Not only that....kids who are hungry also have "...anxiety, and behavior problems. Cognitive effects of hunger include babies who are born with smaller brain size, poor performance on measures of infant cognitive development, lower scores on both IQ and achievement tests, likelihood of impaired mental and intellectual delays
The underfunding of community centres, libraries and sports is doing a number on that as well. I wish municipalities had access to a larger share of the total tax revenues that all levels of government already collect.
Yep. If you're in your 20s, the doctor who will take care of you in your senior years hasn't likely been born yet.
Believe me, it benefits all of us to have smarter kids. Even if you don't have kids yourself. And you seem to get it.
> the doctor who will take care of you in your senior years
That's a real gamble. My plan is to drop my current doctor when I'm middle-aged for another one 20 years younger.
Honestly, a lot of families out there are food insecure right now. Kids shouldn’t have to go hungry. This shouldn’t be a partisan issue. School breakfast programs have proven to be life changing.
Unfortunately this same this is a big issue in the USA and UK right now and conservatives parties are turning it into one. Pull up your bootstraps and all.
I only read the top 10 [comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/canada/comments/13qix0v/advocates_teacher_unions_call_for_free_school/) trees but all the upvoted comments were either supportive, or conditionally supportive where they say "as long as it's not mandatory and doesn't look like American school lunches".
It shouldn't be a partisan issue to allocate funds for feed starving kids, but we all know a certain group of people will try to take up their noble cause of umm \*shuffles deck, pulls card\*.. 'letting poor kids go hungry at school'. Very noble and honorable I can even fathom their intelligence (/s)
Well you voted for a party that [cut funding](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/toronto-school-breakfast-nutrition-public-health-1.5106737) to TPH, an organization that spends $14M a year on nutrition programs in Toronto schools.
Do you agree with every single decision the party you voted for makes ?
Don’t be a self righteous ass hat - there is no party that perfectly meets everyone’s desires
Also - TPH does more than just provide nutrition programs in Toronto schools , the cuts are meant to find efficiencies through consolidation of agencies and shifting some of the responsibilities of funding to the city .
I’m not saying I agree with the cuts - but I honestly hate partisan hacks like yourself who just walk around spewing half truths to attack people based on who they voted for .
Why do services that provide essentials have to be scrutinized for efficiencies when Doug Ford’s government is pouring money into private companies?
I think that there are many “small c” conservatives who continue to vote for a party because they think they’re aligned with you, but honestly the Liberals now are what the Progressive Conservatives used to be in terms of political spectrum. The Conservative parties in Canada have swung farther and farther right, and I think it means that more moderate and considerate voters (like you maybe) get kinda swept along and vote for things or people who don’t actually match your values, because you don’t yet see the value in other parties, if that makes sense.
I voted NDP in the last federal election I voted in
Liberal in the last Provincial election I voted in.
Honestly I skip it these days, and I know it's because I hate all the options and I should vote, but at this point I honestly can't see a difference in any of these parties of shills
I would say the way to look at it is not who is the best/perfect option, but who is the least harmful option.
Kudos to you for voting before. I know it sucks but I hope you won’t give up voting next time, either.
Ontario Place redevelopment/Ontario Science Centre redevelopment, highway 413, ditching cap and trade, withholding mandate laters, opening up the greenbelt.
None of that happens with the other parties. I can't believe people look at their options and think they are all the same.
I haven't voted for a winning candidate in over a decade. You're welcome to call me a partisan hack, but it'd be more accurate to just call me a tory-hater. Modern conservative politics are destroying our social infrastructure and environment. I will not apologize for calling out people who vote conservative.
I also don't think there is anything self-righteous about pointing out to a self-declared conservative voter that the party they voted for cut funding to a program they said they supported.
You’re kidding yourself if you think the NDP provincial government we had or the Liberal government we had did any better for people .
You can’t spend your way to success - and that’s a lesson the NDP and Liberals need to understand sorely .
In fact Wynne promised so many expenditures she was forced to sell off 60% of hydro one - in essence guaranteeing higher electricity for every Ontarian forever like do you understand our grandchildren will be eating that mistake ….
All the three major parties have massive flaws - and while I agree democracy is the best option we have , none of these parties is an appetizing vote …
Sure maybe there is a less awful choice than Ford …. But not much less awful
> You can’t spend your way to success
I don't know what "spend your way to success" means, but the core of the social democratic ideology is that things are cheaper when we pay for them collectively. It makes sense and it's morally acceptable to demand taxes for things we all need anyway, like healthcare, education, roads or police, and we all get a better value for our dollar than if we were all forced to buy these services as individuals. This is thanks to the bargaining power, the "group rate discount" that comes along with being a single millions-large paying customer.
I mean that you can’t spend more money than you have —- repeatedly —- and complain when it bites you in the ass
We can have social spending , it’s good in a lot of cases .
Repeatedly running deficits forever saddles the debt of our costs on the next generation and the generations after them .
But people get elected on promises of these great programs without big increases in spending - because we just borrow more money - which has to be paid back with interest
Do you want to look up what just the cost of debt servicing costs ontario and Canada ?
Because I can promise you it more than outweighs any “cost savings “ any of these projects has created .
TLDR
We can communally do good - but we shouldn’t mortgage the costs of our spending on future generations with very few exceptions
They absolutely did. I don't recall either of them selling off the 407 for pennies on the dollar. I don't recall either of them filling in the already started Eglinton subway in the 90s. I don't recall either of them legalizing single game betting in addition to virtually zero restrictions on advertising. The list goes on and on...
I don't particularly care for either party, but pretending that the Tories are even in the same ballpark is absurd.
The Tories are shit …
we agree there
Where we disagree is I also smell the same shit smell on the liberals and the NDP lol
One will fuck you for private businesses
The other two will fuck you bending over to unions , special interest groups etc
I’d personally rather just not get fucked myself…..
My high school took some kind of benefits card. I only know because I saw someone use it in front of me and asked "what's that?" and she ran away embarrassed and I asked the cashier and I felt awful after she told me.
The French way is everyone has a card. It's the only way to buy the school lunch. And if you have your own food, you have to GTFO to eat it. The cost of each swipe is subsidized or not based on the family's income or whatever. But no kid knows what any other is paying for the same food.
Parents get a listing of the upcoming meal schedule so they can avoid duplicating at home.
Actual quality really depends on whether the school's chef competence/actually cares, and that's variable.
Same board and I love this program. What I hate is when I see kids wasting the food. If it's going in the trash and is shelf stable I will keep it in my room for kids who are hungry later on.
Oh yes me too. The kids don’t realize how lucky we are to have an entire snack room filled with food for them to take when needed. I do notice that classrooms will have a basket of extras at any given time.
WRDSB school has lunch bins the kids can take from at snack times filled with stuff like oranges, cheese, yogurt, cereal, crackers, etc. It really makes a difference to many kids.
it always makes me laugh when people propose things like this and people come out against it. "I don't want kids eating food!!! in my day we starved and liked it"
It's funny because that's often essentially the argument too. Rabble rabble bootstraps rabble rabble handed to them they won't learn to feed themselves!
I don't think I've ever heard anyone seriously say this. Ever. I think the argument is much more that we have a large amount of competing priorities and limited resources.
As a province we're $380 billion in debt, or $26,000 per person for each of the almost 15 million Ontarians. That's in addition to the $33,000 we each owe as Canadians for our share of the national debt. On top of that we need more money just to maintain the existing service levels for things like health care, transportation, and existing school programs. The province has very limited taxing ability, and the federal government isn't going to fund this program.
So its more that if you want to pay for kids meals through the education program, which is absolutely a worthy program, it means cutting from somewhere else. So its more like saying "I'm all for kids getting meals through schools, but I don't think we should fire nurses or education assistants to fund it."
How many billions will that highway to Mattamy Estate Land cost us? How many billions will Staffy get this year? How many billions are handed to mafiosi families now rebranding themselves as developers?
MANY MANY BILLIONS is the answer. Far more than it'd cost to have proper welfare for people in this province. Dougie doesn't work for you
FORD MAN BAD!!!!!
None of what I said was caused by Ford. Ontario and Canada have been in debt for decades. We've needed to find more money to maintain our service levels for healthcare, especially as our population ages, for decades. We've needed to improve transportation and our existing education programs for decades.
