MA Considering Banning 'Fat Letters'

During the summer of 2013, the Department of Public Health in Massachusetts (DPH) found that the Body Mass Index (BMI) reports on schoolchildren have been used to bully fat children in the state. This has prompted state lawmakers to consider laws banning “fat letters” being sent home to the parents of overweight schoolchildren. 

Currently, the state’s schools gather data correlating each student’s height, weight and body mass index. Overweight children’s parents receive letters, but critics of the letters want the parents to assume responsibility, not the schools.

Cheryl Bartlett of the DPH told WBZ NewsRadio 1030 in July that the department was thinking of leaving the testing for BMI in place but terminating the letter writing program.