Thread: Push is on to give more kids free breakfast at their schools

Published: 12.18.2006

Push is on to give more kids free breakfast at their schools
By Jeff Commings
ARIZONA DAILY STAR
eligibility
All students who are eligible for free or reduced-price school lunches are eligible for a similar breakfast program. Many districts do not keep comprehensive records of the number of low-income students who participate, but the numbers below show how many are eligible for the breakfast program.
Amphitheater Free lunch students: 4,949 Reduced-price students: 878 Total: 5,827 Percent of total student population: 34 percent

Flowing Wells Free lunch students: 2,992 Reduced-price students: 661 Total: 3,653 Percent of total student population: 61 percent

Marana* Free lunch students: 2,478 Reduced-price students: 889 Total: 3,367 Percent of total student population: 27 percent

Sahuarita Free lunch students: 1,150 Reduced-price students: 394 Total: 1,544 Percent of total student population: 40 percent

Sunnyside** Free lunch students: 12,323 Reduced-price students: 1,806 Total: 14,129 Percent of total student population: 83 percent

Tanque Verde Free lunch students: 92 Reduced-price students: 15 Total: 107 Percent of total student population: 8 percent

Tucson Unified Free lunch students: 29,820 Reduced-price students: 5,033 Total: 34,853 Percent of total student population: 57 percent

Vail Free lunch students: 791 Reduced-price students: 540 Total: 1,331 Percent of total student population: 18 percent

Catalina Foothills does not participate in the National School Lunch Program.
*Two schools in Marana offer free breakfast to all students. **Five schools in Sunnyside offer free breakfast to all students. Source: Arizona Department of Education
Learn more
For more information about the school breakfast program:
Arizona Department of Education Web site: www.ade.az.gov/health- safety/cnp/nslp/Operating/ BreakfastInfoandFacts.asp
U.S. Department of Agriculture Web site: www.fns.usda.gov/cnd/ breakfast/