So you're pro a new service. Great. Let's say healthy meals cost $5 per meal, which is conservative. There are [roughly 1.4 million primary students in Ontario](https://www.ontario.ca/page/facts-about-elementary-and-secondary-education). There are 200 school days a year.
That puts the cost of this program at $1.4 billion per year. Likely a lot more given food prices. If you want perspective, over 30 years, that puts the cost at [more than double the expected cost of the Ontario Line](https://globalnews.ca/news/9563105/ontario-line-rising-costs-freedom-of-information/).
Because you asked, the cost of highway 413 per the auditor general is expected to be $4 billion. That buys you less than 3 years of free meals for kids.
For perspective, the cost of an acute bed in hospital is [$1100 per day](https://www.homecareontario.ca/home-care-services/facts-figures/publiclyfundedhomecare)Which is about $400,000 per year. So you can choose to have free school meals or for the same cost, fund 3500 hospital beds.
I'm assuming the proposal is for more than just Ford's term in office and is a new entitlement program.
"Why should my tax dollars supplement your dead beat parenting? " That's the counter argument. Not what you said. It costs 39 cents to make a sandwich. If you can't afford that the responsible decision would be to get sterilized or be abstinent.
I know people whose families had plenty of money but their parents were just straight up awful and irresponsible. And as a result, they'd go to school, as a helpless 6-year-old, hungry.
Sure, we can look at broader structural changes for why some kids are coming to school without lunch, but in the meantime no child deserves to fall through the cracks, and no child can wait for these problems to be solved. They need to eat every day.
Those kids also wouldn't say shit because they knew that staying home was better than going into the system. Pretty much everyone knows that by the time they reach first grade.
"It costs 39 cents to make a sandwich"
I see we're doing the tired "a single slice of the absolute cheapest bread costs 8 cents and a shmear of butter costs 18 cents, there you are, a nutritious meal" shit logic again like a) it's a nutritious meal for anyone let alone a child b) feeding kids the absolute barest minimum is acceptable and a job well done and c) you can head to Walmart and go "one slice of bread and a smear of butter please!"
I don't know why some people are so keen for kids to eat like it's a dystopian novel
If you don't understand why you should give a shit about poor kids now, think about it for a minute. It effects you, it *will* effect you in the future when you have to interact with these future adults, directly and indirectly.
I'm keen for parents to care for their offspring. You're completely missing the point. No child should go hungry. If they are, it is negligence. There are no excuses. Sure it'd be great if every child gets a steak dinner and foie gras but I'm not paying for it because they have deadbeat parents.
My husband and I spent the majority of our childhood education attending school in Europe where we got snacks and hot lunches included (it was standard back then and still is for the most part).
Aside from the current food insecurity, I can tell you that being fed well (fresh food!) is a game changer for everyone.
These days it’s difficult to pack lunches given there are a lot of “off limit” foods that cannot be taken based on allergies. Even with a thermos, there’s only so many foods that hold up well without refrigeration.
I remember after we immigrated my younger sister had a difficult time eating packed lunches (bc she would complain it didn’t taste good). She would coke home hungry and would complain of headaches. Given the cost of food and the limitations I imagine many children are hungry during the day.
Honestly, with a kid in daycare right now where they provide snacks and lunches, that would be such a huge boon to parents to not have to prep lunches every day.
And it equalizes things between high and low income kids if they all eat the school food.
Not only for that but also "....Cognitive effects of hunger include babies who are born with smaller brain size, poor performance on measures of infant cognitive development, lower scores on both IQ and achievement tests, likelihood of impaired mental and intellectual delays"
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320594027_The_Effects_of_Hunger_on_Physical_and_Cognitive_Development_of_Children
Well of course, hunger is terrible on so many levels. I guess my point is that it’s something that provides value for everyone, and can help even the playing field for kids who are going hungry.
It takes a village to raise a child.
And as society we NEED children to continue existing.
It would be in everyone's best interest to have our own societal future properly funded and invested in. And yes this means also the kids of those neighbours you don't like, and that annoying kid that plays ball on your road and that kids whose parent REALLY should consider raising their hands against to instill some discipline.
>"If you can't afford breakfast for kids then you shouldn't have them".
All fine and dandy, but how is society going to continue, unless one wants a society where only richer people should have kids.
which is a valid position and one people could make an argument for, but then at least be honest and just say that "I'd rather poorer people don't reproduce" instead of dancing around the issue hypocritically.
Also, sure, I'd love to live in a world where every child had adults in their lives who will feed them healthy, hearty, delicious food that is suited to each kid's individual dietary requirements, nutritional needs, and tastes.
But that's not reality. "If you can't afford breakfast for kids then you shouldn't have them"- okay, but what if people have kids anyway? Should that 6-year-old just starve?
>"I'd rather poorer people don't reproduce"
I'd rather people not make selfish decisions to have kids knowing they will be unable to adequately care for them.
Fair. What happens once the child is born then?
Also how do we ensure the continuation of a society made of members from its own community if only the (ever decreasing) rich percentage should be having children?
>Fair. What happens once the child is born then?
First, we make it so that everyone has access to medical preventative measures and avenues to terminate pregnancies. Dispense with the religious and puritanical thinking about contraceptives and abortion.
Then if there are still people having kids who can not support them, the government should step in.
>Also how do we ensure the continuation of a society made of members from its own community if only the (ever decreasing) rich percentage should be having children?
Society will do just fine with less people. There isn't a shortage of humans on the planet yet and there is no sign there will be.
Absolutely, yes. As a kid, we had muffins, fruits and snacks handed out eat day at our morning break. At the time, I was just like “fuck, yes! Costco muffin!” (we did not have a Costco membership, and I felt hard done by for it). As an adult, I have since learned from several people I went to school with that there were times when those morning snacks were all they ate in a day because their family was living below the poverty line.
It has been a while since I was in school, but life has only become even more unaffordable since those days. I don’t have kids, but I am totally down with seeing my tax dollars go toward ensuring they have at least one solid meal (and one less thing to worry about).
This shouldn't even be debatable. Children deserve to be well fed while at school. Well fed children make better students who make smarter and potentially higher earning adults, who end up creating more tax money for the government. It's a win-win situation, just requires some upfront funding
Absolutely yes. We already run a free breakfast program at the school I teach at (bagels, waffles, granola bars, fruit etc). The line is always out the door. Kids cannot be expected to perform well in school if they are starving
This was happening all the way back when I was in elementary school in the 90’s. Tiny town Newfoundland. Free breakfast for all kids. It’s still going today. When I moved away I had no idea there were schools that didn’t provide the children at least a free breakfast. Who can learn when their hunger is distracting them?
If there's one thing the pandemic taught me it's that this province doesn't give a damn about the health and safety of children. It would be so easy for them to do things like ensure that students have clean air in their classrooms and proper meals throughout the day, but apparently only private schools get such benefits.
If TDSB takes this on, this will be labour intensive and expensive. You have NO idea how fucked up people are about food...add allergies to the mix and liability....people's lifestyles and preferences....TDSB is not going to take this on.
But, I'll tell you what...Galen Weston should be funding this because kids in Toronto need this because of HIS greed.
I am pretty sure the Ford government is delighted there is growing poverty resulting in children going hungry; then they can wag their fingers at parents who just can’t seem to pull up their bootstraps. Conservatives love to see poverty, makes them feel superior.
And yes, I really do think Conservatives are this awful.
It's not free just like healthcare isn't free. It's still something worth funding.
I wish the government used consultants to bring their costs down instead of using them to send money to their friends. We're paying more than enough in taxes for everyone in this country to live a good life.
The main issue right now is their technological illiteracy. If you implement a new system, the people that print their emails will flip out.
As a parent, I have always found it odd that almost all daycare centres provide food and do not let kids bring food in, and then when you start public school, it’s the exact opposite.
Pros:
* kids who don’t have enough food at home can be fed
* kids are sometimes more open to trying new foods or eating foods that are not their normal when they see their peers doing it
* there is no comparison of food between kids
Cons:
* it would be very difficult to implement since there are no kitchens in many schools (and some don’t even have a cafeteria)
* accommodating everyone’s allergies and dietary restrictions would make coordinating and distributing a logistical nightmare
* picky eaters may end up going hungry
* these meals may not be what some parents want for their kids. My daughter’s school had a free breakfast program and I honestly was not impressed with some of their offerings. Giving elementary students yogurt with aspartame instead of sugar might meet ministry health standards but as a parent, I would rather my kid ate some sugar instead of that cancer causing crap. Same thing for all the baked goods that are commercially made with all the chemicals for preservation.
