Kids Can Make a Difference

Story Lead: Kids educate other kids about poverty and hunger.

Brief Synopsis
Five years ago, World Hunger Year (WHY) board members, Larry and Jane Levine encountered a group of sixth grade students in York, Maine who wanted to learn about hunger and poverty. Based on their experiences with this group of children, the Levines founded "Kids Can Make a Difference" (KIDS), an educational program for middle and high school students that focuses on the root causes of hunger, the people most effected, solutions and how students can help. The major goal of KIDS is to stimulate the students to take some definite action as they begin to realize that one person can make a difference. The program teaches kids how to help other kids, instead of leaving action up to experts and adults. Having created an innovative teacher guide and KIDS Newsletter, the Levines have extended their program to include over 800 public, private and religious schools across the United States. The Peace Corps has purchased 200 curriculum guides for use in its own programs. KIDS has won numerous recognition awards, and one of its major strengths continues to be the outstanding group of dedicated teachers involved in the program at the classroom level.

Program
Kids Can Make a Difference (KIDS)
P.O. Box 54
Kittery Point, ME 03905
(207) 439-9588
Fax: (207) 439-4917
Email: kids@kids.maine.org
Web Site: http://www.kids.maine.org

Story Contacts
Larry Levine/Jane Finn Levine, Ed.D.
KIDS P.O. Box 54
Kittery Point, ME 03905
(207) 439-9588
Fax: (207)439-4917
Email: kids@kids.maine.org
Founders and Directors of KIDS

Jane Darby
The Caedmon School
416 E. 80th Street
New York, NY 10021
(212) 879-2296
Teacher and participant in KIDS program

Expert Contacts
Dr. Ava L.
McCall University of Wisconsin at Oshkosh
Curriculum and Instruction
800 Algoma Boulevard
Oshkosh, WI 54901
(920) 424-3155
Relevant area: Teaches social studies methods for elementary education majors and supervises clinical students at the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh

Dr. J. Larry Brown Director
Hunger, Poverty and Nutrition
Tufts University
11 Curtis Avenue
Medford, MA 02155
(617) 627-3956
Relevant area: Nutritional Effects on Children

Ruth Sidel Professor of Sociology Hunter College 695 Park Avenue New York, NY 10021 (212) 772-4000 Relevant area: Poverty in America

Background
Poverty is the main cause of hunger. Poor people often lack access to land to grow food or inadequate income to buy food. Nearly one in four people, 1.3 billion people live on less than $1 per day, while the world's 358 billionaires have assets exceeding the combined annual incomes of countries with 45 percent of the world's people. (KIDS Can Make a Difference, Hunger Facts. http://www.kids.maine.org).

According to The National Center for Children in Poverty at Columbia University, the poverty rate for U.S. children under six is currently the highest ever reported. The NCCP study indicated that a staggering six million children under six live in poverty, an increase of one million children from 1987 to 1992. (National Center for Children in Poverty at Columbia University. http://cpmcnet.columbia.edu/dept/sph/dean/dean0009.html.)

One in twelve people worldwide is malnourished, including 160 million children under the age of 5. (KIDS Can Make a Difference, Hunger Facts. http://www.kids.maine.org).

Young children in the United States have about a 50 % chance of escaping the risks of poverty or near poverty. (KIDS Can Make a Difference, Hunger Facts. http://www.kids.maine.org)

The average child living in a wealthy U.S. family is better off financially than the typical wealthy child in any other country. At the same time, the average child in a low-income U.S. family is worse off than the average poor child in 15 other industrialized countries. (KIDS Can Make a Difference, Hunger Facts. http://www.kids.maine.org).

The USDA's annual report, Expenditures on Children by Families, shows that it costs six times as much to raise an infant born in 1997 (from birth to 17 years) than it did to raise a child born in 1960. The report states that overall, the primary expense in childrearing is housing and the second highest expense is food. ("USDA Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion". http://www.usda.gov/fcs/cnpp.htm).

According to Wasting America's Future: The Children's Defense Fund Report on the Costs of Child Poverty, "Poverty wears down...[children's] resilience and emotional reserves; saps their spirits and sense of self, crushes their hopes; devalues their potential and aspirations; and subjects them over time to physical, mental, and emotional assault, injury, and indignity." (Children's Defense Fund Reports. http://childrensdefense.org).

In a 1995 survey conducted by the Gallup Organization, more children reported getting their information about food and nutrition from schools and teachers (90%) than from any other source-even their parents. The survey concluded that food and nutrition messages that reach children in schools are therefore of utmost importance in shaping children's eating behavior. (Gallup Organization. (1995). Food, Physical Activity and Fun: What Kids Think (a survey prepared for The American Dietetic Association, International Food Information Council, & President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports.)

Recent scientific evidence from Columbia University-based National Center for Children in Poverty (NCCP) indicates that life in near poverty is almost as detrimental to children's health and development as living just below the poverty line, and that extreme poverty early in life is especially deleterious to children's future life chances. (National Center for Children in Poverty at Columbia University. http://cpmcnet.columbia.edu/dept/nccp/reports/longterm.html).

Related Coverage Cosentino, C.S.W., R.N., Barbra Williams. (Week of November 17, 1998). "Hunger Helpers." RESIDENT.

Edelman, Marian Wright. "A Child Shall Lead Us." Why.Magazine. Spring, 1998.

Maren, Michael. "The Faces of Famine." Newsweek. July 27, 1998. (http://www.newsweek.wp.com/nw-srv/issue/04_98b).

Mozingo, Anne M. (1998, January 11). "Kittery Point pair try to end hunger." New Hampshire Portsmouth Herald Sunday. Section B, p. 1.

What To Do About Famine. Newsweek, Interview. (1998, November 2). Newsweek. Online. (http://www.newsweek.washingtonpost.com/nw-srv/issue17_98b).

Compiled by: Jeanette Park