United Way plans program to help schools feed more kids

By Sherri Welch
http://www.crainsdetroit.com/article/20100228/SUB01/302289994

The United Way for Southeastern Michigan plans to launch a pilot program in March to embed "food navigators" in school districts in Wayne, Oakland and Macomb counties to make free and reduced-cost meals more accessible to needy students.

The program also hopes to increase the number of students registering for existing programs.

The state of Michigan requires districts with needy students to offer free and reduced-cost lunch programs and to offer breakfast programs if more than 20 percent of students enrolled qualify for the programs.

But no such mandate exists for making after-school snacks, suppers and summer meals available to students, said Bill Sullivan, director of the 2-1-1 health and human services hot line for United Way.

Offering other free meals "is at the will of the school or district. Schools are relying on their own assessment of need and their capacity to provide those programs," he said.

Parents often are unaware of free meal programs, and for some, illiteracy prevents them from filling out applications to enroll their children in the programs.

Union rules and unwillingness among some administrators and teachers to offer free meal programs at the start of the school day, rather than before it, also presents challenges at some schools, Sullivan said.

"Schools ask where they would get money to staff the (free) meals, keep the lights on, or bus the students home," he said.

The money to develop and run free meal programs at schools is reimbursable from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, he said.

"But throwing money at the problem isn't the answer. I think it's about introducing new ways of (schools) doing business," Sullivan said.

Enter the food navigators.

United Way plans to hire four people to serve as food navigators by March and another six by the end of the year, Sullivan said. The navigators will help set up free meal programs at schools that express readiness to put them in place, Sullivan said.

They also will be called on to help willing schools and districts shift their breakfasts to the beginning of the school day, rather than before it, so more children get fed.

"We want to help so that kids who are hungry can be fed. We think the food navigators will help schools achieve this, and by doing so ... permanently (change) the system."About 290,000 children in the tri-county area are eligible and most are receiving free lunch, Sullivan said. But less than a third of them are getting free breakfast.

Research shows that offering breakfast to all students in low-income districts at the beginning of school day decreases tardiness and absenteeism and improves performance, said Madeleine Levin, senior policy analyst at the Food Research and Action Center, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit working with United Way.

According to FRAC, 81.5 percent of schools in Michigan provide a breakfast program.

"But the problem is it's harder for kids to participate in breakfast than in lunch because ... the buses would have to get there on time," Levin said.

There are also other barriers to participation, she said.

"Kids that walk to school in Detroit may want to hang out in the school yard with their friends rather than eating breakfast...What we have been promoting with United Way in Southeastern Michigan is for schools to establish that breakfast program at the beginning of class," for all students, Levin said.

The work is fraught with issues, Levin said.

"Any time you make a change in a school building, there's going to be a little resistance; you're going to have to change the way people do their jobs, such as janitors and the cafeteria folks.

"It takes a little bit of getting used to, but in the end everyone thinks the effort is worth it because kids benefit so much," Levin said.

United Way's food navigator approach is laudable, she said.

"The schools really need help in these tight times. This is a wonderful public-private partnership."

FRAC is also working with United Way to encourage more schools in low-income areas offering after-school snacks, supper and summer meal programs.

"There are other organizations like health departments and YMCA and YWCA that can do the programs in the summer with (fewer) hurdles."

Sherri Welch: (313) 446-1694, swelch@crain.com