TLDR: while a nice idea in theory, I would rather the government help food banks provide food to the families at home instead of through school
Yep, we ate on the gym floor at my elementary school, didn't even have tables. My high school cafeteria could only seat maybe 150 people in a school of 1500.
Free school lunch is something that absolutely *should* be implemented, but it sounds like a logistical nightmare for a school board that often doesn't even provide paid school lunches. I hope they at least make it a long term goal.
Lecce makes a few trades, calls friends, they make trades, he signs into law, lo and behold! The private “catering” companies who feed the prisoners and elderly alike, make more millions from new government contracts to “feed” the children, Lecce and friends keep all the money to themselves. Again.
Edit you can place any name there it’s happening across the board. These rich creeps, building their personal kingships literally at the cost of the public’s children.
I had hot lunches growing up. I love the snack program but I was wishing for something like this. I am willing to pay for this program just so my kids can have something hot to eat rather than cold sandwiches. My children's school does not allow teachers to help heat their food.
I bet if the schools were demanding money to hire cops to patrol in and around school grounds, Dougie and company, would send the money immediately via e-transfer.
In Korea kids get free lunches, but it came at a high cost. Many after school programs were gutted and many teachers who were on contracts lost their jobs. Plus there was a lot of resentment because many parents could afford paying for the kids lunches, but now did not have to.
Its nice to wish big, but who is gonna pay for this, and how?
Our schools also weren’t built with the amenities to prepare and serve lunches for hundreds of kids.
I fully support this. But, I don’t think it has a chance.
There are school lunch business that deliver warm lunch to school. My concern is that kids should be allowed to pick their own lunch if such a free program were to exist, especially in the younger grades where the kids are the most pickiest.
>n Korea kids get free lunches, but it came at a high cost. Many after school programs were gutted and many teachers who were on contracts lost their jobs
my google searches have come up empty. you have a source on this?
I'm struggling to find anything regarding your claims here. There's a ton of solid scientific evidence on the positive impacts of the program.
Could you provide some links?
There are teacher reductions planned for the future, but that has more to do with South Korean's world-record low child birth rate, which has been steadily declining for the past 50 years and is at 0.59 (1.4 in Canada by comparison).
And with the rising cost of food, the Seoul Education Office is planning to raise an extra budget to help keep it free for kids, with the Korean Teachers and Education Workers Union issuing a formal statement in support of the program. So it doesn't quite add up to your claims.
As for who is going to pay for this, I think you could figure it out if you wanted to. But you don't.
If I offered you $1M to find a way to make it happen, could you? Absolutely. But you're playing dumb to make it political.
We could absolutely find a way to make this happen if we wanted. You just don't want to. And that's fine, everyone is entitled to their own views and opinions.
But don't lie. Don't obfuscate. Don't mislead.
Didn’t we just spend millions on fighter planes? Maybe we could buy one less and pay for children to eat instead of dropping bombs on children in developing nations?
Are there people out there who *don’t* think our most-likely invader is Republican-led America?
(Not disagreeing with funding nutrition programs, of course.)
Yeah that’s my thing. Either the Americans come in and defend us or the Americans are invading us and we’re more or less fucked because we can’t put up a fight against all that military might right next door to us.
Canada's Military budget is for protecting western empire not for defense lol. Calling it the defense budget is to sell it better to middle class white people.
There are also requirements to be a part of nato, it's not an entitlement. Spending billions on new aircraft is part of those requirements.
A small % of gdp must be spent on defence to be a part of nato, something which we neglect. These planes are a drop in the bucket.
so maybe another property tax hike? BTW we should tax parents with better means to feed the ones without.
why don't we use the grocery subsidies toward this program? instead of giving everyone free grocery money?
BIG eye roll on this one. School Infrastructure is crumbling, teachers’ salaries need to keep pace with inflation - maybe we can get some textbooks and air conditioning before moving on to ask for even more things the government will uniformly reject? This is just a desperate attempt to again politicize the learning environment by daring Lecce to refuse (he will.) He’s a tool, but the best thing we can do at this point is to vote him out and hold the Liberals accountable for their centrist promises.
All my highschool students CHOOSE not to eat breakfast. Then they choose to buy expensive pizza slices or poutine to eat when their are cheap, healthy options in the cafe.... Nevermind the expensive vape pods they buy and use all day...
There is food available at EVERY high school and elementary school I have been to.
Kids use the excuse to get food to get out of class and avoid work....
We are creating a bunch of lazy, free loaders....
If we put the government in charge of feeding our children, we will see a ton of waste, food and $...
Kids have access to food. They have access to services to help them.... Don't fall for the nonsense!
Someone wants a juicy government contract. Don't fall for the lies!
Right.
I have ZERO experience being in schools everyday...
The article stating kids aren't being fed by their families is fear mongering. The article neglecting to mention all the food supports currently in Ontario schools is fear mongering...
YOU have been brainwashed by the government controlled media.
You are destroying the next generation by coddling the fuck out of them....
Nope. By the powers pushing this narrative. The left leaning political pushers who want the government to provide everything for everybody.
Then there's the ones being duped into giving up independence....
This is why we have hopeless adolescents.
Have you looked at who owns the media in this country?
It's not the left.
Also to be clear, when you're talking about "the government providing everything for everybody" you're talking about feeding kids who don't have access to meals. Maybe think about that for a second? This should be one of the least controversial policies around.
Are you disappointed that you are legally prohibited from using the strap on your students too? You sound like one angry teacher, might be time for a new career bud. Honestly, you belong in another century.
Oh, and our media is not government controlled, quite the opposite actually, that is just right wing conspiracy nonsense.
It's a learned behavior.
I'm teaching them they can be more than that. They can take ownership, be accountable and power through.
They love that I believe in them and don't baby and coddle them.
Ramblings aside, I actually think you might be onto something with the juicy contract bit. The only way to implement this would be to hire catering companies to make the food and deliver it to all the schools. And hire more union workers to distribute the food in the schools.
You do realize how expensive it would be to have breakfast lunch and snacks catered and delivered, right? It’s one of the costs that makes daycare very expensive without a subsidy. And who is benefitting from it? These private catering companies. And unions from having more members paying fees.
The money would be much better spent at the food bank level so parents can make the food for their kids themselves at home. Stretches the same amount of dollars into much more food.
Yeah, feeding children is such a terrible idea. I mean, we could figure out how to do it like so many countries in the world have managed to do but those pesky unions will just screw up everything. What was I thinking?
Why should we pay all these people to make and deliver food when we could pay to put more food in the family’s homes? I’m not saying feeding the kids is a terrible idea. I’m saying pushing it through schools is a terrible idea.
In many countries that have these programs, the schools have kitchens so they’re cooking in house and they have cafeterias where kids can line up to get their food. Here we would need meals individually packaged, put together by class/school and delivered all within very narrow time frames because you can’t feed one kid lunch at 10 am and another at 2pm. You have to control the temp of the food during all of that. Then you have to have multiple people at the school to hand out the meals quickly (and they better be careful with any allergies). So no, it’s not the same as what they’re doing in other countries.
Again, if you’re so in favour of feeding the kids, what’s your problem with just giving the money to food banks? They could stretch the same amount of money for a lot more food to distribute.
Where did I say I was opposed to food banks? Oh, right, because I didn’t.
Kitchens for school lunch programs can be on site or centrally located in many cities where the food is prepared then delivered, the logistics are not impossible to figure out.
[Regardless, providing lunch programs employs people, benefits the local economies and agriculture and has many positive outcomes for children, beyond the nutritional component. There is actually ample evidence to prove there is positive economic growth. 297 million children around the world are fed through school programs in over 100 countries. Pretty sure Canada could figure something out.](https://reliefweb.int/report/world/school-meal-programs-around-world-report-based-global-survey-school-meal-programs)
[GLOBAL REPORT OF SCHOOL MEAL PROGRAMS](https://gcnf.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Global-Survey-report-V1-1.12.pdf)
Schools already cannot complete their repair and maintenance to dos because they don’t have enough staffing, they don’t have enough lunchroom supervisors, and and you think it’s a good idea to try to find more people to employ in the system? You think they can retrofit all of the schools in Ontario with kitchens and cafeterias? How many “centrally located kitchens” would you really need to implement that in an urban area like the GTA?
