Did you sit down and enjoy a leisurely breakfast this morning? Almost 2 million children across Canada were deprived of that comfort and left for school without relief from the nagging feeling of an empty stomach. Hardly imaginable but that is a miserable fact and according to statisticians this number is growing.
According to General Romeo LeBlanc, “When a child’s stomach is empty, everything else is secondary. Before developing a thirst for knowledge and a hunger for learning, one must first satisfy the body’s thirst and hunger.”
This lack of proper nutrition does a great deal of harm to these children both physically and mentally. Simply stated, a child can not properly learn nor grow nor behave properly on an empty stomach. This food deprivation will have a very serious impact on their long-term development and the well being of the society they inherit. Sadly, many of them may likely require more from their society than it will be capable of giving.
This terrible societal deficiency is predicted to have terrible outcomes and has been recognized by some education systems. They have introduced programs referred to as breakfast clubs. With so many students in food-deprived jurisdictions, the learning performance scores began to decline. After the introduction of a patchwork of these breakfast programs, educators were relieved to see these scores improve toward previous levels.
The breakfast program in the Niagara Region is called the National Nutrition Partners (NNP) and was established in 1998. According to that organization’s website (nationalnutritionpartners.ca) they nurture more than 201 school and community based programs, nourishing 24,000 children and youth each day! In Niagara these nutrition programs range from full breakfast and/or lunch and relies on the services of some 1,000 volunteers to complete their mission.
In 2014, the Student Council at Niagara College recognized the same food deficiency at that post secondary level and introduced a free breakfast meal program labelled Rise and Shine. These nutritional head starts to the day were very popular and made available on Tuesday and Thursday mornings throughout the school term. So you can see that the issue affects learners at all levels of the education system.
According to the Breakfast Clubs of Canada’s website (breakfastclubcanada.org) Their mission is to be helping children reach their full potential one breakfast at a time. The benefits of eating a healthy meal at school has been scientifically proven by many in the educational sector.
Thank goodness that breakfast clubs have come to the rescue in these very trying times for many families across the Country. It is to be hoped that the economy will soon improve to the point where families will again be able to enjoy fully self sufficient lifestyles.
Should you be inclined to be of help in some way, use the web address above, or by mail at 14 North Street, P.O. Box 575, St. Catharines, ON, L2R 6W8.
Such generosity will help make Niagara’s 24,000 school-aged children’s day start out right.
