If You Care About Student Attendance and Achievement, You Should Care About School Breakfast
At Oakland Natives Give Back (ONGB), we focus on improving attendance in Oakland public schools. Hunger is one of many barriers to student attendance that can be addressed with a school-based intervention. This post is about the importance of school breakfast programs and the compelling evidence in favor of making schools breakfast available to students after the start of the school day.
When asked about the Fremont High School breakfast program, which allows students to access breakfast foods between classes, Oriana Ides, a Community School Manager, notes that her students “don’t come to school for many reasons, many of them economic” and that having access to breakfast during a passing period is a start to addressing her student’s needs.
Fremont is one of the few schools in Oakland Unified School District to offer free and reduced price breakfast to students after the school day starts. At Fremont High School, 80% of the student body qualifies for free and reduced lunch. In Oakland Unified School District, 71.5% of students qualify for free and reduced lunch.
Statewide, food insecurity impacts an alarming 22.9% of California’s children.
Imagine the experience of attempting to focus while hungry, coupled with the lack of self-knowledge that allows adults to say “I’m just hungry, and when I eat this feeling will pass.” In many schools, food is not allowed in the classroom, and there is no free snack option between classes. Imagine, from the perspective of a child, the irritability, headache, stomach pain and low-level discontent that hunger causes. Imagine going to school without breakfast and being expected to sit still in a chair, pay attention, and follow instructions from around 8:20 until 12:30.
According to a research brief from the Food Research and Action Center, problems with academic achievement as well as behavioral, emotional and mental health are more prevalent among children and adolescents struggling with hunger. The same research brief indicates that students who participate in school breakfast show improved attendance, behavior, and academic performance as well as decreased tardiness.
A recent report from the CDC on the connection between child health and learning confirms that breakfast plays a significant role in student achievement: student participation in the USDA School Breakfast Program (SBP) is associated with higher grades and standardized test scores, reduced absenteeism, and improved cognitive performance.
Unfortunately, data from the 2014–2015 school year indicates that only 38 percent of low-income students in California are accessing school breakfast.
In OUSD, close to 36,000 kids are eligible for free and reduced price breakfast and lunch, but the district only serves an average of 7,745 breakfasts per day. The factor most responsible for that gap is timing — at most OUSD schools, breakfast is served before school starts, and a child has to arrive early enough to finish her breakfast before her first class.
Family income, which determines the price of a child’s school meals, also influences access to transportation and other factors that determine the ease with which a child arrives at school on time — students living in conditions of poverty are those most likely to experience difficulty with tardiness and attendance given factors like transportation and parent work-schedules. Many of the students who most need a subsidized school breakfast are those who face challenges coming to school consistently and on time.
One evidence-based solution to the problem of student breakfast access involves providing school breakfast after the school day starts. Such programs, (collectively called Breakfast After the Bell programs), can take a variety of forms, including: breakfast delivery to classrooms, prepackaged “Grab n’ Go” breakfast distribution via centrally located kiosks, or breakfast service during an extended break between first and second periods.
Given the success of the the Grab n’ Go model at four participating OUSD middle schools, the OUSD Nutrition Services department would like to see the Grab n’ Go model expanded district-wide.
Startup costs for existing OUSD Breakfast After the Bell programs were covered by grants, which schools can obtain in partnership with the Alameda County Community Food Bank and other community entities. In the long term, Breakfast After the Bell programs are completely financially sustainable: the higher breakfast participation rate at participating schools brings increased school meal reimbursement revenue, which covers the increased costs of labor and supplies.
Oakland Natives Give Back recently launched our second Bonta Attendance Challenge, during which we will award a total of $100,000 to three OUSD schools with innovative plans for sustained attendance improvement at their respective school sites. During our most recent technical assistance meeting for grant applicants, we encouraged schools to consider including Breakfast After the Bell proposals in their applications. Applicants who are interested in learning more about Breakfast After the Bell can reach out to us via the “contact” page of our website, oaklandnatives.org.
Oakland Natives Give Back promotes daily school attendance and youth development in pursuit of a future in which 100% of Oakland students graduate from high school.
For more information about Oakland Natives Give Back, please visit: www.oaklandnatives.org