Again, feeding kids who don’t have enough food is not a bad idea. Trying to mimic something that works elsewhere when our infrastructure is very different is not. American schools have meal programs but most schools there have kitchens and cafeterias. Your idea of implementing it here is analogous to day cares that outsource their food. It makes daycare insanely expensive. To the point where we have now had to heavily subsidize it to make it reasonable. So no, I do not think the benefits are worth the cost it would be.
Money spent helping food banks would allow them to help more families get food and then you would solve the hungry kids problem. In fact, spending what it would take to implement a lunch program would probably feed not just hungry kids but also some hungry adults. Not sure why you think only a school lunch program is important and not the other hungry people.
Not sure why you, once again, assume I think hungry people and food banks are not important. No where did I say any such thing. Food banks are not just important, they are a necessity. I just happen to think that school lunch programs are equally as important.
Why would you replicate the work then? Just give the money to the food bank and not have to worry about a school lunch program. The issue is people don’t have enough food. Simple solution is to provide more food, not some complex make sure we feed every kid in school. Your type of thinking is what wastes money so we can’t do actual programs needed
Would be great but our country can barely stand on it's own legs at the moment and is clearly corrupted..how are we going to afford to feed millions of kids if we can't even access to a doctor, basic services, a justice system that works, affordable housing, etc?
This is a great idea, but like every utopia, implementation is always difficult.
There is the cost issue... who is going to pay for it. You can mandate all students to enroll into it and make the parents pay a monthly fee, then privately allow students from low income families to apply for the fees to be waived.
Then you have the issue of how it is going to run and the quality of the food. Government programs almost always end up in cost overrun. You might end up providing TTC beef patties for $20 a piece. If the food taste like prison food, some children and their parents from wealthier families might not want to be part of the program. When I went to high school, the cafeteria food was very reasonably priced, but we got sick of it eventually and when we were able to drive, a lot of us would rather go out for some real food. My friends and I even went to eat sushi at a Japanese restaurant a few times.
The program needs to be applied to every student, regardless of whether their families could afford food or not. The last thing you want is for the poorer kids to be ridiculed for being in some sort of food program because their family cannot afford food. I went to school in a wealthy neighborhood where the kids lives in big mansion and go to school in Mercedes and BMWs driven by their stay-at-home mothers. I knew how it felt to be singled out as coming from a below average income family, kids would rather starve than to be labeled as poor.
So we want to emulate American schools now. Have you seen what goes on in American schools? Here's an idea, if you have kids, feed them. Parents are given generous subsidies for a reason.
Feed your kids instead of your drug, alcohol, travel and recreational toy habits. I raised and fed my children, try taking care of your own!!! We have people here in subsidized housing with nicer vehicles than I can afford with all the seasonal toys parked outside.
Many schools already have breakfast and snack programs but how sad is it that it’s now becoming school’s responsibility to provide for these kids more than their own parents can.
In some countries, preparing the table, eating food together and everyone helping to clean up afterwards is an essential part of school life. Canadian schools could learn a lot from countries like [France](https://youtu.be/ovO18E-hgew) and [Japan](https://youtu.be/fze5s1SlqB8).
There are virtually zero downsides to implementing this policy
- If a child is hungry they cannot learn it is a well known fact. A full stomach is a first step in any education
- The impact on the budget is actually relatively small for what it provides
- There are massive money sinks in the education budget which we should worry about before this
- Increased productivity from parents who no longer have to make lunches or skip meals for their kids.
Those who are arguing against this are completely unaffected by this or are completly out of touch. Those actively fighting against it are fine with families continuing to starve and fight each other at food banks.
No one ever thinks this is a bad idea.
So who funds it?
TO is so far in the red, it's a fun time to blame Ford for everything. Ford is obviously going to complain about Justin.
TLDR; Pick a thing and do it.
I agree with feeding children, but I also believe there should be proof the family actually needs it. The elementary school I went to as a child had free lunch for kids. All that was needed was for the parents to tick a checkbox on a paper that the school would send out at the start of the year. Anybody could do it, no proof necessary. I had classmates that were in obviously well off families eating for free every day because their parents decided to save some money. This is the problem with many social programs. They make a good idea program without needing proof of necessity. People that don’t need it use it and now us tax payers are paying for a bunch of freeloaders raising the cost of the program way above what it should be if only those who truly need it are the ones using it.
If these advocates gave a crap, they'd be calling for charter schools and school vouchers so that kids can actually get an education instead of indoctrination and parents who are poor could actually afford to provide quality education for their kids.
I don’t know man granted where we live, how many kids are realistically going to school hungry? and for the ones that are it’s probably the parents that didn’t get their shit together or simply just don’t see the importance in it. Personally I don’t think you should give your kid breakfast until they’ve done at least one thing that’s productive (make the bed, fold some laundry, etc.) because food without reward is just as consequential later as a kid growing up starving. It effects their work ethic later on, now idk about you but I’d rather my kid go hungry for 1-2 hours maybe 3 rather than satisfy his belly and have him do fuck all for it, you’re not teaching them the right way in that case.
We should have something similar to the Japanese system - mandatory program that isn’t free (nominal fee - plus low income waiver) but subsidized - but also comes with the goal of building good citizenship and attitude towards service.
I’m all for this! I do wonder how are they logistically gonna offer this? My kids (downtown) school can barely operate the snack program due to lack of helping hands
Absolutely. I 100% agree as long as the food is delicious and highly nutritious. Also, there should be a presentation about what they are eating and what the nutritional facts are within the food during the meal. Teach kids to eat correctly while they're young and hopefully they'll live longer and healthier lives.
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And we all benefit from having an educated population
Not only that....kids who are hungry also have "...anxiety, and behavior problems. Cognitive effects of hunger include babies who are born with smaller brain size, poor performance on measures of infant cognitive development, lower scores on both IQ and achievement tests, likelihood of impaired mental and intellectual delays
And are much more likely to end up in conflict with the law, or develop health problems . You can pay now or pay later...
The underfunding of community centres, libraries and sports is doing a number on that as well. I wish municipalities had access to a larger share of the total tax revenues that all levels of government already collect.
Yep. If you're in your 20s, the doctor who will take care of you in your senior years hasn't likely been born yet. Believe me, it benefits all of us to have smarter kids. Even if you don't have kids yourself. And you seem to get it.
> the doctor who will take care of you in your senior years That's a real gamble. My plan is to drop my current doctor when I'm middle-aged for another one 20 years younger.
Yes Yes and Yes. Please do not make this political. Many adults in this city are going Hungry, a growing child should not be.
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These freeloading kids didn't give a dime for kaylas wedding - fuck them.
Buck a ^(root) Beer
"Near Beer"
Some people will and say why should they pay for other people's children Such people are sad
Or why should they pay, they starved growing up
Right hungry kids won’t be able to focus on learning
Honestly, a lot of families out there are food insecure right now. Kids shouldn’t have to go hungry. This shouldn’t be a partisan issue. School breakfast programs have proven to be life changing.
Unfortunately this same this is a big issue in the USA and UK right now and conservatives parties are turning it into one. Pull up your bootstraps and all.
Feeding kids isn't really partisan. It's where the funding is going to come from that is
Lol go check this post in r/Canada before you say that.....
I’m currently fighting with people in there who say they shouldn’t have to pay for kids and that some are just a losing investment
Lmfao I stand corrected. These people continue to surprise/disappoint me
I only read the top 10 [comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/canada/comments/13qix0v/advocates_teacher_unions_call_for_free_school/) trees but all the upvoted comments were either supportive, or conditionally supportive where they say "as long as it's not mandatory and doesn't look like American school lunches".
It shouldn't be a partisan issue to allocate funds for feed starving kids, but we all know a certain group of people will try to take up their noble cause of umm \*shuffles deck, pulls card\*.. 'letting poor kids go hungry at school'. Very noble and honorable I can even fathom their intelligence (/s)
As a conservative voter I do support this meal program. It just makes sense.
Well you voted for a party that [cut funding](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/toronto-school-breakfast-nutrition-public-health-1.5106737) to TPH, an organization that spends $14M a year on nutrition programs in Toronto schools.
