With Classroom Breakfasts, a Concern That Some Children Eat Twice

Statism and corrupt parents = fat kids.

It is an innovative, intuitive and increasingly common way to ensure that food reaches the mouths of hungry children from low-income families: give out free breakfast in the classroom at the start of each school day.

The results, seen at urban districts across the country, are striking. Without the stigma of a trip to the cafeteria, the number of students in Newark who eat breakfast in school has tripled. Absenteeism has fallen in Los Angeles, and officials in Chicago say children from low-income families are eating healthier meals, more often.

But New York City, a leader in public health reform, has balked at expanding the approach in its own schools, and City Hall is citing a surprising concern: that all those classroom Cheerios and cheese sticks could lead to more obesity.

Some children, it turns out, may be double-dipping.

The city’s health department hit the pause button after a study found that the Breakfast in the Classroom program, now used in 381 of the city’s 1,750 schools, was problematic because some children might be “inadvertently taking in excess calories by eating in multiple locations” — in other words, having a meal at home, or snacking on the way to school, then eating again in school.

Very likely, especially since a huge percentage of the so-called impoverished are not.