| “Already, we have noticed much higher levels of concentration, energy and enthusiasm across all year levels. Kids who are appropriately nourished are much easier to teach.” |
Full tummies feed hungry minds
Napoleon famously said an army marches on its stomach, an adage not lost on some Australian schoolteachers who know that each morning a number of Australian children go to school without breakfast.
To help more children jump start their day, the PwC Foundation raises money for The Good Start Breakfast Club, an Australian Red Cross initiative that assist schools to provide nutritious breakfasts for primary school aged children.
The money is raised by the PwC Foundation Café in the foyer of the firm’s Melbourne office. In 2007, these funds were boosted with an additional donation of $10,000 from the Foundation, specifically to establish these clubs for a year in two Melbourne schools.
“To say the Breakfast Club has been successful so far is an understatement,” says Iain Luck, principal of the Victorian College of Koori Education . “Already we have noticed much higher levels of concentration, energy and enthusiasm. Classroom behaviour has improved out of sight, as have our dealings with the students themselves. Children who are appropriately nourished are much easier to teach.”
Other participating schools agree. They also point out that some of the children who previously attended the breakfast clubs now make their own breakfast at home, which is a great example of how a good initiative backed by PwC can change behaviour for the better.
