One in Five Ohio Children Start School Year Hungry
As Ohio students return to school, an old problem remains: child hunger. Despite the efforts of food banks, churches, and schools, more than 517,000 children in Ohio, 1 in 5, face hunger, according to Feeding America.
Deacon Nick Bates of the Hunger Network in Ohio says pantries are being forced to ration, cutting food distributions from five days’ worth down to just two or three.
“The pandemic may have ended, but the scars still remain,” Bates said. “When children are hungry, they’re more likely to get sick; when children are hungry, they have trouble learning.”
Schools are straining to fill the gap. In Pickerington, federal funding currently provides free breakfast and lunch to 12,000 students, but staff fear it may disappear next year. Education support professional Joie Moore recalls the days when a student without lunch money was handed nothing more than a cheese sandwich.
“We had children come into school hungry, and I would keep granola bars in my desk so they’d at least have something,” Moore said.
But with state budget cuts reducing resources for food programs, including a $2 million reduction to the Children’s Hunger Alliance, fewer meals are being served, while the need keeps rising. Food banks report pantry visits have nearly doubled since 2019, yet families now receive less food than before.
School districts, meanwhile, face tough financial choices. Some are leaving federal free-meal programs because they can no longer sustain them. “Compromise” has become the rule, even when it means fewer children eating.
The persistence of child hunger in Ohio reveals more than just gaps in funding; it exposes a failure to protect children’s most basic rights. Every child is entitled to health and nutrition, an adequate standard of living, and access to education.
These rights cannot be met when students arrive at school without enough to eat. The best interests of children should guide every policy choice, yet compromises in budgets and food programs continue to leave many behind. Until Ohio and national leaders commit to treating food as a right rather than a privilege, thousands of children will continue to bear the cost.
