Help Yourself and Your NYC Public School...By Eating Breakfast?

A study performed by the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) shows that out of a group of 23 large American cities, New York City is in second-to-last place when it comes to the amount of students who utilize the public schools' free breakfast programs, even though they are available to all students, regardless of their families' income. A meager 29% of kids who get free lunch also get free breakfast.

Any NYC public school student knows that getting ready in the morning can be very chaotic, with barely enough time to grab notebooks and a backpack and scramble out the door, let alone to sit down to a satisfying meal. Granted, more students would probably eat breakfast if school didn't start so obscenely early. However, these free breakfast programs are a major convenience of NYC public schools and students should take advantage of them, not only to ward off the annoying feeling of being extremely hungry by 10 AM, but also because the government gives NYC money for every free or lower-priced breakfast served.

Now, isn't it a good thing if we have more federal funding? Think of all the wonderful places we could press for this money to go. Think of all the schools that need more desks, more textbooks, more teachers, more resources in general. Makes breakfast seem just a little more important, doesn't it?