Coke sponsoring a school near you?

(Evansville, IN) The EVSC needs more funding, and one of the possibilities is an exclusive soft drink contract.

On Monday night the EVSC school board looked at a proposal from Coca-Cola to help pay for extracurricular activities. It's a five-year deal worth about $2.5 million. During the first year $700,000 would be paid.

The proposal would allow each school principal to decide where the vending machines are placed. For every carbonated drink offered, there has to be a non-carbonated alternative.

The school board still has to approve the proposal. May we suggest they pop by adbusters issue 28 "Make your school an ad free zone" first.

Update: via MeFiIn a related story The Seattle Times reports;

"The year-end school party in Catherine Poling's third-grade class last week was a bit unusual: Girls wore their best dresses and kids scribbled "Go Homework" and "I (heart) Homework" on the whiteboard.

It was different in another respect, too: It had a corporate sponsor. Dunkin' Donuts sent four dozen doughnuts and a representative to help celebrate the class's $6,000 grand-prize victory in the company's contest to develop a one-minute commercial on "selling" the importance of homework.

The school, Oakdale Elementary in Frederick County, Md., is getting used to receiving large corporate checks. Last year, it won $10,000 for performing the best interpretation of Oscar Mayer's well-known wiener song. This year it won another $10,000 from Oscar Mayer for singing its bologna song and two other melodies, written by music teacher Lori Bower, praising Oscar Mayer Lunchables, complete with children dressed up as dancing pieces of bologna, ham and cheese."