{"id":664,"date":"2015-09-29T13:08:49","date_gmt":"2015-09-29T17:08:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/msde\/?p=664"},"modified":"2015-09-29T13:08:49","modified_gmt":"2015-09-29T17:08:49","slug":"principal-perspective-breakfast-and-a-book-a-great-way-to-start-the-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/msde\/principal-perspective-breakfast-and-a-book-a-great-way-to-start-the-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Principal Perspective: Breakfast and a Book: A Great Way to Start the Day"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Yolanda Stanislaus, Principal, Francis Scott Key Middle School, Montgomery County<\/em><\/p>\n

\"MMFA-YolandaStanislaus-092015\"<\/a><\/p>\n

As the proud Principal of Francis Scott Key Middle School in Montgomery County, my staff and I work hard to ensure that all of our students start their day off right by eating a nutritious breakfast.\u00a0 Over 90% (approximately 900) of my students partake in our MMFA free breakfast program.<\/p>\n

On a personal note, I grew up the child of two working-class parents who worked tirelessly to clothe, feed and nurture five children. As a child, I participated in a free breakfast program at my school. I can testify, first-hand, that the program had a positive impact on my life and learning.<\/p>\n

Today, as a school principal, I have seen the positive effect the MMFA program has on the students in my school.\u00a0 <\/span>When my students eat a nutritious breakfast, they are alert, engaged and ready to learn. \u00a0 <\/span>Every morning when my students enter their classrooms, they have a nutritious breakfast waiting for them.\u00a0 <\/span>We call this time “Books and Breakfast.”\u00a0 <\/span>Our students enjoy a healthy breakfast, while reading a book of choice and in some cases simultaneously listening to soft music.\u00a0 <\/span>I can tell you that our students really enjoy this time and it enables them to access the curriculum at higher levels and appropriately socialize with their teachers and classmates.<\/p>\n

Our students and staff are so excited about the MMFA program, we even made a commercial starring students, posters advertising the importance of eating a nutritious breakfast, and PSAs for our morning show.<\/p>\n

We know it\u2019s important because the numbers show that one out of five school-aged children struggle with hunger in this country.<\/p>\n

There are teachers and principals all over this country who will tell you the same thing.\u00a0 <\/span>There are children in classrooms all over this nation \u2013 in our cities<\/span> and in the suburbs<\/span> who are coming to school too hungry to learn. In some cases, the nutritious school breakfast and school lunch are the only meals students have on a daily basis.<\/p>\n

The MMFA breakfast program gets my students reading and geared-up for a full day of learning.\u00a0 <\/span>I could not imagine my school without the MMFA program.<\/p>\n

At my school, we know that eating a nutritious breakfast is the KEY to our success!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Yolanda Stanislaus, Principal, Francis Scott Key Middle School, Montgomery County
\n<\/a>
\nAs the proud Principal of Francis Scott Key Middle School in Montgomery County, my   …Learn more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":56,"featured_media":666,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blogs","category-principalperspectives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/msde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/msde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/msde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/msde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/56"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/msde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=664"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/msde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":674,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/msde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664\/revisions\/674"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/msde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/666"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/msde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/msde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/msde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}