Fourth-grader Leilani Watson said it best: “Eating breakfast allows me to stay focused. It’s fuel to help us all have a great day.”
Leilani is a student at Giffen Memorial Elementary School, where breakfast in the cafeteria on Wednesday provided the perfect backdrop for her and school district leaders, policymakers, advocates and elected officials to tout the importance of school breakfast.
The American Dairy Association North East sponsored the event, which was held in conjunction with National School Breakfast Week.
With the hum of students eating breakfast and quietly talking in the background, Superintendent Joseph Hochreiter, Giffen Principal Nicole Newman and School Lunch Director Lisa Perron each discussed different pieces of the City School District of 鶹Ӱ’s school breakfast program, which provides a free healthy breakfast to students in the district’s 18 schools.
Numerous studies clearly document the benefits of school breakfast, Hochreiter said. Students who eat breakfast at school are more focused and alert, do better across all subjects, and have better attendance and fewer behavior problems.
“These aren’t just feel-good statistics,” Hochreiter said. “The ripple effects are astounding when we can remove barriers to learning, and hunger is one of those barriers.”
Hochreiter raised concerns about proposed $12 billion in cuts to federal programs that support school breakfast and lunch programs. He also expressed appreciation to Gov. Kathy Hochul and state lawmakers who vowed that the programs will continue for New York students.
Also on hand for Wednesday’s news conference were state Sen. Michelle Hinchey, Assemblymember Jessica Gonzalez-Rojas and Agriculture and Markets Commissioner Richard Ball. They were joined by representatives from the state Education Department, the advocacy group Hunger Solutions Update and Schuylerville dairy farmer Neil Peck.
Check out a Facebook photo album from the event!
