• Texas Hunger Initiative report card aims to help more students enjoy school breakfast

    breakfast-mar14

    In the fight to eliminate hunger throughout the state of Texas, one of the biggest weapons is breakfast — more specifically, breakfast at school for students who might not get it at home.

    As you may have seen in the news over the past week, Baylor University’s Texas Hunger Initiative has released the second edition of its Texas School Breakfast Report Card, a study designed to help administrators and nutrition personnel at school districts across Texas determine how to ensure that more students get their days off to a good start by eating breakfast. Findings show that eating breakfast decreases not only food insecurity, but also “absenteeism and behavioral problems among students, while increasing their potential for learning.”

    To help schools encourage more eligible students to participate in the free and reduced-price National School Breakfast Program, the study provides real numbers for each district, and offers a few suggestions for districts to consider. One suggestion offered by the report is moving the location; breakfast served in the cafeteria can come attached with a stigma, according to the study, whereas serving breakfast in the classrooms (and to everyone) can help overcome social barriers that may keep students from participating.

    You can find the entire 115-page report (including statistics on your area school district) here. The report card is the latest step in the Texas Hunger Initiative’s efforts to eliminate hunger. Working collaboratively with Baylor’s School of Social Work, the Initiative is looking to make current programs that fight hunger more efficient and has already seen millions more breakfasts served to students in just a year’s time.

    Sic ’em, Texas Hunger Initiative!