School Commercialism Hurts All Children, Ethnic Minority Group Children Most of All

Journal of Negro Education, The, Fall 2003 by Molnar, Alex

School commercialism has increased dramatically over the past two decades. It is now common for advertisers to incorporate schools into their overall marketing plans for products as diverse as soft drinks and automobiles. In addition to distracting children from academic learning, marketing activities often promote unhealthy behaviors that have a disproportionate impact on minority children. The heavy consumption of soft drinks, for example, is suspected of contributing significantly to the increase in childhood obesity, which is in turn associated with increased rates of diabetes. Although obesity and diabetes are problems across all groups, African Americans and Latinos are particularly at risk. Similarly, privatizing school reforms may harm minority children.

Commercialism-through advertising aimed at young people, the marketing of candy and soft drinks on school premises, the appropriation of school space for commercial marketing activities, the sponsorship of curricular materials, and the privatization of everything from cafeteria services to school management and classroom teaching by forprofit companies-has steadily grown in America's public schools. This growth has been documented over more than a dozen years by the Commercialism in Education Research Unit (CERU) at the Education Policy Research Laboratory at Arizona State University (Molnar, 2002).

The evidence suggests that commercialism in schools harms all students in various ways that include promoting poor health habits (e.g., consumption of sugar- and fatladen snacks and soft drinks), distorting the curriculum, and eroding critical thinking skills. When one considers both the forces that drive rising school commercialism and the potential outcomes, it appears likely, however, that ethnic minority group students, particularly African Americans and Latinos, are the most severely at risk. Schoolhouse commercialism is allowed to flourish in an environment in which public schools increasingly are starved for resources, and no schools are more in need of funding than those in urban communities where poor and ethnic minority group children are so heavily concentrated. Moreover, health problems in young people, which may be exacerbated by some commercial activities in schools, are particularly acute in poor and ethnic minority group communities.

A RISING TIDE OF SCHOOLHOUSE COMMERCIALISM

Commercialism in schools and classrooms is not new, but over the last two decades, corporations have dramatically increased their involvement in education. Today, almost every large corporation sponsors some type of in-school project. They range from advertising on school buses, on scoreboards, and in lunchrooms to the creation of curriculum materials for courses (e.g., science, government, history, mathematics).

Commercial messages in school serve a variety of interests and cover a variety of topics. Some schoolhouse commercialism activities seek to build goodwill for industries or individual corporations; others promote industry views relating to controversial subjects, such as ways to protect natural resources in science courses. Many, however, seek to influence buying patterns, particularly for specific brand-named products that children and teenagers buy such as clothing, athletic shoes, foods, beverages, and electronics. Perhaps the most well known school-based marketing effort is Channel One, the adbearing TV news program for middle and high school students. Channel One, used in approximately 12,000 schools nationally, provides 10 minutes of current events programming and 2 minutes of commercials. Participating schools, in return for the programming and the free use of the equipment necessary to broadcast it in their classrooms, are required to guarantee that their students are watching, creating a captive audience for advertisers. Other, lesser known examples include a geography unit for third graders in which students locate major cities according to where Tootsie Rolls are made and sold, and the "Chocolate Dream Machine," a nutrition guide and video that promote Hershey's chocolate. There are many others, ranging from General Mills' efforts to induce families to buy the company's cereals by promising donations to schools that submit special box top labels to Pizza Hut's program of rewarding children who fulfill reading goals with a free personal pizza (Consumers Union, 1995; Molnar, 1998,1999,2002; Molnar & Morales, 2000; Molnar & Reaves, 2001).

As part of their overall marketing strategy, corporations are seeking access to schools in an unprecedented diversity of ways. Commercial messages, invitations to enter students in contests, proposals for exclusive vending contracts with soft drink bottlers, and offers of free equipment and services in return for advertisers' access to students are now commonplace. Students, educators, family and community members, and policymakers all feel the impact of commercialism. The apparent increase in commercial activities is likely the result of both the increase in marketing to children in general and the vulnerability of schools. Schools are experiencing increasing demands for academic improvement from government agencies, family and community members, including the business community, and their budgets are strained in the attempt to offer a wide variety of sophisticated and expensive technology to students (National Commission on Excellence in Education, 1983). These intense external pressures make commercialized offers of assistance seem very attractive.