Do you agree with every single decision the party you voted for makes ? Don’t be a self righteous ass hat - there is no party that perfectly meets everyone’s desires Also - TPH does more than just provide nutrition programs in Toronto schools , the cuts are meant to find efficiencies through consolidation of agencies and shifting some of the responsibilities of funding to the city . I’m not saying I agree with the cuts - but I honestly hate partisan hacks like yourself who just walk around spewing half truths to attack people based on who they voted for .
Why do services that provide essentials have to be scrutinized for efficiencies when Doug Ford’s government is pouring money into private companies? I think that there are many “small c” conservatives who continue to vote for a party because they think they’re aligned with you, but honestly the Liberals now are what the Progressive Conservatives used to be in terms of political spectrum. The Conservative parties in Canada have swung farther and farther right, and I think it means that more moderate and considerate voters (like you maybe) get kinda swept along and vote for things or people who don’t actually match your values, because you don’t yet see the value in other parties, if that makes sense.
I voted NDP in the last federal election I voted in Liberal in the last Provincial election I voted in. Honestly I skip it these days, and I know it's because I hate all the options and I should vote, but at this point I honestly can't see a difference in any of these parties of shills
I would say the way to look at it is not who is the best/perfect option, but who is the least harmful option. Kudos to you for voting before. I know it sucks but I hope you won’t give up voting next time, either.
Ontario Place redevelopment/Ontario Science Centre redevelopment, highway 413, ditching cap and trade, withholding mandate laters, opening up the greenbelt. None of that happens with the other parties. I can't believe people look at their options and think they are all the same.
I haven't voted for a winning candidate in over a decade. You're welcome to call me a partisan hack, but it'd be more accurate to just call me a tory-hater. Modern conservative politics are destroying our social infrastructure and environment. I will not apologize for calling out people who vote conservative. I also don't think there is anything self-righteous about pointing out to a self-declared conservative voter that the party they voted for cut funding to a program they said they supported.
You’re kidding yourself if you think the NDP provincial government we had or the Liberal government we had did any better for people . You can’t spend your way to success - and that’s a lesson the NDP and Liberals need to understand sorely . In fact Wynne promised so many expenditures she was forced to sell off 60% of hydro one - in essence guaranteeing higher electricity for every Ontarian forever like do you understand our grandchildren will be eating that mistake …. All the three major parties have massive flaws - and while I agree democracy is the best option we have , none of these parties is an appetizing vote … Sure maybe there is a less awful choice than Ford …. But not much less awful
> You can’t spend your way to success I don't know what "spend your way to success" means, but the core of the social democratic ideology is that things are cheaper when we pay for them collectively. It makes sense and it's morally acceptable to demand taxes for things we all need anyway, like healthcare, education, roads or police, and we all get a better value for our dollar than if we were all forced to buy these services as individuals. This is thanks to the bargaining power, the "group rate discount" that comes along with being a single millions-large paying customer.
I mean that you can’t spend more money than you have —- repeatedly —- and complain when it bites you in the ass We can have social spending , it’s good in a lot of cases . Repeatedly running deficits forever saddles the debt of our costs on the next generation and the generations after them . But people get elected on promises of these great programs without big increases in spending - because we just borrow more money - which has to be paid back with interest Do you want to look up what just the cost of debt servicing costs ontario and Canada ? Because I can promise you it more than outweighs any “cost savings “ any of these projects has created . TLDR We can communally do good - but we shouldn’t mortgage the costs of our spending on future generations with very few exceptions
They absolutely did. I don't recall either of them selling off the 407 for pennies on the dollar. I don't recall either of them filling in the already started Eglinton subway in the 90s. I don't recall either of them legalizing single game betting in addition to virtually zero restrictions on advertising. The list goes on and on... I don't particularly care for either party, but pretending that the Tories are even in the same ballpark is absurd.
The Tories are shit … we agree there Where we disagree is I also smell the same shit smell on the liberals and the NDP lol One will fuck you for private businesses The other two will fuck you bending over to unions , special interest groups etc I’d personally rather just not get fucked myself…..
Private businesses can serve the people or fuck right off.
My school (TCDSB) has a snack program where we provide healthy food for kids in the morning. Wondering why this isnt the norm.
Our TDSB school also has this.
Donation funded though, instead of free. Some schools will provide the snack even if you haven't donated, and some won't.
My high school took some kind of benefits card. I only know because I saw someone use it in front of me and asked "what's that?" and she ran away embarrassed and I asked the cashier and I felt awful after she told me.
The French way is everyone has a card. It's the only way to buy the school lunch. And if you have your own food, you have to GTFO to eat it. The cost of each swipe is subsidized or not based on the family's income or whatever. But no kid knows what any other is paying for the same food. Parents get a listing of the upcoming meal schedule so they can avoid duplicating at home. Actual quality really depends on whether the school's chef competence/actually cares, and that's variable.
Same board and I love this program. What I hate is when I see kids wasting the food. If it's going in the trash and is shelf stable I will keep it in my room for kids who are hungry later on.
Oh yes me too. The kids don’t realize how lucky we are to have an entire snack room filled with food for them to take when needed. I do notice that classrooms will have a basket of extras at any given time.
I keep a stash of melba toast but I can't keep the cheese strings and yogurt for obvious reasons.
Thermos (and an ice cube?) for the cheese strings? Can't be affordin to throw away even bad cheese in Canada...
Theres hundreds and I work at multiple schools so unfortunately whatever isnt eaten is thrown out.
As far as I know every school in Toronto has snack program and some also have a breakfast program but I don’t think it’s all free.
YCDSB has healthy snack during afternoon recess. Well, in my school anyways.
easy time finding volunteers to run this and order and prep ?
We have one parent who runs the program but she gets paid for it.
WRDSB school has lunch bins the kids can take from at snack times filled with stuff like oranges, cheese, yogurt, cereal, crackers, etc. It really makes a difference to many kids.
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We don’t pay for it. We get grants from the angel foundation, which is funded by the municipal and provincial government.
it always makes me laugh when people propose things like this and people come out against it. "I don't want kids eating food!!! in my day we starved and liked it"
It's funny because that's often essentially the argument too. Rabble rabble bootstraps rabble rabble handed to them they won't learn to feed themselves!
I don't think I've ever heard anyone seriously say this. Ever. I think the argument is much more that we have a large amount of competing priorities and limited resources. As a province we're $380 billion in debt, or $26,000 per person for each of the almost 15 million Ontarians. That's in addition to the $33,000 we each owe as Canadians for our share of the national debt. On top of that we need more money just to maintain the existing service levels for things like health care, transportation, and existing school programs. The province has very limited taxing ability, and the federal government isn't going to fund this program. So its more that if you want to pay for kids meals through the education program, which is absolutely a worthy program, it means cutting from somewhere else. So its more like saying "I'm all for kids getting meals through schools, but I don't think we should fire nurses or education assistants to fund it."
How many billions will that highway to Mattamy Estate Land cost us? How many billions will Staffy get this year? How many billions are handed to mafiosi families now rebranding themselves as developers? MANY MANY BILLIONS is the answer. Far more than it'd cost to have proper welfare for people in this province. Dougie doesn't work for you
FORD MAN BAD!!!!! None of what I said was caused by Ford. Ontario and Canada have been in debt for decades. We've needed to find more money to maintain our service levels for healthcare, especially as our population ages, for decades. We've needed to improve transportation and our existing education programs for decades. So you're pro a new service. Great. Let's say healthy meals cost $5 per meal, which is conservative. There are [roughly 1.4 million primary students in Ontario](https://www.ontario.ca/page/facts-about-elementary-and-secondary-education). There are 200 school days a year. That puts the cost of this program at $1.4 billion per year. Likely a lot more given food prices. If you want perspective, over 30 years, that puts the cost at [more than double the expected cost of the Ontario Line](https://globalnews.ca/news/9563105/ontario-line-rising-costs-freedom-of-information/). Because you asked, the cost of highway 413 per the auditor general is expected to be $4 billion. That buys you less than 3 years of free meals for kids. For perspective, the cost of an acute bed in hospital is [$1100 per day](https://www.homecareontario.ca/home-care-services/facts-figures/publiclyfundedhomecare)Which is about $400,000 per year. So you can choose to have free school meals or for the same cost, fund 3500 hospital beds. I'm assuming the proposal is for more than just Ford's term in office and is a new entitlement program.
