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Global Food for Education Program
Attendance Increases
According to reports from teachers and administrators, school attendance increased in the GFE school feeding projects. Due to differences in how schools define and record attendance, there is a lack of accurate, consistent attendance data. School attendance was thus one of the most difficult GFE indicators to reliably measure and document. Although improvements in attendance and performance could not be quantitatively documented, program monitors did receive feedback through focus group discussions and reports by teachers, school administrators, parents, and students. All projects repeatedly confirmed that attendance rates increased after the feeding program began. School officials and program monitors found this qualitative evidence to be significant and compelling. It is also consistent with the findings of rigorous studies on the relationship between school feeding and attendance.
Examples of increases in attendance include:
In Guatemala, CRS reported that, in the School of Trapiche, 50 students that had dropped out returned when the feeding began and rations were available. Many children routinely missed over 50 percent of classes because of income-generating work, but thanks to the school feeding and rations these children returned to school, arrived every day, and were able to take their final exams, passing to the next grade. Researching attendance records, monitors found it difficult to document prior year’s attendance.
WFP Guinea reported that the parents associations stated that the children now come to school and stay longer since the "canteen has chased hunger from our school."
In Uganda, Save the Children reported that rates of absenteeism had been considerable, and those children who went home during lunchtime often did not return due to the long distances and lack of food at home. Once the school began offering an afternoon meal, teachers said children were present for the afternoon sessions and participated actively.
In Kyrgyzstan, Mercy Corps reported that increased attendance in schools initially resulted in crowded classrooms, without enough desks or chairs. Parents and the community responded by making infrastructure repairs and building extra desks and chairs. The government of the Dominican Republic reported similar results.
In Lebanon, International Orthodox Christian Charities reported that a third grade female student began attending school regularly, whereas prior to the program she would often miss school to beg for money on the streets.
In Senegal, Counterpart International reported that in the north of the country, where most of the Pular population is pastoral and nomadic, parents usually start moving with their livestock in search of a green pasture from March through July, and they take their children out of school to go with them. School administrators were pleased to see that most of the parents kept their children in school this year because of the school lunch program.
WFP reported that in El Salvador 200,000 children in four of the poorest regions received a school meal prepared by the parents in the community. For many, this meal offered the incentive to stay in school and learn to read and write rather than working in the fields or in the streets.
In Bhutan, the WFP contacts with beneficiaries and from regular monitoring has clearly indicated that schools meals play a key role in ensuring regular attendance and active student participation.
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