Have you heard about the Illinois teacher who has pledged to eat school cafeteria lunches alongside students for a year to prove the point that school lunches are not nutritious? She (at least her posts indicate that she is a she, and a wife and mom) has been blogging anonymously since February, under the pseudonym "Mrs. Q." According to Mrs. Q, she is worried that she will most likely be fired if anyone learns about her project.

Her undertaking, which she is calling the Fed Up with Lunch: the School Lunch Project, has garnered a lot of attention. She has reportedly gained thousands of readers a day, and has recently been featured on the Yahoo home page.

One of the main reasons Mrs. Q. cites as her motivation for starting this project is that so many of her student come from lower-income families. As such, they are especially in need of healthy, nutritious lunches to provide what they may not be getting from home. Instead, what they often get is overly processed lunches that often lack fresh fruits or vegetables.

Mrs. Q. is also careful to point out that her blog isn't just about her school. Her goal is to raise awareness about the lack of better food models in school cafeterias all around the nation. She has a point.

In a recent Time magazine article about school lunches in France, the writer, a mom of a preschooler in a French public school, notes with astonishment the incredible attention that is paid to the variety and quality of school lunches. (The writer, Vivienne Walt, is South-African born, and has lived in the U.S.) No single meal is repeated in a 32-school day period, she writes, and each lunch includes an hors d'oeuvre, salad, main course, cheese plate and dessert. Wow. Parents are even given dinner suggestions so that they can balance out what to have that evening according to what their child had for lunch. Double wow. If our schools placed that much care and effort into kids' school lunches, Mrs. Q. would have nothing to write about.

Here's an inspiring story about the difference children can make in the world when they are allowed to do their part to help their communities. More than a thousand students in Fargo, North Dakota have been filling and lugging sandbags, working alongside adults in an effort to help prevent flooding and save Fargo from the rising Red River, which is expected to crest on Sunday.

Children of all ages from preschoolers to high-schoolers have been volunteering in the sandbagging effort. The older students have been working three-, four-, and even five-hour shifts. Adults are crediting the kids' hard work with getting the sandbags stacked ahead of schedule, before the river rises.

On Tuesday morning, children in some parts of North Carolina who were tuned in to kids' programming saw some things that were definitely not meant for kids. When viewers selected Channel 552 "Kids On Demand" and Channel 555 "Preschool On Demand," they saw previews of sexually explicit Playboy channel content.

Parents called Time Warner Cable to report the problem around 6:15 a.m. but it took the cable company until 8:15 a.m. to find the error and correct it. Time Warner Cable has apologized for the glitch, and has blamed a technical error.

This incident reminds me of a story a friend of mine told me a few years ago about her then-5-year-old daughter walking in on her and her husband while they were, um, having a rather explicit moment of their own. They quickly explained to their daughter (who was, to their relief, still a bit groggy from sleep) that they'd been "hugging." At 5, she seemed to buy this story without much question. I wonder what those parents in North Carolina told their kids about what they'd seen!

Spring vacation is coming...are you ready? Still thinking of ideas? If so, check out these suggestions for Spring Break Activities you can do with the kids this vacation. You can make great memories by doing something as simple as making yummy treats or decorating Easter eggs at home. Or you may want to hit the road for a fun family vacation. Whatever you decide to do, enjoy this last big break as we head into the home stretch of the school year and the flurry of end-of-year activities that are sure to come.