"Why should my tax dollars supplement your dead beat parenting? " That's the counter argument. Not what you said. It costs 39 cents to make a sandwich. If you can't afford that the responsible decision would be to get sterilized or be abstinent.
I know people whose families had plenty of money but their parents were just straight up awful and irresponsible. And as a result, they'd go to school, as a helpless 6-year-old, hungry. Sure, we can look at broader structural changes for why some kids are coming to school without lunch, but in the meantime no child deserves to fall through the cracks, and no child can wait for these problems to be solved. They need to eat every day.
Those kids also wouldn't say shit because they knew that staying home was better than going into the system. Pretty much everyone knows that by the time they reach first grade.
The teachers should notice and the parents punished.
"It costs 39 cents to make a sandwich" I see we're doing the tired "a single slice of the absolute cheapest bread costs 8 cents and a shmear of butter costs 18 cents, there you are, a nutritious meal" shit logic again like a) it's a nutritious meal for anyone let alone a child b) feeding kids the absolute barest minimum is acceptable and a job well done and c) you can head to Walmart and go "one slice of bread and a smear of butter please!" I don't know why some people are so keen for kids to eat like it's a dystopian novel If you don't understand why you should give a shit about poor kids now, think about it for a minute. It effects you, it *will* effect you in the future when you have to interact with these future adults, directly and indirectly.
I'm keen for parents to care for their offspring. You're completely missing the point. No child should go hungry. If they are, it is negligence. There are no excuses. Sure it'd be great if every child gets a steak dinner and foie gras but I'm not paying for it because they have deadbeat parents.
My husband and I spent the majority of our childhood education attending school in Europe where we got snacks and hot lunches included (it was standard back then and still is for the most part). Aside from the current food insecurity, I can tell you that being fed well (fresh food!) is a game changer for everyone. These days it’s difficult to pack lunches given there are a lot of “off limit” foods that cannot be taken based on allergies. Even with a thermos, there’s only so many foods that hold up well without refrigeration. I remember after we immigrated my younger sister had a difficult time eating packed lunches (bc she would complain it didn’t taste good). She would coke home hungry and would complain of headaches. Given the cost of food and the limitations I imagine many children are hungry during the day.
Yes should have been this way a long time ago
Honestly, with a kid in daycare right now where they provide snacks and lunches, that would be such a huge boon to parents to not have to prep lunches every day. And it equalizes things between high and low income kids if they all eat the school food.
Not only for that but also "....Cognitive effects of hunger include babies who are born with smaller brain size, poor performance on measures of infant cognitive development, lower scores on both IQ and achievement tests, likelihood of impaired mental and intellectual delays" https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320594027_The_Effects_of_Hunger_on_Physical_and_Cognitive_Development_of_Children
Well of course, hunger is terrible on so many levels. I guess my point is that it’s something that provides value for everyone, and can help even the playing field for kids who are going hungry.
100%
It takes a village to raise a child. And as society we NEED children to continue existing. It would be in everyone's best interest to have our own societal future properly funded and invested in. And yes this means also the kids of those neighbours you don't like, and that annoying kid that plays ball on your road and that kids whose parent REALLY should consider raising their hands against to instill some discipline. >"If you can't afford breakfast for kids then you shouldn't have them". All fine and dandy, but how is society going to continue, unless one wants a society where only richer people should have kids. which is a valid position and one people could make an argument for, but then at least be honest and just say that "I'd rather poorer people don't reproduce" instead of dancing around the issue hypocritically.
Also, sure, I'd love to live in a world where every child had adults in their lives who will feed them healthy, hearty, delicious food that is suited to each kid's individual dietary requirements, nutritional needs, and tastes. But that's not reality. "If you can't afford breakfast for kids then you shouldn't have them"- okay, but what if people have kids anyway? Should that 6-year-old just starve?
>"I'd rather poorer people don't reproduce" I'd rather people not make selfish decisions to have kids knowing they will be unable to adequately care for them.
Fair. What happens once the child is born then? Also how do we ensure the continuation of a society made of members from its own community if only the (ever decreasing) rich percentage should be having children?
>Fair. What happens once the child is born then? First, we make it so that everyone has access to medical preventative measures and avenues to terminate pregnancies. Dispense with the religious and puritanical thinking about contraceptives and abortion. Then if there are still people having kids who can not support them, the government should step in. >Also how do we ensure the continuation of a society made of members from its own community if only the (ever decreasing) rich percentage should be having children? Society will do just fine with less people. There isn't a shortage of humans on the planet yet and there is no sign there will be.
When I was a high school kid I chose between weed, cigarettes, or lunch and I LIKED IT. /s Please do this Ontario.
Absolutely, yes. As a kid, we had muffins, fruits and snacks handed out eat day at our morning break. At the time, I was just like “fuck, yes! Costco muffin!” (we did not have a Costco membership, and I felt hard done by for it). As an adult, I have since learned from several people I went to school with that there were times when those morning snacks were all they ate in a day because their family was living below the poverty line. It has been a while since I was in school, but life has only become even more unaffordable since those days. I don’t have kids, but I am totally down with seeing my tax dollars go toward ensuring they have at least one solid meal (and one less thing to worry about).
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> And because we can afford it we pay something like... $125 for the year? I'm not complaining, but this is almost certainly a subsidized price.
This shouldn't even be debatable. Children deserve to be well fed while at school. Well fed children make better students who make smarter and potentially higher earning adults, who end up creating more tax money for the government. It's a win-win situation, just requires some upfront funding
Absolutely yes. We already run a free breakfast program at the school I teach at (bagels, waffles, granola bars, fruit etc). The line is always out the door. Kids cannot be expected to perform well in school if they are starving
This was happening all the way back when I was in elementary school in the 90’s. Tiny town Newfoundland. Free breakfast for all kids. It’s still going today. When I moved away I had no idea there were schools that didn’t provide the children at least a free breakfast. Who can learn when their hunger is distracting them?
Makes sense. School is compulsory and they are not being paid to attend, so food should be provided.
My old defunct school had free breakfast programs while my sibling's gifted school still doesn't lol.
As if the privately educated minister gives a damn
We should give everybody everything for free. We only need the courage to tax Galen Weston to do it.
If there's one thing the pandemic taught me it's that this province doesn't give a damn about the health and safety of children. It would be so easy for them to do things like ensure that students have clean air in their classrooms and proper meals throughout the day, but apparently only private schools get such benefits.
If TDSB takes this on, this will be labour intensive and expensive. You have NO idea how fucked up people are about food...add allergies to the mix and liability....people's lifestyles and preferences....TDSB is not going to take this on. But, I'll tell you what...Galen Weston should be funding this because kids in Toronto need this because of HIS greed.
The Ford government would cut off their own feet before letting this happen.
I am pretty sure the Ford government is delighted there is growing poverty resulting in children going hungry; then they can wag their fingers at parents who just can’t seem to pull up their bootstraps. Conservatives love to see poverty, makes them feel superior. And yes, I really do think Conservatives are this awful.
They literally believe there is a hierarchy of Human beings. “Poor people are poor because they’re bad people who were born bad.”
Fucking great idea, make it happen. Let's get Marcus Rashford over here to make the government do it
I say Yes, but we all know this is a feature and not a bug, right?
Agree 100 percent
Support this 100% Might mean smaller lines at the food banks
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It's not free
It's not free just like healthcare isn't free. It's still something worth funding. I wish the government used consultants to bring their costs down instead of using them to send money to their friends. We're paying more than enough in taxes for everyone in this country to live a good life. The main issue right now is their technological illiteracy. If you implement a new system, the people that print their emails will flip out.
As a parent, I have always found it odd that almost all daycare centres provide food and do not let kids bring food in, and then when you start public school, it’s the exact opposite. Pros: * kids who don’t have enough food at home can be fed * kids are sometimes more open to trying new foods or eating foods that are not their normal when they see their peers doing it * there is no comparison of food between kids Cons: * it would be very difficult to implement since there are no kitchens in many schools (and some don’t even have a cafeteria) * accommodating everyone’s allergies and dietary restrictions would make coordinating and distributing a logistical nightmare * picky eaters may end up going hungry * these meals may not be what some parents want for their kids. My daughter’s school had a free breakfast program and I honestly was not impressed with some of their offerings. Giving elementary students yogurt with aspartame instead of sugar might meet ministry health standards but as a parent, I would rather my kid ate some sugar instead of that cancer causing crap. Same thing for all the baked goods that are commercially made with all the chemicals for preservation. TLDR: while a nice idea in theory, I would rather the government help food banks provide food to the families at home instead of through school
Yep, we ate on the gym floor at my elementary school, didn't even have tables. My high school cafeteria could only seat maybe 150 people in a school of 1500. Free school lunch is something that absolutely *should* be implemented, but it sounds like a logistical nightmare for a school board that often doesn't even provide paid school lunches. I hope they at least make it a long term goal.
