The district's governing board approved the pilot program at its March 15 meeting.
"I suspect, as other districts have found, that we will find that the five to 10 minutes that it will take the kids to eat [breakfast] will manifest itself in better scores, better attention in class and healthier students," said Larry Teixeira, Selma Unified's assistant superintendent in charge of business and support services.
Starting in April, district administrators and K-6 principals will watch Roosevelt Elementary's food service staff in operation for the final two months of the school year, Teixeira said.
Breakfasts will be delivered to classrooms in coolers and boxes carried on small carts. Teachers and aides will assist the students in opening the simple, prepackaged meals, which will include fruit (bananas, oranges, apples and raisins), fruit bars, yogurt, milk and juices. No pancakes, toast, scrambled eggs or other foods that are greasy, sticky or likely to wind up all over the desks and floor will be served.
Teixeira said he wants staff to work out the kinks in the program before it is taken districtwide in August with the start of the 2005-2006 school year.
Additionally, local staff next week will visit several other districts in Fresno County, taking a look at the way they do their breakfast programs. Teixeira said that modifications could be made in Selma Unified's pilot approach at Roosevelt if better ways to conduct the breakfast program are seen during the visits.
Selma Unified has been serving breakfast for years in its school cafeterias, but "room service" is a totally new concept in the district, Teixeira said.
"The change would be we would take the breakfasts to the classrooms and every student in each class would get a free breakfast," Teixeira said.
Selma Unified will pay the costs to operate the K-6 breakfast program out of its existing cafeteria fund budget, allowing it to get started this spring. He anticipates costs to start the program will be minimal, mostly limited to the carts (or wagons, as Teixeira described them) and coolers, and some additional breakfasts that will have to be prepared.
On a parallel yet separate track, Selma Unified has applied to the California Department of Education's Nutrition Services Division for a state grant that would enable it to buy several specialized vendor carts that would be placed at strategic points on the campuses of Selma High School and Abraham Lincoln Middle School. From these carts, students could pick up a quick, free breakfast before they hustle off to class. This program (for grades 7-12) could be in place in May, if grant funding is approved in April and the carts are immediately ordered, but Teixeira said it might not be able to get going until classes start in August, coinciding with the K-6 program.
Selma Unified's beleaguered food services program, which annually operates in the red by many thousands of dollars, would get a boost if everyone is eating breakfast -- and that sparked increased participation in the lunch program -- because the district gets reimbursed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture for each student who receives a free and reduced-price meal. Student eligibility is based on a family's income qualifications, Teixeira said. The greater the participation, the more money gets reimbursed to the district.
More than 70 percent of Selma Unified's 6,000-plus students are eligible for free or reduced-price meals, though a lesser percentage (between 50 to 60 percent) actually participate in the program sponsored by the USDA.
No student will ever have to identify him or herself as a full-pay participant or as one who pays little or nothing at all.
"We cannot use something that identifies a student who is eligible for free or reduced-price meals, like a chip or a ticket, because it is against the law," Teixeira said.
The district keeps detailed records of students who are full-pay meal eaters and those who are eligible for free or reduced-priced meals. Since everyone will get to eat breakfast -- and no student's payment status will be outwardly obvious -- Teixeira said the stigma of receiving a free meal while other students must pay will be reduced or eliminated. Additionally, if more full-pay students participate, even more income will be generated, he said. The district gets a small amount of reimbursement from the USDA when it serves a full-pay student to help offset the costs to prepare those meals.
Students in grades 7-12 will be able to eat -- breakfast or lunch -- without disclosing their payment status, by simply passing their ID cards through a scanner as they grab a meal. Everyone gets scanned, and the computer separates out those who are full-pay from those who are free or reduced-price, Teixeira said. Only the computer and those who operate the system know who is paying and who isn't.
"Nobody pays anything [at the cash register], they just swipe their cards and everybody looks the same," Teixeira said.
Increased participation at the high school and middle school is essential, Teixeira said, because that is where the most income can be generated through reimbursement of free and reduced-price meals and full-pay purchases.
"They [high school and middle school students] may respond more if they can walk by a cart, swipe their card through the electronic reader, grab a bag and take off to class, or if they are early enough, sit there on the quad and eat while talking with their friends before class," Teixeira said.
Currently, Selma High serves meals in the cafeteria and at the snack bar, as does ALMS. Carts would be placed around the campuses so they are accessible to students arriving from different parts of town. Teixeira said that by using all three food service systems, it will make getting something to eat more efficient and less time consuming.
"We are hoping that by spreading our points of sale around the campuses, we will be able to serve them quicker and everyone will have time to eat," he said.
Teixeira said Roosevelt Elementary's teachers will have a considerable say when it comes to extending the breakfast program past this spring.
"If the teachers decide that this [serving and eating in the classroom] takes too much time away from the instructional process, then we will take a serious look at it and either change it or discontinue it," he said.
Another factor that might determine how far the K-12 breakfast programs go will be staffing. Some additional staff might be needed at the high school and at ALMS to handle the carts, or the hours of those now employed in food service might have to be extended, Teixeira said. He said an evaluation of staffing needs is underway but no determinations have been made to hire or expand workloads.
Annemarie Summers, president of Selma Chapter 231 of the California School Employees Association, urged Teixeira and the district's governing trustees to make certain enough staff is provided.
"I want to make sure our district is supporting the manpower issue," said the classified staff's leader. "If we need more manpower, they need to provide it, because I don't want it to impact our current staff. They are already impacted enough as it is."
Eating and Learning
n Selma High School currently serves breakfast to about 10 percent of its students.
n Abraham Lincoln Middle School currently serves breakfast to about 13 percent of its students.
n The objective of the "Grab-and-Go" outdoor breakfast program -- served from specialized vendor carts -- is to increase participation on both campuses. The point-of-sale carts would make getting a breakfast more convenient and faster, and would remove the stigma having to go into the cafeteria to get a free or reduced-price meal.
This reporter can be reached at
tkibler@pulitzer.net.
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