Ateneo undertakes massive feeding program

MANILA, Philippines –  The best and the brightest from the Ateneo Professional Schools (APS) will put together their collective brain power and pool their extra cash to come up with an efficient school feeding program for public school children.

Under the Blueplate for Better Learning project, the APS – which includes the Ateneo Graduate School of Business, the Ateneo Law School, the Ateneo School of Government and the Ateneo School of Medicine and Public Health – will seek to scale up and improve a school feeding program being pilot tested by the Quezon City government under Vice Mayor Joy Belmonte with the help of Jollibee Foods Corp. the feeding program started with 40 school children and will be increased to 4,000 school children in four Quezon City public schools.

Alfredo Bengzon, former health secretary and now vice president for the APS, said Blueplate for Better Learning, aside from feeding the 4,000 school children, will focus on coming up with an efficient system that the Department of Education (DepEd) can adopt nationwide.

“The model we are developing can de adopted by any school in any community throughout the country,” Bengzon told reporters Friday at the launching of the project during the APS 2nd Congress at the APS Rockwell campus.

Bengzon said the APS chose the school feeding approach to improve learning in public schools as a result of past experience partnering with the DepEd and local governments, particularly the Quezon City government, for education initiatives.

Looking at the poor performance of public school children, Bengzon said that a major factor was malnutrition among children in public schools.

“The common denominator is they were all undernourished. It (maltnutrition) is very pervasive, it’s commonplace,” Bengzon said.

With the DepEd focused on addressing shortages in teachers, textbooks and classrooms, Bengzon said malnutrition was being left out.

With the Blueplate for Better Learning project, Bengzon said that the APS can do something worthwhile.

“We want to make a dent,” Bengzon said.

Under the project, Ateneans with expertise in different fields such as management, public health, particularly nutrition, and logistics and systems will pool their resources to come up with an efficient system to feed public school children.

It will not only be giving money but a contribution of their expertise in their respective fields, Bengzon stressed.