Expanding Breakfast Participation in the School District of Philadelphia

• In Event: 28.089 - MTCC Roundtable Session 10
  In Roundtable Session: 28.089-7 - Social Policies and Their Impact on Students and Schools

Abstract

School breakfast programs are among the most important antipoverty policies in the United States, perhaps even improving attendance and achievement. This paper is the first stage of a larger mixed methods project examining the role of school breakfast generally, and the implementation of specific breakfast initiatives. Using school district administrative data, we compare monthly participation rates by breakfast model and initiative for 214 schools. Consistent with the literature, we find that the “Breakfast in the Classroom” model shows significantly higher participation rates compared to traditional cafeteria service, and even higher rates for schools targeted by both Food Services and community partner support. However, preliminary analysis of attendance data show mixed results. More detailed and contextualized analyses are needed.

Authors

• Catherine Tkatch, School District of Philadelphia

• Erin Cassar, School District of Philadelphia

• Ebru Erdem-Akcay, School District of Philadelphia