school.

You might want to give the counter-arguments that each side would use against the other, rather than just giving the main points for each side. Also, these sorts of articles normally take a stance on the issue, so you might want to consider saying which side of the issue you think has the stronger case.

Wait a minute, the article is supposed to take a stance on the issue? I thought journalists were supposed to be neutral, and I would assume that a school paper tries to emulate that ideal of neutrality. However, I assume Sean is correct because he seems knowledgeable about every subject that comes up, so I wondered if I could find out something important here... what kind of article is it you are talking about, Sean, when you say they are supposed to take a side?

Your comment surprised me, but now that I think of it lots of articles in major papers take sides! Yes, in journalism neutrality and objectivity are ideals, but the most important thing is to be entertainintg, i think!

npxzs, put a space after the periods at the end of sentences.

Moreover, they could buy the"junk food" outside the school. Therefore, the students have no use for the policy.

Oh, so it is health vs. freedom of choice! That is interesting... Yes, students are people, too. maybe you could write a sentence in para #1 about the tension between students' free choice and parents' health concerns.

Interesting essay!!!

:)

I suppose it depends on the type of article, really. I was thinking editorials, specifically, when I wrote the comment. Editorials by definitions are statements of the newspaper's stance on an issue. Also, assuming that both sides are basing their argument on some sort of empirical claims, then presumably a good reporter would engage in some fact checking, while also looking at context, to determine which claims were accurate and which were not. The very act of doing this would tend to result in choosing a side.

On further reflection, I think Kevin makes a good point -- journalism used to be about neutrality and objectivity. But, then, it became fashionable to argue that it was impossible for anyone to be neutral or objective, especially news media, which had to decide which facts to include, which elements of context to cover. I don't know of any news outlets that now make even the slightest attempt at neutrality within a single piece. At best, they aim for balance by presenting two or more articles on the same topic but written from different viewpoints. U.S.A Today, I believe, tends to publish two articles each issue on the same topic, one for, the other against.

In any event, you could try presenting both sides equally well (this is good practice, actually. Nothing builds critical thinking better than learning to argue both sides of an issue, regardless of your actual stance.), but you would still want to cover the counter-arguments for each side. Think of the debate as a dialogue, with the participants responding to each other, rather than as two unconnected sets of arguments.

That's interesting about U.S.A. Today taking both sides... smart strategy! Speaking of editorials, my grandmother recently wrote an editorial about a Wal-Mart superstore with birds living in the ceiling -- she complained that the birds were a health hazard, ha ha. Crazy Nana...

Anyway, that's quite irrelevant.