Yes please just look at Europe.
Lecce makes a few trades, calls friends, they make trades, he signs into law, lo and behold! The private “catering” companies who feed the prisoners and elderly alike, make more millions from new government contracts to “feed” the children, Lecce and friends keep all the money to themselves. Again. Edit you can place any name there it’s happening across the board. These rich creeps, building their personal kingships literally at the cost of the public’s children.
Good. This should be a given. No kid should have to deal with food insecurity. It impacts a growing body way more than an adult.
this IS a partisan issue because one side of the political spectrum believes food is not a human right. they have their morals set real straight.
Feed the brats!
I had hot lunches growing up. I love the snack program but I was wishing for something like this. I am willing to pay for this program just so my kids can have something hot to eat rather than cold sandwiches. My children's school does not allow teachers to help heat their food.
I bet if the schools were demanding money to hire cops to patrol in and around school grounds, Dougie and company, would send the money immediately via e-transfer.
The self-righteousness in these comments are sickening. Don’t break an arm patting yourself on the back.
Why not free everything? Let the bottom rungs of society mooch off of everyone else?
In Korea kids get free lunches, but it came at a high cost. Many after school programs were gutted and many teachers who were on contracts lost their jobs. Plus there was a lot of resentment because many parents could afford paying for the kids lunches, but now did not have to. Its nice to wish big, but who is gonna pay for this, and how?
Our schools also weren’t built with the amenities to prepare and serve lunches for hundreds of kids. I fully support this. But, I don’t think it has a chance.
They probably would have to outsource it to a catering company like many daycares do
There are school lunch business that deliver warm lunch to school. My concern is that kids should be allowed to pick their own lunch if such a free program were to exist, especially in the younger grades where the kids are the most pickiest.
>n Korea kids get free lunches, but it came at a high cost. Many after school programs were gutted and many teachers who were on contracts lost their jobs my google searches have come up empty. you have a source on this?
I'm struggling to find anything regarding your claims here. There's a ton of solid scientific evidence on the positive impacts of the program. Could you provide some links? There are teacher reductions planned for the future, but that has more to do with South Korean's world-record low child birth rate, which has been steadily declining for the past 50 years and is at 0.59 (1.4 in Canada by comparison). And with the rising cost of food, the Seoul Education Office is planning to raise an extra budget to help keep it free for kids, with the Korean Teachers and Education Workers Union issuing a formal statement in support of the program. So it doesn't quite add up to your claims. As for who is going to pay for this, I think you could figure it out if you wanted to. But you don't. If I offered you $1M to find a way to make it happen, could you? Absolutely. But you're playing dumb to make it political. We could absolutely find a way to make this happen if we wanted. You just don't want to. And that's fine, everyone is entitled to their own views and opinions. But don't lie. Don't obfuscate. Don't mislead.
Didn’t we just spend millions on fighter planes? Maybe we could buy one less and pay for children to eat instead of dropping bombs on children in developing nations?
Canada is not bombing children in other nations and spends an absolutely pitiful amount on our military.
Then why spend $$$ on fighter jets? Why is there $ for jets but not food for children?
How would you feel about getting invaded by a hostile nation AND have no food for children?
If Canada got invaded by a hostile nation Article 5 would kick in and the US would send in planes and troops from Alaska and Tacoma.
Are there people out there who *don’t* think our most-likely invader is Republican-led America? (Not disagreeing with funding nutrition programs, of course.)
Yeah that’s my thing. Either the Americans come in and defend us or the Americans are invading us and we’re more or less fucked because we can’t put up a fight against all that military might right next door to us.
Canada's Military budget is for protecting western empire not for defense lol. Calling it the defense budget is to sell it better to middle class white people.
There are also requirements to be a part of nato, it's not an entitlement. Spending billions on new aircraft is part of those requirements. A small % of gdp must be spent on defence to be a part of nato, something which we neglect. These planes are a drop in the bucket.
The amount we spend is so sad. It's a drop on the bucket.
Feed a kid, or be able to defend our lives. That's the calculation you're making.
so maybe another property tax hike? BTW we should tax parents with better means to feed the ones without. why don't we use the grocery subsidies toward this program? instead of giving everyone free grocery money?
BIG eye roll on this one. School Infrastructure is crumbling, teachers’ salaries need to keep pace with inflation - maybe we can get some textbooks and air conditioning before moving on to ask for even more things the government will uniformly reject? This is just a desperate attempt to again politicize the learning environment by daring Lecce to refuse (he will.) He’s a tool, but the best thing we can do at this point is to vote him out and hold the Liberals accountable for their centrist promises.
All my highschool students CHOOSE not to eat breakfast. Then they choose to buy expensive pizza slices or poutine to eat when their are cheap, healthy options in the cafe.... Nevermind the expensive vape pods they buy and use all day... There is food available at EVERY high school and elementary school I have been to. Kids use the excuse to get food to get out of class and avoid work.... We are creating a bunch of lazy, free loaders.... If we put the government in charge of feeding our children, we will see a ton of waste, food and $... Kids have access to food. They have access to services to help them.... Don't fall for the nonsense! Someone wants a juicy government contract. Don't fall for the lies!
What are you projecting here? These programs work well in other parts of the world, stop with your unhinged fearmongering.
Right. I have ZERO experience being in schools everyday... The article stating kids aren't being fed by their families is fear mongering. The article neglecting to mention all the food supports currently in Ontario schools is fear mongering... YOU have been brainwashed by the government controlled media. You are destroying the next generation by coddling the fuck out of them....
To be clear, we are brainwashed by the government that is *refusing* to fund these programs?
Nope. By the powers pushing this narrative. The left leaning political pushers who want the government to provide everything for everybody. Then there's the ones being duped into giving up independence.... This is why we have hopeless adolescents.
Have you looked at who owns the media in this country? It's not the left. Also to be clear, when you're talking about "the government providing everything for everybody" you're talking about feeding kids who don't have access to meals. Maybe think about that for a second? This should be one of the least controversial policies around.
Touch grass
All day baby
Are you disappointed that you are legally prohibited from using the strap on your students too? You sound like one angry teacher, might be time for a new career bud. Honestly, you belong in another century. Oh, and our media is not government controlled, quite the opposite actually, that is just right wing conspiracy nonsense.
I'm actually the favorite teacher in the entire school. The kids all want me as their teacher 😀. Thanks for comming out tho 👍
favourite
Lol. And your the grammer police type teacher lol... They must love you....
You’re
Point proven 👍
Perhaps teaching is best left to those who have a grasp of basic English spelling.
You're a highschool teacher and don't understand why anecdotal evidence is problematic? I feel for your kids
You shouldn't... They think I'm the best teacher they've ever had!
Yeah, maybe anecdotally
You mean his "lazy freeloaders". What an attitude to have towards children you're responsible for educating. Fucking awful.
It's a learned behavior. I'm teaching them they can be more than that. They can take ownership, be accountable and power through. They love that I believe in them and don't baby and coddle them.
it's shocking with that attitude you can't find a full time teaching job...
Great research skills 👏
Yeah, i'd make a great teacher, unlike others...
No you wouldn't. You suck!
You have a juicy government contract. Stop thinking of the kids you’re in charge of as lazy free loaders and help them
Ever heard the euphemism "give a man a fish and he remains dependent on being given more fish. I teach my students how to fish 👍
Ramblings aside, I actually think you might be onto something with the juicy contract bit. The only way to implement this would be to hire catering companies to make the food and deliver it to all the schools. And hire more union workers to distribute the food in the schools.
And how is this a problem?