Early one morning at Los Ranchitos Elementary School, bus loads of students made a beeline for the cafeteria. Some walked slower than others, but most made a mad dash for a bowl of cereal or a plate of eggs.
One of the eager students was Leticia Salcido, a 6-year-old first-grader.
"I like the food here," she said between bites of scrambled eggs. "An apple and yogurt would be good, too."
The situation at Los Ranchitos, 2054 E. Ginter Road on Tucson's South Side, mirrors findings from a new national study touting Arizona as one of three states — with Louisiana and Hawaii — experiencing a declining number of low-income students taking advantage of the free or reduced-price breakfasts at school. In a span of two years, participation at the South Side school has dropped from 90 percent to about 54 percent.
The decline came even as the school piloted a program the study's authors want to see in more low-income schools around the country: free breakfast for all students regardless of income. Los Ranchitos officials are working to increase interest in the program and are hopeful for a resurgence.
Despite Los Ranchitos' experience, Tucson-area district officials say the percentage of low-income students eating breakfast at school has either remained steady or grown slightly.
The study does not break down participation in the school breakfast program by region or city, but officials speculate that rural districts are most likely to experience declining participation because bus routes can get longer as areas grow, so kids don't get to school in time for breakfast.
Arizona's overall drop in participation was small, but it stands out in the study by the Food and Research Action Center in Washington, D.C. In the 2004-05 school year, 40.9 percent of Arizona students eligible for free and reduced-price breakfast ate at school. The next school year, only 39.8 percent took part.
About half of Arizona's students are eligible for free and reduced-price meals, Arizona Department of Education data show.
Breakfast in Tucson
The study praises efforts of many states to get students interested in eating breakfast at school. Nationwide, participation in the federal breakfast program among low-income students grew by 3.3 percent to 7.7 million students in one year. Still, that's only half of the students who are eligible in the free and reduced-price lunch program.
Eating breakfast "is an invaluable part of their learning," said Caroline Greene, Los Ranchitos kindergarten teacher. "It contributes so much to retaining information because they learn more on a full stomach."
Thanks to new nutrition guidelines mandated by the Arizona Board of Education and a renewed interest in healthier eating for students, officials are devising new strategies to get more kids to eat breakfast at school.
Offering free breakfast for all students, as Los Ranchitos does, is a key way to increase numbers at schools with high percentages of low-income children, said Madeleine Levin, an author of the national study and a senior policy adviser for the Food and Research Action Center.
"If it's offered to all kids at no charge, it takes away the stigma that's associated with breakfast," she said. Low-income students "will see that breakfast is for everybody, not just those who can't afford it."
Two schools in the Marana Unified School District — Desert Winds and Roadrunner elementaries — are taking the breakfast program one step further by providing breakfast for every student in the classroom. The program focuses on the schools that have a "severe" number of students in the free or reduced-price lunch program, said James Remete, the district's director of food services, who brought the program to the school after seeing success in Texas and Phoenix.
"When they get off the bus and go into the classroom, breakfast is waiting for them," Remete said. Previously, he said, teachers had to buy snacks for their students; now they can use that money for school supplies.
Parental interest in the program is the key, said Principal Kathleen Bethel of Los Ranchitos. No parent at her school has criticized the program. Many of them take their kids to school just to make sure they eat breakfast, because many kids tend to skip the cafeteria for the playground.
Lidia Bustos, a parent, often sits with her three children at Los Ranchitos to make sure they eat everything offered to them. She likes the program because she often doesn't have time to put together a good breakfast.
Convenience cited
"It's convenient to have breakfast here," she said in Spanish through a translator. "Everything's real healthy."
The school breakfast program was approved by Congress in 1966, when only 80,000 kids in the United States took part. Participation now is almost 100 times that number.
But the writers of the national study hope that states will work to push the 44.6 percent participation rate nationwide to 60 percent. For that to happen this year, 2.7 million more students would have to participate.
If 60 percent of low-income students were to participate in Arizona, it would mean breakfasts for 81,000 more students.
If that goal is reached, schools would get more subsidized money. For every student who gets free breakfast, a school can get $1.51 from the federal government. For every kid buying breakfast at a reduced price, the government pays $1.21. Schools get 23 cents for every student who pays full price for breakfast.
"We contact every school district that does not participate in the program," said state Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne. "We reach out to urge participation."
Officials say the money isn't what's enticing them to get more students eating breakfast, because reimbursement is fairly minuscule for each school.
"I'd love to put it in all schools because breakfast is breakfast, and it's a great way to start the day off," said Marana's Remete.
State education departments and legislators are key to making that happen, Levin said. "We should be able to get a breakfast to every kid," she said.
On StarNet: Read more education-related stories and surveys of private and charter schools around Tucson at azstarnet.com/education
eligibility
● Contact reporter Jeff Commings at 573-4191 or jcommings@azstarnet.com.
http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/printDS/160809

Nice to see socialism at work. One of the biggest problems with this, besides the fact that it IS socialism, is that many kids still won't eat was is given to them. The food will get thrown away. What a waste! At least the school gets it's $1.51 out of it. It's not about the money? Please! If the parent actually made an effort, they could feed the kids. Even when we struggle financially, we always make sure the kiddies are fed, and we have three.

I once saw the mother of a student eating the free breakfast at school. That sure rubbed me wrong. Just like any program this is abused and taken advantage of too. I don't want children hungry but I'm sorry, most these kids can eat a bowl of cereal at home. We've become so compassionate we look stupid at times.

Oh right! Most of those kids have all the latest game pads and gadgets including razor phones and ipods...give me a big ole break. Can't afford breakfast? The schools want to make the money off the contracts plain and simple. The illiteracy rate isn't due to no breakfasts, it's due to horrible teaching and teaching horribly! Get a clue.

I used to work in the school and you wouldn't believe how much food is thrown away. It's maddening!

