[Laughter]
by a show of hands how many of you would
say that a large portion of your work
involves group projects or team work Wow
I was gonna say majority if that looks
like everybody well according to a
recent Bryant grads capstone project on
group dynamics she determined that
upwards of 80% of her grades were
influenced by others in the form of
teamwork and group projects not always
good sometimes bad so imagine in your
next project or assignment you don’t get
all the key people you need what if
you’re missing the numbers guy or the
perfect presenter I’m gonna suggest it
would have a negative impact on your
project now imagining this is actually
not isolated to just school projects in
the business world right now business
leaders in Rhode Island are saying one
of their biggest challenges is not
having access to a workforce educated
employee base I think we’d all agree
that students that don’t learn don’t
graduate high school now the step excuse
me
students that don’t graduate high school
let’s go to the step next so just don’t
graduate high school won’t have access
to all the benefits of higher education
and better jobs that can provide now
let’s go step backwards students that
don’t learn don’t graduate high school
most importantly at least in my world
students that are hungry don’t learn now
unfortunately in Rhode Island one in
seven residents is considered food and
secure what does that mean simply put it
means they lack access to safe and
nutritious food
what if our group of about a hundred or
so represented Rhode Island
that would mean up to fourteen of us
would be food insecure lacking access to
safe and nutritious food also we might
not know where our next meal is coming
from
now I’m hopeful this doesn’t affect you
now it didn’t impact you growing up but
I can assure you it does impact
thousands of our students every day in
Rhode Island today according to a
group called feeding America National
anti-hunger organization they’ve done
some research they’ve determined that
child hunger is a health problem and
it’s an education problem but they’ve
also determined that it’s a workforce
and job readiness problem but there’s
good news the good news is we have a
solution to this problem and the even
better news is the solution has funding
there’s resources to support it I
propose that we increase access and
participation in the USDA child
nutrition programs I’ve been in the
industry for almost 23 years and I can
say the group that I manage serves a
large portion of our 140,000 K through
12 students in Rhode Island the amazing
team that I work with prepares and
serves upwards of 35,000 meals a day
now these meals are vitally important to
a lot of our students these meals are
locally produced locally sourced they’re
healthy and they’re affordable these
programs are in the form of breakfast
lunch sometimes snack programs but they
don’t really only benefit the students
that are in the schools these programs
through the reimbursements that are
provided with them also benefit the
schools these resources come in to help
support the programs which allows our
schools and school districts to use
their financial resources for other
things like education like for teachers
for books now in Rhode Island one of our
biggest areas of opportunity is actually
in the area of school breakfast
last year school district cross the
state serve millions of meals brought in
over ten million dollars in positive
economic impact in the form of federal
and state reimbursements unfortunately
fewer than half of the students that
qualify for these free and reduced-price
meals participated in the breakfast
programs I’d like to see us move that
needle I’d like to see us increase the
access and the participation think about
that what that could do if we could
increase the participation closer to one
percent generating upwards of twenty
million dollars of positive economic
impact for our state now you might be
wondering what does this have to do with
innovation the theme for today well
believe it or not Rhode Island is
actually an innovative leader when it
comes to child nutrition we’ve led the
country for over a decade about the
country for over a decade with some of
the strictest nutrition standards in the
country
we’re also and this is an interesting
one we’re also the only state in the
Union with a governor appointed director
of food strategy now she’s tasked with
amongst many other things helping to
reduce child hunger and food insecurity
so one of the areas that I said was
school breakfast and the areas that I
think we can improve upon that would be
working with our educational leaders we
have some amazing educational leaders
out there who are innovative and are
creative and are open-minded different
ideas and in school breakfast one of the
things that we’re focused on right now
is something called alternate
alternative breakfast service simply put
it just means we’re looking for ways to
serve our students outside of the
cafeteria serving students breakfast in
the morning in schools is is a challenge
it could be because of busing issues it
could be because of teacher schedules it
could be because our cafeterias weren’t
built big enough to to seat all of our
students so what we’ve done in some
schools is looked at alternative methods
one that’s very very successful is
something called breakfast in the
classroom and it just as it sounds
students come in go right to their
classroom are served a healthy breakfast
to their desk and start their
educational day another one is something
called a grab-and-go or after the bell
program students can once again get
access to a healthy breakfast get to
their classroom start their educational
day one that has a bit of a
technological twist is a cashless
refrigerated vending machine students
can use their student ID into a secure
PIN pad get a healthy breakfast once
again get to their class
for what therefore therefore for
education now one of my favorites is
something called a blender bike it’s
just as it appears students can pedal
the bike which then turns the blender we
pour in some fresh fruit some yogurt
low-fat yogurt of course how cool is
that to start your day with a fresh
yogurt smoothie now these are just a few
of the ideas but they are helping
they’re helping to improve access
getting kids out of the cafeteria if
it’s too tight they’re helping to
improve participation because they’re
new and innovative ways that kids can
can react to but I’m hopeful with with
your extra input with your creative
ideas with your innovation and almost
more importantly with your willingness
to share this information with our
educational leaders with our influencers
so we can improve the access and
participation across our state
benefiting all of us in the form of a
better educated employee base now once
again final note we’ve hopefully learned
that students that are hungry don’t
learn and then from there if they don’t
learn they won’t graduate and then
finally most importantly for for the
next step is if they don’t graduate they
won’t have access to higher education
better jobs and all the vaca provide and
all the benefits that there are that our
state would would reap from it thank you
for your support
by a show of hands how many of you would