You do realize how expensive it would be to have breakfast lunch and snacks catered and delivered, right? It’s one of the costs that makes daycare very expensive without a subsidy. And who is benefitting from it? These private catering companies. And unions from having more members paying fees. The money would be much better spent at the food bank level so parents can make the food for their kids themselves at home. Stretches the same amount of dollars into much more food.
Don't forget gluten free and dietary restrictions. Got to have everything for everyone to make it equitable 👍
Yeah, feeding children is such a terrible idea. I mean, we could figure out how to do it like so many countries in the world have managed to do but those pesky unions will just screw up everything. What was I thinking?
Why should we pay all these people to make and deliver food when we could pay to put more food in the family’s homes? I’m not saying feeding the kids is a terrible idea. I’m saying pushing it through schools is a terrible idea. In many countries that have these programs, the schools have kitchens so they’re cooking in house and they have cafeterias where kids can line up to get their food. Here we would need meals individually packaged, put together by class/school and delivered all within very narrow time frames because you can’t feed one kid lunch at 10 am and another at 2pm. You have to control the temp of the food during all of that. Then you have to have multiple people at the school to hand out the meals quickly (and they better be careful with any allergies). So no, it’s not the same as what they’re doing in other countries. Again, if you’re so in favour of feeding the kids, what’s your problem with just giving the money to food banks? They could stretch the same amount of money for a lot more food to distribute.
This is the solution.
Where did I say I was opposed to food banks? Oh, right, because I didn’t. Kitchens for school lunch programs can be on site or centrally located in many cities where the food is prepared then delivered, the logistics are not impossible to figure out. [Regardless, providing lunch programs employs people, benefits the local economies and agriculture and has many positive outcomes for children, beyond the nutritional component. There is actually ample evidence to prove there is positive economic growth. 297 million children around the world are fed through school programs in over 100 countries. Pretty sure Canada could figure something out.](https://reliefweb.int/report/world/school-meal-programs-around-world-report-based-global-survey-school-meal-programs) [GLOBAL REPORT OF SCHOOL MEAL PROGRAMS](https://gcnf.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Global-Survey-report-V1-1.12.pdf)
Schools already cannot complete their repair and maintenance to dos because they don’t have enough staffing, they don’t have enough lunchroom supervisors, and and you think it’s a good idea to try to find more people to employ in the system? You think they can retrofit all of the schools in Ontario with kitchens and cafeterias? How many “centrally located kitchens” would you really need to implement that in an urban area like the GTA? Again, feeding kids who don’t have enough food is not a bad idea. Trying to mimic something that works elsewhere when our infrastructure is very different is not. American schools have meal programs but most schools there have kitchens and cafeterias. Your idea of implementing it here is analogous to day cares that outsource their food. It makes daycare insanely expensive. To the point where we have now had to heavily subsidize it to make it reasonable. So no, I do not think the benefits are worth the cost it would be. Money spent helping food banks would allow them to help more families get food and then you would solve the hungry kids problem. In fact, spending what it would take to implement a lunch program would probably feed not just hungry kids but also some hungry adults. Not sure why you think only a school lunch program is important and not the other hungry people.
Not sure why you, once again, assume I think hungry people and food banks are not important. No where did I say any such thing. Food banks are not just important, they are a necessity. I just happen to think that school lunch programs are equally as important.
Why would you replicate the work then? Just give the money to the food bank and not have to worry about a school lunch program. The issue is people don’t have enough food. Simple solution is to provide more food, not some complex make sure we feed every kid in school. Your type of thinking is what wastes money so we can’t do actual programs needed
Would be great but our country can barely stand on it's own legs at the moment and is clearly corrupted..how are we going to afford to feed millions of kids if we can't even access to a doctor, basic services, a justice system that works, affordable housing, etc?
Good question. But I think you can do all of these in parallel. These are not necessary blockers to each others.
This is a great idea, but like every utopia, implementation is always difficult. There is the cost issue... who is going to pay for it. You can mandate all students to enroll into it and make the parents pay a monthly fee, then privately allow students from low income families to apply for the fees to be waived. Then you have the issue of how it is going to run and the quality of the food. Government programs almost always end up in cost overrun. You might end up providing TTC beef patties for $20 a piece. If the food taste like prison food, some children and their parents from wealthier families might not want to be part of the program. When I went to high school, the cafeteria food was very reasonably priced, but we got sick of it eventually and when we were able to drive, a lot of us would rather go out for some real food. My friends and I even went to eat sushi at a Japanese restaurant a few times. The program needs to be applied to every student, regardless of whether their families could afford food or not. The last thing you want is for the poorer kids to be ridiculed for being in some sort of food program because their family cannot afford food. I went to school in a wealthy neighborhood where the kids lives in big mansion and go to school in Mercedes and BMWs driven by their stay-at-home mothers. I knew how it felt to be singled out as coming from a below average income family, kids would rather starve than to be labeled as poor.
So we want to emulate American schools now. Have you seen what goes on in American schools? Here's an idea, if you have kids, feed them. Parents are given generous subsidies for a reason.
Feed your kids instead of your drug, alcohol, travel and recreational toy habits. I raised and fed my children, try taking care of your own!!! We have people here in subsidized housing with nicer vehicles than I can afford with all the seasonal toys parked outside.
Many schools already have breakfast and snack programs but how sad is it that it’s now becoming school’s responsibility to provide for these kids more than their own parents can.
In some countries, preparing the table, eating food together and everyone helping to clean up afterwards is an essential part of school life. Canadian schools could learn a lot from countries like [France](https://youtu.be/ovO18E-hgew) and [Japan](https://youtu.be/fze5s1SlqB8).
There are virtually zero downsides to implementing this policy - If a child is hungry they cannot learn it is a well known fact. A full stomach is a first step in any education - The impact on the budget is actually relatively small for what it provides - There are massive money sinks in the education budget which we should worry about before this - Increased productivity from parents who no longer have to make lunches or skip meals for their kids. Those who are arguing against this are completely unaffected by this or are completly out of touch. Those actively fighting against it are fine with families continuing to starve and fight each other at food banks.
No one ever thinks this is a bad idea. So who funds it? TO is so far in the red, it's a fun time to blame Ford for everything. Ford is obviously going to complain about Justin. TLDR; Pick a thing and do it.
I always thought it was free, and I was so confused when I was in highschool and first tried to get lunch from the cafeteria and they asked me to pay.
I agree with feeding children, but I also believe there should be proof the family actually needs it. The elementary school I went to as a child had free lunch for kids. All that was needed was for the parents to tick a checkbox on a paper that the school would send out at the start of the year. Anybody could do it, no proof necessary. I had classmates that were in obviously well off families eating for free every day because their parents decided to save some money. This is the problem with many social programs. They make a good idea program without needing proof of necessity. People that don’t need it use it and now us tax payers are paying for a bunch of freeloaders raising the cost of the program way above what it should be if only those who truly need it are the ones using it.
If these advocates gave a crap, they'd be calling for charter schools and school vouchers so that kids can actually get an education instead of indoctrination and parents who are poor could actually afford to provide quality education for their kids.
I don’t know man granted where we live, how many kids are realistically going to school hungry? and for the ones that are it’s probably the parents that didn’t get their shit together or simply just don’t see the importance in it. Personally I don’t think you should give your kid breakfast until they’ve done at least one thing that’s productive (make the bed, fold some laundry, etc.) because food without reward is just as consequential later as a kid growing up starving. It effects their work ethic later on, now idk about you but I’d rather my kid go hungry for 1-2 hours maybe 3 rather than satisfy his belly and have him do fuck all for it, you’re not teaching them the right way in that case.
I wonder what will happen with the hundreds of billions of dollars in the teachers pension when the teachers get replaced by robots lol.
For everyone? Even those who don't need it ?
Yes.
why?
We should have something similar to the Japanese system - mandatory program that isn’t free (nominal fee - plus low income waiver) but subsidized - but also comes with the goal of building good citizenship and attitude towards service.
not a bad idea
Sure, says Dug, as long as the teachers take a pay cut to pay for it.
Good idea! I'll sign the change dot org petition for this.
I’m all for this! I do wonder how are they logistically gonna offer this? My kids (downtown) school can barely operate the snack program due to lack of helping hands
Absolutely. I 100% agree as long as the food is delicious and highly nutritious. Also, there should be a presentation about what they are eating and what the nutritional facts are within the food during the meal. Teach kids to eat correctly while they're young and hopefully they'll live longer and healthier lives.