School leaders, advocates talk food insecurity
Feb. 22—A panel of school leaders and advocates gave their thoughts Wednesday on child hunger in Kern County in a brainstorming session over breakfast provided by Kern's Superintendent of Schools.
According to 2020 data by Feeding America, more than 20 percent of Kern County schoolchildren — approximately 54,000 kids — experience food insecurity and more than 84 percent qualify for subsidized meals.
The breakfast, according to Program Manager Clinton Mungary from the nonprofit No Kid Hungry California, was to corral its partners into a single room and share ideas on how to reverse that course, which they all said was highlighted during the pandemic.
"We're here today to have a conversation with some of our partners and hear about the work that they're doing in the community to end child hunger and the innovative solutions they are implementing," Mungary said.
No Kid Hungry, a campaign run by the parent nonprofit Share Our Strength, provides grant funding for everything related to school meals, from meal carts to refrigerators and delivery trucks. It has provided vans and kitchen equipment to the Boys and Girls Clubs of Kern County's Armstrong Youth Center on Niles Street, where the breakfast was held.
Chelsea Dow, nutrition coordinator with Boys and Girls Clubs of Kern County, began the panel discussion by talking about the club's success with grab-and-go meals, which they expanded during COVID. The BGC of Kern provides 4,000 free meals to kids across the county on a daily basis, including areas such as Frazier Park and Tejon.
"Being able to have those grab-and-go meals where the kids can grab them, take them back home, eat them in the safety of their house or with their parents has been tremendous," Dow said.
Kern County and Bakersfield's school districts, especially since COVID, have provided meals to students outside the normal school hours, including the summer.
After classrooms closed or went hybrid during the pandemic, schools continued to serve meals in grab-and-go lines at parks, county libraries and along bus routes.
"I cannot emphasize the importance of making after-school programs and meals available beyond the school day," said Rafael Juarez, director of the Kern County Superintendent of Schools Nutrition Services Department. "There's a lot of our children that get out of school at 2:45 to 3 p.m. and where do they go — parents are still working."
Juarez said that home-cooked meals are not only cheaper than packaged foods; they are also more appealing to kids. He and Dow, both of whom have culinary backgrounds, want kids to "get back to what a meal should look like," which is "outside of the package."
"Outside the stuff you get through the drive-thru, not because all of that has to be eliminated but because we have to incorporate more wholesome and fresh (ingredients)," Juarez said. "And provide education on why it's good for them."
Also on the panel was Ashley De La Rosa, the education policy director with the Dolores Huerta Foundation. De La Rosa explained that the foundation has long been a mediator between school districts and families, especially during the pandemic.
"The foundation is really an entrusted community messenger," De La Rosa said. "Parents and students come to us when they see a challenge because they're looking for tools to create opportunities for themselves."
De La Rosa said that it is important going forward to find new ways to include some of the most vulnerable families in the conversation. Many working parents are not able to attend city council or school board meetings due to long working hours and little free time.
"A lot of parents didn't know how to use Zoom, so we would be (with them) on conference calls," De La Rosa said. "And we would merge the calls together to get people set up with school administrators so they can share their concerns."
Even before the pandemic, food insecurity has been entangled with associated challenges such as unaffordable housing, unemployment, healthcare costs and unreliable transportation, all of which still affect Kern residents. Panelists agreed that this issue does not exist in a vacuum.
"We have to find creative ways of making meals more affordable," Juarez said.
The Boys and Girls Clubs of Kern County will host a "Career Launch" summer jobs fair for Bakersfield teens on Feb. 28. Those interested can visit https://www.bgclubsofkerncounty.org/summerjobsprogram. Registration runs through the day of the jobs fair.
For more information on child food insecurity, call 661-325-3730 or visit https://www.bgclubsofkerncounty.org/nutritionprogram.
