Many students and parents have reacted strongly to new guidelines for the National School Lunch program mandating calorie limits and more fruits and vegetables, saying the meals are unappealing or leave kids hungry after eating.

The changes began this school year and affect more than 1.1 million Ohio students who participate in the program, which served more than 180 million meals at reduced cost or no charge in fiscal year 2011. Some say the changes go too far, while others argue they are necessary for student health.

Danielle Geeting, whose nine children in kindergarten through 11th grade attend Tecumseh schools, said the portions are much smaller than they were last year.

“(School administrators) talk about obesity and getting fat at school, but if we’re starving, we’re just going to go home and eat a lot,” said Dalton Geeting, a freshman at Tecumseh High School. “It needs to get better because when we get hungry, it’s hard to concentrate on your work.”

The changes were part of reauthorizing the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Child Nutrition Programs — most notably the National School Lunch program — with the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act.

Efforts for the legislation were led by Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! campaign meant to encourage activity and decrease childhood obesity, which increased nationally from 7 percent for kids aged 6 to 11 in 1980 to 20 percent in 2008, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In Ohio, 15 percent of high school students were obese in 2011.

Officials say they hope the changes help children stay healthy now and also teach better habits for the future. They also warn that the lunch program meals are meant to be only part of a child’s eating plan for the day.

Becky Gonter-Dray, pediatric dietitian for the Children’s Medical Center of Dayton, said an appropriate breakfast will help ease concerns about lunch sizes.

“Research shows that if you don’t eat breakfast that you don’t perform as well in school and you are at an increased risk for being obese later in life,” she said.

Some students at Tecumseh Local Schools have had a difficult time with the new nutritional guidelines, said Superintendent Jim Gay. There has also been an increase in waste because some students choose not to eat the additional fruits and vegetables in the new meals.

“Whether a kid is getting enough to eat or not kind of depends on the kid and the size of the kid,” Gay said. “We were very happy with the way it was last year, but the law changed and we need to follow the law. Certainly, we want the food that they get to be healthy for them, we want it to taste good and we don’t want them to be hungry.”

The new legislation changed numerous standards for the school lunch program.

Before, there were no calorie limits with one-half to three-fourths of a cup or any mix of fruits or vegetables allowed. Beginning this year, there are per-meal calorie limits depending on grades, ranging from 650 calories to 850 calories. There must also be one-half of a cup to one cup of fruits and three-fourths of a cup to one cup of vegetables.

There are also standards for meats, grains, whole grains, milk, sodium and fat.

Schools must meet those standards to be reimbursed for meals, with rates ranging from $2.46 to $3.09 per free to reduced-price meal. In fiscal year 2011, the USDA paid more than $311 million in reimbursements to Ohio schools for the National School Lunch program, part of $10.1 billion paid out nationally.

At Springfield High School, where breakfast and lunch are free for all students this year through a district-wide federal subsidy, students don’t seem to have noticed the changed guidelines.

The cafeteria there offers an unlimited salad bar, pizza option, sandwich option and specialty meal and serves 3,500 breakfasts and 6,000 lunches each day. Filling the basket of apples at the end of the line demands about 1,330 apples per week.

Springfield didn’t make a significant change to sizes this year because it had kept its meals modest said Chris Ashley, the district’s food service supervisor. Some districts saw more significant changes.

“I understand that there’s got to be a world of difference between what they were getting and could get, and what they can get now,” Ashley said. “We never super-sized because we didn’t think it was a good nutritional choice.”

Because Springfield High Schools never strayed far from the old nutritional recommendations, their students didn’t seem to mind the changes, Ashley said. For them, the new guidelines only mean small changes to meat portions, one less slice of meat on a sub and only one ounce less meat in a burger, while the amount of fruit and vegetables in each meal doubled from 4 ounces to 8 ounces.

“I think the intentions are good, but I think the sweeping reforms that they did all in one year were tough for everybody to adjust to,” Ashley said. “If the changes had been more gradual, kids would have adjusted better and schools would have adjusted better.”

Dinah May, a senior at Springfield, said that although she tries to pack her own lunch as much as possible, she like the new fruit and vegetable options. She said that although she noticed that the lunches are smaller, she appreciates that the meals are free for everyone.

Although students have the option to buy additional food, some parents expressed concern about their children eating enough food to last through the day, particularly if they take part in after-school sports or activities.

For athlete David Torok, a senior at Springfield, the additional fruit and vegetable options makes it easier to make good food decisions, he said.

“There are a lot more healthy choices,” Torok said. “If you know what you’re getting, you can be more healthy with it, and as an athlete I think it’s awesome.”