More Students Are Starting Their Day With Breakfast At School

Main Category: Nutrition / Diet
Article Date: 05 Mar 2008 - 2:00 PDT

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ARAMARK, a leading provider of food and nutrition services to more than 400 school districts nationwide, announced that it has seen significant growth in the number of students eating breakfast at school. Since the company introduced its AMP Up! With Breakfast program last year, ARAMARK is now serving breakfast every day to over 400,000 students nationwide. ARAMARK is celebrating "National School Breakfast Week" from March 3 - 7, 2008 by continuing to raise awareness about the importance of eating breakfast.

While the benefits of breakfast and good nutrition are well documented, studies have shown that an alarming number of school age children do not eat breakfast each morning. According to the American Dietetic Association, more than 40 percent of girls and 32 percent of boys skip breakfast on a regular basis. A recent study conducted by Harvard University and Massachusetts General Hospital found that children who ate breakfast in school had fewer absences, higher math grades, and fewer incidences of problems like depression, anxiety, and hyperactivity.

"All schools, private or public, are eligible to receive federal funds for every breakfast served. Unfortunately, the funds are significantly underutilized," said Dennis Maple, president, ARAMARK Education. "We are dedicated to working with our school district partners to ensure breakfast is served every morning to students. In fact, many of partners have seen an increase in student attendance and classroom performance after they started offering breakfast at school."

ARAMARK's AMP Up! With Breakfast program offers easy-to-implement breakfast delivery options for classrooms, cafeterias and/or portable stations, with a focus on convenience. It features over 400 grab and go products to build a new breakfast program menu or enhance existing breakfast offerings. Students are enjoying great-tasting, morning favorites, such as fruits, wholesome hot foods, cereals, breakfast snacks, yogurt, smoothies and juice beverages. In honor of this year's National School Breakfast Week theme, "School Breakfast: Fuel Your Imagination," ARAMARK has developed customized educational tools, posters, banners, letters to parents, advertisements in school papers, public address announcements, and graphics to communicate the importance of eating a well-balanced breakfast.

Following are a few examples of how ARAMARK-managed school districts are getting students excited about eating breakfast:

Decatur Public Schools (IL) recently held a Breakfast Promotion Competition where High School students developed Breakfast Commercials focusing on the importance of eating breakfast. The Superintendent and the Student Advisory Council judged the entries and the winning entry will be announced during National School Breakfast Week. The winners will be awarded a $2,000 scholarship and winning commercials will air on local radio and television stations.

- The Pflugerville Independent School District (TX) has seen its breakfast participation triple over the course of a year because it started serving breakfast in the classroom.

- At Berwyn School District (IL) a "Breakfast Bingo" game was developed to increase breakfast participation. Students received a Bingo card from the breakfast server and every day would answer questions, with a corresponding Bingo number, which were posted in the breakfast line. The more days the students ate breakfast, the more chances they had to win.

- Spike®, ARAMARK's nutrition mascot, is visiting various school districts to encourage elementary students to eat right and exercise, and to start the day with a healthy breakfast.

About ARAMARK Education

ARAMARK Education provides a complete range of food, facility, uniform and other support services to more than 500 K-12 school districts in the U.S. It offers public and private education institutions a family of dining and facility services including: on-site and off-site breakfast and lunch meal programs, after-school snacks, catering, nutrition education, retail design and operations, maintenance, custodial, grounds, energy management, construction management, and building commissioning. For more information on ARAMARK's K-12 food service programs, please visit http://www.aramarkschools.com.

About ARAMARK

ARAMARK is a leader in professional services, providing award-winning food services, facilities management, and uniform and career apparel to health care institutions, universities and school districts, stadiums and arenas, and businesses around the world. In FORTUNE magazine's list of "America's Most Admired Companies," ARAMARK has consistently ranked as one of the top three most admired companies in its industry and also ranked first in its industry in the 2007 FORTUNE 500 survey. ARAMARK seeks to responsibly address issues that matter to its clients, customers, employees and communities by focusing on employee advocacy, environmental stewardship, health and wellness, and community involvement. Headquartered in Philadelphia, ARAMARK has approximately 250,000 employees serving clients in 19 countries. Learn more at the company's Web site, http://www.aramark.com.