How School Backpack Programs Help Alleviate Hunger in America

As Americans, we live in one of the richest nations on the planet, and yet 1 in 5 children struggles with hunger. We live in a country that's mastered innovation -- we were able to send a rolling robot to Mars and communicate with it from 250 million miles away -- and yet 15 million children in our own backyard live in food insecure households. Government officials are engaged in a "school food fight" over whether to gut existing regulations that limit junk food in schools and ensure hungry kids can get free meals. As a society, we often turn a blind eye to childhood poverty and hunger. We may be generally aware of these issues, but most of us never see what it does to children.

Hunger is a huge health problem in the U.S., and researchers and advocates tell us the impact goes well beyond a child's stomach. Childhood hunger affects a student's health, academic performance and behavior. Hungry children cannot learn as much, as fast or as well. They don't perform as well in school, because they are not well-prepared and cannot concentrate. Malnutrition can have a detrimental impact on a child's ability to grasp basic skills and diminishes concentration and overall learning potential. In addition, hunger can result in behavioral issues -- it can increase absences, tardiness and disciplinary actions -- and it's also associated with a higher risk of suspension among older students.

Taken together, the effects of childhood hunger increase the achievement and life expectancy gaps separating some low-income children from their peers, making this the social issue of our time.

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There are numerous organizations working on hunger-related issues, including Share Our Strength, Feeding America, Stop Hunger Now, U.S. governmental programs such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, and Women, Infants, and Children, or WIC, as well as food banks, faith-based organizations and local nongovernmental organizations.

In Boulder Valley School District in Colorado, we implemented a public/private partnership that works toward alleviating hunger for our most at-risk students and their families. Our program takes a two-pronged approach: We serve our preschool students breakfast and/or lunch during the school day, and we send them home with food for the weekend, which is also known as a "backpack" or "bag" program.

Our school district partnered with local food bank Community Food Share, the YMCA of Boulder Valley and local philanthropist Gordon Gamm to implement our backpack program. Currently running in four schools, this program prepares and delivers bags to approximately 250 children and their families every week. Our collaboration is not the first to implement a backpack program, but ours has some unique components. First of all, our school district administers the program. We work with Community Food Share on food procurement, with the YMCA on fundraising and distribution, and with all of the departments in the school district to procure, store, pack and distribute the bags.

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Additionally, where most backpack programs offer highly processed, shelf-stable foods only, fresh fruit and vegetables comprise at least 50 percent of the food our program provides -- and much of that produce is procured from local farmers. The shelf-stable products that are included in the bags meet the district's rigorous food and snack guidelines, so they're free of chemicals, dyes, high fructose corn syrup and the like.

To further support the students and families, our bags include "Harvest of the Month" cards that showcase the local produce and recipes to assist the families in utilizing the fresh food in their weekend meals. The inclusion of a high percentage of fresh food makes our program unique, and the "Harvest of the Month" cards and recipes help to support families cooking and eating together. On the first day of the program, one preschool parent sent us a picture in which she and her child were cooking dinner together. Not only was it too cute, but it was exactly the type of healthy food interaction that we hoped to instill.

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Our backpack program is a success and we want to see it replicated in communities all across America. There are hungry children in every state, county and city in our country, and we believe that with public/private partnerships at a local level, we can help these food insecure children live long, healthy and active lives. With programs like these, we can begin to close both the achievement and life expectancy gap, and perhaps start to reform our food system as well. It should be a birthright in our country that every child has healthy food every day, and that no child is ever hungry. As we work together to make this a priority, backpack programs can and should be part of the solution.

Chef Ann Cooper is a celebrated author, chef, educator and enduring advocate for better food for all children. A graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, Ann has been a chef for more than 30 years, over 15 of those in school food programs. She currently serves as the director of nutrition services for the Boulder Valley School District. Known as the Renegade Lunch Lady, Ann has been honored by The National Resources Defense Council, selected as a Kellogg Food and Society Policy Fellow and awarded an honorary doctorate from SUNY Cobleskill for her work on sustainable agriculture. In 2009, Ann founded the nonprofit Chef Ann Foundation to focus on solutions to the school food crisis. CAF's pivotal project is The Lunch Box -- a web portal that provides free and accessible tools, recipes and community connections to support school food reform.