Childhood Hunger
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- September 17
Under-use of school breakfast program Report criticizes under-use of school breakfast program
By Jeff McDonald
SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE
September 15, 2007The failure of school principals to fully enroll students costs the region almost $25 million a year in federal reimbursements, according to California Food Policy Advocates, a San Francisco group that fights hunger and promotes nutrition among low-income families.
The organization urges education leaders across the state to do a better job making sure schools offer breakfast to students.
“All students, regardless of their location or their family income, should be able to start the day well-nourished and ready to learn,” said Kumar Chandran, who wrote the report. Schools “have a special responsibility to offer breakfast.”
Widespread lack of participation in the decades-old federal School Breakfast Program is not limited to San Diego County.
According to the report, only 35 percent of California students who enroll in free and reduced lunch program take advantage of the same plan available for breakfast. The national average is nearly 45 percent. The San Diego County average is 29.9 percent.
Educators fear the lack of breakfast may exacerbate the so-called achievement gap, the long-standing difference in test scores between some minority groups and their white counterparts.
The federal School Breakfast Program was developed as a pilot project in 1966 to help “nutritionally needy” children and was made permanent by Congress in 1975. It provides money for food, but not for labor or equipment needed to serve meals.
Participation in the program is voluntary. Decisions about whether to provide breakfast are typically left to individual principals rather than district officials.
In San Diego County, 99 schools teaching more than 66,000 children have never signed up for the breakfast program, the report said. Twenty-seven of those campuses are defined as “severe-need” schools.
“A lot of districts are kind of stuck in the old mindset” that parents are responsible for their children’s breakfast, Chandran said. “And that doesn’t yield good participation.”
State funding difficult The report suggests that all schools offer breakfast and that they should apply for grants to pay for equipment needed to serve the meals.
Phyllis Bramson-Paul of the state Department of Education said her office is committed to raising the number of students who eat breakfast at school, but the state can fund only 25 percent of grant applications.
Apart from that, the new state budget failed to include $11 million earmarked for the Fresh Start program, which pays schools an extra 10 cents for each serving of fruit served at breakfast, Bramson-Paul said.
“We know that the more kids eat breakfast, the better they do academically,” she said, “but the budget is so tight this year.”
Three campuses in the Fallbrook Union Elementary School District are on the list of 27 “severe need” schools that do not offer breakfast. Assistant Superintendent James Whitlock said there has been little demand,
“If parents felt like this is something they are interested in, certainly they ought to discuss it with the principal,” he said. “We have no policy that would preclude this.”
Six Cajon Valley Union School District campuses appeared on the list of needy schools that do not provide breakfast. Child nutrition services director Linda Patzold said starting a breakfast program at those schools would be a “huge undertaking” that is not a top priority.
“At this time, (principals) have not felt the need for that program or the community push for that program,” said Patzold, who noted that grants to pay operational costs have been difficult to come by.
The San Diego Unified School District appears to be doing a good job serving breakfast to its 130,000 students. Four city schools landed on the “severe needs” list, but three are charter schools outside the district’s control.
*‘Families are busy’
“Breakfast at school is a really viable option for any child,” said Joanne Tucker, a district food-services official. “Families are busy in the mornings. It’s usually all they can do to get kids out the door dressed.”
Tucker said three schools south of Interstate 8 just launched a program where children eat breakfast in class rather than before school, which is one of the key recommendations of the California Food Policy Advocates report.
“It made the teachers and the students have a better learning experience throughout the morning,” she said.
The San Diego Hunger Coalition co-released the report on school breakfasts.
“Hopefully, the county and school districts will pick up the ball and run with it,” said Tia Anzellotti, the coalition’s executive director. “This is another really important tool in the fights against obesity and in promoting health and good nutrition.
Statewide, about 700,000 students attend schools that do not offer breakfast, the report said. More than 1 million additional students would eat breakfast every day if all schools participated in the breakfast program, it said.
The low participation rate costs California $330 million a year in federal tax dollars that are not returned to the state, researchers said.
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