Busy weekday mornings make it a challenge for families to find time for a healthy breakfast. U.S. Department of Agriculture data show that more students are starting their day with nutritious breakfasts in their school cafeterias.

To encourage more families to take advantage of school breakfast, Long County schools celebrated National School Breakfast Week from March 7-10.

The National School Breakfast Week campaign theme, “Wake Up to School Breakfast,” is designed to remind the school community that school breakfast provides a healthy, energizing start to the day for students. Students were encouraged to “wake up” their minds and bodies during the observance with special menus, decorations, activities and student raffles.

“Each year we try to find items to raffle that correlate with the theme for the year, and I immediately thought about watches,” said Stephanie Fox, the school system’s school nutrition director.

The School Nutrition Program raffled 12 watches throughout the district. Additionally, community volunteers, teachers and staff served students breakfast during the week. The volunteers were from the Long County Fire Department and Department of Natural Resources.

“A healthy breakfast at the start of the day is one way to ensure students are getting the best education they can,” Fox said.

The district serves 2,232 breakfast meals daily through the federally funded School Breakfast Program and aims to increase that number.