Breakfast is the easiest and cheapest meal of the day! How hard is it to get a spoon and a bowl, open a box of cereal, put some in a bowl and pour a little milk over it? Or open a carton of yogurt and get a spoon to eat it with or toast some bread and spread it with peanut butter or/and jelly? Most if not all school age kids can do this all by themselves unless of course they have a disability. Plus we know that most of these families get WIC or have foodstamps so why do we need to feed them breakfast too?

No wonder they can have so many babies, they don't have to do anything but have them and collect benefits for them. We feed and care for them.

You know, this thread puts me in a very tough spot. I'm about as anti-illegal immigrant as anyone and I don't typically support giving any free rides to illegals. With that said, the school "free and reduced" meal programs are my one weakness. The truth of the matter is, some of these children, American citizen and illegal immigrant, need the meals served at the schools. If it weren't for those meals, some of these children would go hungry. Do we really want that? Illegal or not, I would prefer these children receive at least one decent meal a day - even if I have to pay for it. Most of you have read enough of my posts to know I'm not friendly toward illegal immigrants, not in the least, but I don't want to see any child in this country go hungry. As for the illegal immigrant parents - I could care less about their nourishment! They are supposed to be responsible adults and they've made their choice, but the child shouldn't go hungry because of the the sins of the parent. There is a catch-22 to this though, because I don't support a taxpayer subsidized education for the children of illegal immigrants. So, if they weren't receiving the "free" education, they wouldn't be receiving the "free" meal and my concerns would not be an issue.

Seriously, I don't want to see any child in this country go to bed hungry! That and emergency medical care are about the only concession the illegal immigrants will receive from me.

No hot meals for illegal children for they belong in their own country now,We are now in a war with Mexico with our nation in danger.In war you do not give sympathy to your enemy .Our sympathy should be for all the citizens killed by the illegals.This should not be happening groups of Mexicans crossing the border and kidnapping American citizens.So nothing for illegals unless you want La Raza running this country..

I am against this form of socialism. I do not want children to starve. I also do not want lazy parents to be so irresponsible that they expect the government to do everything, including feeding the children breakfast. We know who pays for it: the taxpayers. I'm not against charity, but I am against the government forcing the people to contribute to charity, like our welfare system. It is a criminal and unconstitutional plan. It puts an undue burden on the citizens of our country. It creates a society of parasites. Churches and other charity organizations should be used for these purposes, not the government.
Jobs are out there for these people to work. They are in the orchards and fields of California and Florida. They are at the meat-packing plants in Texas, Utah, and Colorado. They are at construction sites throughout the country. They are the jobs being stolen by or handed out to the illegal immigrants. Socialism does not work!

Oh right! Most of those kids have all the latest game pads and gadgets including razor phones and ipods...give me a big ole break. Can't afford breakfast? The schools want to make the money off the contracts plain and simple.

These are the same kids who will also wear $100 shoes, but complain when they can't they go on a field trip with other students who have sold things for fund-raisers. These are also the same parents who will show up for soccer game, but can't take a phone call or show up for a parent conference with thier teachers because thier kid is screwing up in class. Parents who do not care about their kids education chaps my ass!!!

We know who pays for it: the taxpayers. I'm not against charity, but I am against the government forcing the people to contribute to charity, like our welfare system.

Agreed! I say let the Catholic Church put their money where their mouth is and subsidize these "free" meals.

Lidia Bustos, a parent, often sits with her three children at Los Ranchitos to make sure they eat everything offered to them. She likes the program because she often doesn't have time to put together a good breakfast. "It's convenient to have breakfast here," she said in Spanish through a translator. "Everything's real healthy."

Puleeze! She doesn't have the time to make her kids breakfast yet somehow she finds the time to sit with them at school making sure they eat everything they're offered? If you ask me, Ms. Bustos sounds more like a lazy freeloading breeder.