Mom Slams 8th Grade 'Shame Based' Health Assignment for Teens

A mom has taken to the internet this week to slam an assignment her 14-year-old daughter was given at school.

Emily Johnson, who lives in Provo, Utah, was shocked when her daughter alerted her to a worksheet the class had been given.

"It was handed out during class as a worksheet that they discussed," Johnson told Newsweek: "My daughter was disturbed by it so she took a picture of it and texted it to me."

In a tweet that has received thousands of likes and hundreds of retweets, Johnson shared the picture of the worksheet titled "Introduction to Nutrition."

On the sheet was a set of question points for students, including: "How much does the U.S. spend a year on obesity and who pays for this?" and "From studying the Height/Weight chart did you determine how much you should weigh to be physically healthy?"

"I was immediately struck by how shame-based it was. Instead of teaching the students good nutrition, it doubled down on fatphobic rhetoric," said Johnson. "I have tried really hard to teach my children that there's nothing wrong with being fat, or being a certain size, but that we should strive to be healthy and feel good."

Fatphobia refers to the implicit and explicit bias against overweight individuals, rooted in a sense of blame and even assumption of moral failing. The University of Chicago's School of Public Health reports that in the past decade weight discrimination has increased by 66 percent, labelling it one of the only forms of discrimination that is "actively condoned by society."

Alongside the worksheet, Johnson was horrified to learn that the teacher had the students find themselves on a BMI chart to work out if they were "underweight," "overweight," "obese" or "normal."

"I've talked to my daughter especially as a teenage girl about the problems with the BMI—its racist origins and unhelpfulness in public health—as well as how the billion-dollar diet industry spends all their ad money trying to convince girls and women that their bodies aren't good enough and need to change," said Johnson. "Imagine the effect this would have on a middle school student already feeling self-conscious about their body."

There have been many studies on the flaws in the BMI (Body Mass Index) system which uses weight and height to measure body fat content. In 2013, researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania highlighted the issues with BMI, mainly because it does not take into account muscle mass, bone density, overall body composition and racial or sex differences.

Nick Trefethen, professor of numerical analysis at Oxford University's Mathematical Institute, explained in a letter to The Economist that BMI leads to confusion and misinformation by exaggerating thinness in short people and fatness in tall people.

While much better methods to measure fat mass do exist—namely the Dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry or DEXA scan—the BMI method remains the cheapest and easiest to access, which has perpetuated its continued use in health care settings.

It wasn't just the inaccurate BMI charts that Johnson was worried about either, she was also shocked by the language used within the sheet.

"I took issue with the blanket statements attributing chronic diseases to obesity, as well as calling them 'lifestyle choices,'" said Johnson. "There are many factors that go into how much a person weighs, and there are plenty of 'obese' people who are fit and healthy and 'skinny' people who have a terrible diet and no exercise."

There is good reason for particular concern around what we teach young people about their bodies, too. In a 2017 study of 2,000 students aged 11 to 16 years old across the U.K., 79 percent said how they look is important to them and 52 percent admitted that they often worry about how they look.

As well as sharing her concerns online, Johnson contacted the teacher and the school district: "I shared my concerns in the most respectful way I could. It's not easy teaching middle school! She responded very graciously and said she wasn't aware of how the worksheet was coming across and that she would take a second look," said Johnson.

A spokesperson for Provo City School District told Newsweek: "The district and school reached out to the concerned parent immediately after becoming aware of the post on social media. We have had, and will continue to have, discussions between the parent, teacher, school, and district to address her concerns and make any changes or improvements that are determined to be necessary."

"I have a very small friend group of like-minded moms on Twitter that I wanted to share it with since I knew they would sympathize," explained Johnson. "I had no idea it would go as far as it has. Some of the comments have been terrible, mostly from men, continuing the hateful rhetoric that so many Americans think they can direct at fat people for just existing. But mostly it's been positive."