By Fallan Patterson
Staff Writer

Students filing onto campus at Cypress Elementary School in Kissimmee can often find a free breakfast, whether it’s in the cafeteria or in convenient totes on the covered pathway by the car drop-off.

With a free-and-reduced-lunch rate of 84 percent, school faculty took notice when students were coming to class groggy and falling asleep during lessons.

Physical education teacher Edgar Colon applied for and was awarded a $1,500 Kellogg’s Share Breakfast national grant program, which the school uses to offer the convenient grab-and-go bags, which include cereal, breakfast bars or pastries, milk and juice.

“This has increased several hundred more students a day since we started,” Principal Matthew Phillips said.

The school feeds between 270 and 310 students daily with the grab-and-go breakfasts, Colon said.

The breakfast company took notice of the school’s success and last week, the company spent three days filming their “Great Starts” videos, showcasing the school breakfast program and the impact it has had on students.

Cypress Elementary was one of just two schools in the nation – the other is located in Texas – that were chosen to participate in the video campaign.

“We picked the ones that had interesting involvement and staff that had real dedication to the students,” Michael Morrissey, manager of Kellogg’s Brand PR, said. “Our goal is to tell the story and show people how important breakfast is.”

Kellogg’s had a camera crew on-site to highlight stories from parents, students and teachers who have benefited from the power of breakfast. These “Great Starts” video stories will have a narration from celebrity spokesperson Taye Diggs, and will be shared with families across the U.S. online to help raise awareness for this cause, according to a Kellogg’s press release.

The videos will go live www.sharebreakfast.com starting March 4 during National Breakfast Week. For every view, share, like, comment or tweet of the video featuring Cypress Elementary, Kellogg’s will donate one breakfast to a child in need.

According to Kellogg’s and their in-school partner Action for Healthy Kids, nearly one in five children attend school without eating breakfast.

In the program’s third year, Share Breakfast will have provided one million breakfasts to students in need of morning meals across the country.

Nearly 70 schools in 25 states, to date, have received more than $1,500 each in school grants to reach more than 65,000 students.

“The schools can structure this (program) based on their needs. Sometimes it’s a cafeteria-based program; sometimes it’s a convenience-based program,” Morrissey said.

Creative control of the program worked well for Cypress Elementary, which is also part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Universal Free Breakfast program, which offers free breakfast to students at any school with an 80 percent or higher free-and-reduced-lunch population.

The Osceola County School District took the program a step further by offering the program at any school with a 75 percent or higher rate.

For Coach Colon at Cypress Elementary, having morning meals for every student was imperative to their education.

Colon sets up a cart at both car drop-off loops and using parent volunteers and other faculty to facilitate, students can grab a bagged breakfast and sit on the benches in the covered walkway or in a hallway to eat.

He said students like the convenience of the grab bags because the line for the free hot breakfast in the cafeteria is often long and the students don’t get to socialize as much.

“Everything is for the kids. They want to eat outside; socialization is important,” Colon, whose own three children attend the school, said. “I created the program to elevate the process and benefit all the kids who want to eat.”

Colon doesn’t like to be absent from work because the children look for him in the mornings.

“They’re waiting for me. You see the smile on their faces,” Colon, a 17-year School District employee, said. “I feel like I’m doing something that’s worth it.”