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U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown
Summer
Nutrition for children
An End to the School Year Doesn’t Have to Mean an End to Good Nutrition
For most Ohio children, the school year is ending and summer has begun.
Summer ought to be a time for our kids to enjoy playing outside,
reading for pleasure, and spending time with family.
But for too many children, summer means an end to nutritious meals
served in schools.
More than 680,000 Ohio children received free or reduced-price school
lunches on an average day during the 2013-2014 school year. Many of
these students do not have access to a nutritious meal when school
cafeterias close for the summer.
That’s where the Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) steps in.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Ohio Department of Education
work together to ensure that every child has enough food to keep
growing and learning after the final school bell rings. They partner
with volunteers and community organizations to run 1,500 SFSP sites
across Ohio. Last year these sites served more than 3.8 million meals.
But right now, too many Ohio families don’t know about this critical
program, and miss out on receiving assistance once school lets out.
Families need to know the end of the school year doesn’t mean an end to
food services for their children.
At approved schools, synagogues, summer camps, churches, community
centers, pools and recreation centers, volunteers and organizers are
ensuring that our children have the healthy food they need to succeed.
And often these sites also offer summer enrichment activities for kids,
in addition to healthy meals. Last week I spoke with Winnie Brewer, who
runs the SFSP sites in Marion County. At the sites Winnie runs, they
partner with the YMCA to offer exercise activities, and run a literacy
program that provides free books to children at their feeding sites.
I was also in Youngstown earlier this month, to get the word out about
the summer food program. I met with Mark Samuel, who operates a site at
the West Side Community Center. Families need to know about these
sites, and the dedicated folks like Mark and Winnie who run them.
Parents can visit the Ohio Department of education’s website,
http://education.ohio.gov, or call 1-866-3-HUNGRY, to find a Summer
Food Service Program site near them. Summer break shouldn’t mean a
break from good nutrition for our children.
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