Children in our schools are going hungry and we do not know it. Hunger affects learning abilities because it slows cerebral function causing difficulty in concentration and academic tasks. Most food assistance programs only provide help to low-income families, but food insecurity extends into the working class as well.
Providing training on signs of hunger can help school personnel mitigate this issue early. The discussion and implementation of federal and community food assistance partnerships will also help reduce the hunger issue in schools.
The Problem
Food insecurity has affected children in working class homes resulting in increased hunger that can lead to the development of physiological, psychological and social issues (Congressional
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It is not unusual to meet someone dealing with food insecurity that is working class, white, married, clothed and housed (McMillian, 2014). Half of those families facing food insecurity in the United States are white and two-thirds of those that have children have at least one adult working a full-time job (McMillian, 2014). Surprisingly, suburban poverty is on the rise. Decreased wages and increased home prices in larger cities have forced the working class to move resulting in a rise of food insecurity in the suburbs (McMillian, …show more content…
These include federal programs such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP, The National School Lunch and National School Breakfast programs as well as The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children or WIC.
Roughly half of those that receive SNAP benefits are under the age of 18 and there are high participation rates in the National School Lunch Program and WIC. It is not uncommon for participants to receive benefits from more than one of these programs (Congressional Digest, 2010). The National School Lunch Program had 31 million participants in 2012, of those 17 million received free lunches and 3 million received lower-cost lunches (Gunderson, 2015). The School Breakfast Program is similarly run, but participation numbers are not as high, due to the limited number of schools that serve breakfast (Gunderson, 2015). Even with steep participation rates, a large percent of qualified children do not take part in school meal programs. This is due to the stigma for receiving assistance, lack of program participation by the school, or the child not eating the meals provided for one reason or another (Gunderson,
Also the websites states the need for plenty of healthy food choices for children instead of cheaper, more calorie-packed alternatives (“Looking for Info?”). This is where federal food programs come into play and can make a difference in children’s lives. Children are dying day after day due to hunger and these food programs can stop that. These federal food programs can keep kids healthy and can make a difference in the future and life they will continue to
Nicholas Kristof is a two-time Pulitzer prizewinning books and “Prudence or Cruelty” was feature in the New York Times in 2013. In “Prudence or Cruelty” it discuss the potential of ridding our society of food stamps to help boost our economy. Children everyday wonder when, not what, their next meal will be. As sad as it sounds, but “5 percent of American households have very low food security” (Kristof 172). This basically means the household can run out of food whenever, and this usually leads to a parent not eating to make sure their kids have enough to eat.
Child hunger in America is not something that you can just sweep under the rug, as well as child hunger in other parts of the world. Many schools have financial aid for lunch for families that live in poverty, meaning that a child may receive lunch free or at a reduced price. This is very beneficial for kids while they are in school but when school is out, those benefits are no longer available to them. “During
Child Hunger “When the AD council convened focus groups not long ago to help prepare a series of public service announcements on child hunger” In the essay “School’s Out for Summer” Anna Quindlen informs us about child hunger in America because, in America people do not believe this happens in our own country but it does. In this essay, Anna Quindlen, used many examples and scenarios to persuade the reader that, in America, child hunger does exist. Some of the first things Anna talks about in this essay is how during the school year kids will always be about to get a lunch and some even a breakfast because, this is what the school provides for the children. And only 3 million kids are getting a summer lunch program.
In short, many people around the United States suffer from food instability and hunger. People can’t always help the situations they are in, but there are things almost everyone can do to help the hunger situation in
Feeding America is a nationwide network of 200 food banks and 60,000 food pantries and meal programs that provides food and services to people each year. Together this network is the nation’s leading domestic hunger-relief organization. Recently, more families and individuals begin to struggle with hunger due to the cost of living increasing and income from employers not being sufficient enough to feed and take care of a family. Price and income shifts can radically impact the poor and hungry.
They are only able to eat at school. “The saddest are the children who cry when we get out early for a snow day because they won’t get a lunch.” Some children that’s the one thing they look forward to be to go to school to be able to get a nice breakfast and a decent lunch to eat, and when school lets out early it leaves kids going without food because they don’t have any food at their home. Kids with empty bellies find it hard to focus, they concentrate more on making it to lunch than on a math or a reading lesson. (Pg.58)
Did you know that 1 in 5 U.S. kids don’t get the food they need every day? This negatively impacts kids’ health and development, but this can also negatively impact them academically as well as emotionally and socially. No Kid Hungry is an organization that is making a difference regarding this problem. No Kid Hungry was founded by Billy Shore and his sister Debbie Shore in 1984. Since then, No Kid Hungry has raised and invested more than $528 million in the fight against hunger, and has won the support of national leaders in business, government, health and education, sports, and entertainment.
In a country that wastes billions of pounds of food each year, it's almost shocking that anyone in America goes hungry. Yet every day, there are millions of children and adults who do not get the meals they need to thrive. We work to get nourishing food – from farmers, manufacturers, and retailers – to people in need. At the same time, we also seek to help the people we serve build a path to a brighter, food-secure future.
She uses examples of how that parents of the children send them to a free summer school program so that’s one or two less meals that the parents have to worry about. There are people out there who see that there is a problem and they are going to find some way to end the hunger of the children today. “Families are struggling in a way they haven’t done for a long time,” say Brian Loring, the executive director of Neighborhood Centers of Johnson County Iowa, that provide free lunches for the summer
Additionally a 2013 study showed in "Applied Economics Perspectives and Policy" found that on an average school day, students who ate school lunch that had more fruits and vegetables than those who did not. School lunches are not nutritious. Recent data shows that while an estimated 30.6 million US students eat school lunches, only 6% of school lunch programs meet the nutritional requirements established by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Although many school across the country are improving what they serve, most are still loaded with fried foods, soda pop and foods that are high in fats and sugars. Department of agriculture works with US government that administers federal programs related to food production and rural life.
In the discussions of food insecurity, one controversial issue has been the prevalent misconception of why people are suffering from obtaining nutritious food on a consistent basis. On one hand, Frank Eltman, a writer for the Business facet of the Huffington post, argues that university students are facing food insecurity due to college expenses exponentially rising within the past decade. On the other hand, Adam Appelhanz, a police officer featured in the documentary “A Place at the Table,” contends that due to budget constraints he has not received a pay raise in the last four years, and is now inevitably utilizing a local food bank in order to ensure that he has something to eat each month. Others even maintain that food insecurity is synonymous
But the sad answer to this question is that it is extremely serious. In the nation, Washington is firmly in the middle of the pack, ranking as the 25th hungriest state. In 2014, about 600,000 people participated in Washington’s Basic Food Program each month and about 38 percent of those receiving basic food were children. This means that 228000 children are suffering from hunger where the state needs to step in to help them. The poverty plays the biggest factor in causing child hunger.
There are a lot of problems in the world like poverty and pollution but hunger seems to be the most severe to me. There are so many different types of people who are famished most of the day just because they are homeless or because of their race. Studies show former foster youth, L.G.B.T. students and students of color are at substantially increased risk. One group of people who are in hunger the most is college students. College alone is so expensive that a lot of students can’t afford to even feed themselves.
According to dosomething.org, one in five American children face hunger. In theory, this means that in my class of 20 kids, roughly four of them face hunger. According to a CNBC article, 42 million Americans suffer from hunger across the nation. This food insecurity as the Federal Government so kindly puts it, exists in every county in America.