• Every California public school offers the School Breakfast Program.
• All California students participate in the School Breakfast Program.
• School breakfasts help meet students’ nutritional needs.

Why Focus on Breakfast?

Research proves what parents have said for decades: eating a nutritious breakfast helps kids do well at school and be healthy. Yet the School Breakfast Program – funded by federal, state and local dollars – is severely underutilized. The Breakfast First: Healthy Food for Hungry Minds Campaign aims to capture this missed opportunity.

The Benefits of Breakfast

• Eating school breakfast improves kids’ test scores.
• Offering free breakfast to all students increases school attendance and decreases tardiness and nurses’ office visits.
• Kids who eat school breakfast are nearly twice as likely to meet the “5-A-Day” goal for fruits and vegetables as kids who don’t.

The Need for Action

• More than 1,400 California schools don’t offer the School Breakfast Program, including over 1,000 elementary schools.
• 1.3 million children are eligible for a free or reduced-price breakfast, but don’t participate.
• 200,000 low-income students go to a school that doesn’t offer breakfast.

Campaign Strategies

• Research, including focus groups, to understand what kids, parents and schools think about the School Breakfast Program.
• Parent leadership to strengthen local school breakfast programs.
• Technical assistance to help schools begin or expand a program.
• Identifying and sharing best breakfast practices.
• Statewide policy development and advocacy.