Building on the Foundation of Universal Free School Lunch

In April 2016, Lunch 4 Learning youth leader Aminata Abdouranme published an op-ed for Chalkbeat, "How the shame of 'free-free' inspired my push for universal free school lunch." In it, Aminata wrote movingly about her experience with bullying and stigma in the lunch room. Read the full piece here. 

Aminata's piece was covered by Forbes contributer Nancy Huehnergarth, who wrote, "sometimes a teenager writes something so insightful that we should all read it. High school senior Aminata Abdouranme's post for Chalkbeat is one of those occasions." Read the Forbes coverage here. 

Also in April 2016, dnainfo New York published a piece covering teen activist Luwei Long's advocacy around school lunch. Read the piece here. 

Youth took to social media in April with a youth retweet competition directed at Mayor Bill de Blasio. Youth from partner organizations Children's Aid Society, High Line Teens, Queens Community House, Resilience Advocacy Project, Teenergetic, and Citizen's Committee for Children New York wrote tweets urging the Mayor to expand free school lunch, and groups competed to gain the most retweets. The winning group was Citizen's Committee for Children, with the tweet: 

"@BilldebBlasio A healthy lunch energizes our students. Free lunch for all to fuel & nourish the future of New York! #lunch4learning" 

Stay tuned for more media updates!