say that a large portion of your work
involves group projects or team work Wow
I was gonna say majority if that looks
like everybody well according to a
recent Bryant grads capstone project on
group dynamics she determined that
upwards of 80% of her grades were
influenced by others in the form of
teamwork and group projects not always
good sometimes bad so imagine in your
next project or assignment you don’t get
all the key people you need what if
you’re missing the numbers guy or the
perfect presenter I’m gonna suggest it
would have a negative impact on your
project now imagining this is actually
not isolated to just school projects in
the business world right now business
leaders in Rhode Island are saying one
of their biggest challenges is not
having access to a workforce educated
employee base I think we’d all agree
that students that don’t learn don’t
graduate high school now the step excuse
me
students that don’t graduate high school
let’s go to the step next so just don’t
graduate high school won’t have access
to all the benefits of higher education
and better jobs that can provide now
let’s go step backwards students that
don’t learn don’t graduate high school
most importantly at least in my world
students that are hungry don’t learn now
unfortunately in Rhode Island one in
seven residents is considered food and
secure what does that mean simply put it
means they lack access to safe and
nutritious food
what if our group of about a hundred or
so represented Rhode Island
that would mean up to fourteen of us
would be food insecure lacking access to
safe and nutritious food also we might
not know where our next meal is coming
from
now I’m hopeful this doesn’t affect you
now it didn’t impact you growing up but
I can assure you it does impact
thousands of our students every day in
Rhode Island today according to a
group called feeding America National
anti-hunger organization they’ve done
some research they’ve determined that
child hunger is a health problem and
it’s an education problem but they’ve
also determined that it’s a workforce
and job readiness problem but there’s
good news the good news is we have a
solution to this problem and the even
better news is the solution has funding
there’s resources to support it I
propose that we increase access and
participation in the USDA child
nutrition programs I’ve been in the
industry for almost 23 years and I can
say the group that I manage serves a
large portion of our 140,000 K through
12 students in Rhode Island the amazing
team that I work with prepares and
serves upwards of 35,000 meals a day
now these meals are vitally important to
a lot of our students these meals are
locally produced locally sourced they’re
healthy and they’re affordable these
programs are in the form of breakfast
lunch sometimes snack programs but they
don’t really only benefit the students
that are in the schools these programs
through the reimbursements that are
provided with them also benefit the
schools these resources come in to help
support the programs which allows our
schools and school districts to use
their financial resources for other
things like education like for teachers
for books now in Rhode Island one of our
biggest areas of opportunity is actually
in the area of school breakfast
last year school district cross the
state serve millions of meals brought in
over ten million dollars in positive
economic impact in the form of federal
and state reimbursements unfortunately
fewer than half of the students that
qualify for these free and reduced-price
meals participated in the breakfast
programs I’d like to see us move that
needle I’d like to see us increase the
access and the participation think about
that what that could do if we could
increase the participation closer to one
percent generating upwards of twenty
million dollars of positive economic
impact for our state now you might be
wondering what does this have to do with
innovation the theme for today well
believe it or not Rhode Island is
actually an innovative leader when it
comes to child nutrition we’ve led the
country for over a decade about the
country for over a decade with some of
the strictest nutrition standards in the
country
we’re also and this is an interesting
one we’re also the only state in the
Union with a governor appointed director
of food strategy now she’s tasked with
amongst many other things helping to
reduce child hunger and food insecurity
so one of the areas that I said was
school breakfast and the areas that I
think we can improve upon that would be
working with our educational leaders we
have some amazing educational leaders
out there who are innovative and are
creative and are open-minded different
ideas and in school breakfast one of the
things that we’re focused on right now
is something called alternate
alternative breakfast service simply put
it just means we’re looking for ways to
serve our students outside of the
cafeteria serving students breakfast in
the morning in schools is is a challenge
it could be because of busing issues it
could be because of teacher schedules it
could be because our cafeterias weren’t
built big enough to to seat all of our
students so what we’ve done in some
schools is looked at alternative methods
one that’s very very successful is
something called breakfast in the
classroom and it just as it sounds
students come in go right to their
classroom are served a healthy breakfast
to their desk and start their
educational day another one is something
called a grab-and-go or after the bell
program students can once again get
access to a healthy breakfast get to
their classroom start their educational
day one that has a bit of a
technological twist is a cashless
refrigerated vending machine students
can use their student ID into a secure
PIN pad get a healthy breakfast once
again get to their class
for what therefore therefore for
education now one of my favorites is
something called a blender bike it’s
just as it appears students can pedal
the bike which then turns the blender we
pour in some fresh fruit some yogurt
low-fat yogurt of course how cool is
that to start your day with a fresh
yogurt smoothie now these are just a few
of the ideas but they are helping
they’re helping to improve access
getting kids out of the cafeteria if
it’s too tight they’re helping to
improve participation because they’re
new and innovative ways that kids can
can react to but I’m hopeful with with
your extra input with your creative
ideas with your innovation and almost
more importantly with your willingness
to share this information with our
educational leaders with our influencers
so we can improve the access and
participation across our state
benefiting all of us in the form of a
better educated employee base now once
again final note we’ve hopefully learned
that students that are hungry don’t
learn and then from there if they don’t
learn they won’t graduate and then
finally most importantly for for the
next step is if they don’t graduate they
won’t have access to higher education
better jobs and all the vaca provide and
all the benefits that there are that our
state would would reap from it thank you
for your support
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