March 6–10 is National School Breakfast Week, a weeklong celebration recognizing the critical role school breakfast plays in students’ health and learning. Research shows that school breakfast improves children’s nutrition, attendance, behavior, and academic performance; however, far too many students still miss this vital morning meal.
William Lucy is the former International Secretary of Treasurer of the American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and one of the co-founders of the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists. Lucy retired 10 years ago and is currently on the Board of Directors of the NAACP.
In the following interview, Lucy discusses the impact of the 1968 I am A Man Campaign, where sanitation workers went on strike in Memphis, Tennessee. Lucy was a labor leader for this strike.
In celebration of Black History Month, Lucy was interviewed by Michael J. Wilson, director of Maryland Hunger Solutions.
When the COVID-19 pandemic spread across America, school food service workers brought their mission to the forefront of America’s attention, reminding the nation of the importance of the child nutrition programs. With school buildings closed, before masks or social distancing, months before a vaccine was available, school nutrition professionals came out of their kitchens to serve their community. Baltimore City Public Schools (BCPS), in collaboration with the Baltimore Museum of Industry, has recognized that heroic effort and the work cafeteria professionals do daily in their current exhibition “Food For Thought: Spotlighting Food Service Workers at Baltimore City Public Schools”.
Emergency Allotments will end in D.C. on February 28. This comes at a time when many families are still trying to recover from the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and are now seeing unprecedented inflation at the grocery store. These factors will lead to what many call a “hunger cliff,” where households are seeing a large decrease in benefits that makes it more difficult to put food on the table. This will worsen the hardship that many are already facing, widen racial disparities in food access and food insecurity, and increase food insecurity in households with children. The loss of SNAP EAs also will negatively impact our economy.
For 2.5 million children around the U.S., grandparents, other relatives, or close family friends show an ultimate form of love each day by stepping up to raise these children when their parents are unable to do so. These families, known as grandfamilies or kinship families, provide needed stability, connection, and care.
Many grandfamilies face struggles with the sudden expansion of the household. Grandparents and other caregivers may be on a fixed income, have to move from older adult housing to more expensive housing that allows children, or have other circumstances that make it difficult to put food on the table. A quarter of grandparent-headed households reported experiencing food insecurity, according to a Food Research & Action Center (FRAC) analysis conducted for Generations United.
