This was originally a Global Family program that I was put in charge of implementing during my first term in Cambodia. MCC had a breakfast program at a Primary School just outside of Phnom Penh previously but they wanted it to move to a rural location where it would help more vulnerable students.

There’s a longer story there that I might tell later but I’m really amazed at how the program has grown over the last ten years. The service workers and national staff who came after me did incredible work. I’ll be describing the current Rural Primary School Program piece by piece, but I wanted to start with the original initiative that I worked on – the breakfast program.

The breakfast program serves rice porridge – similar to what we ate at Visal’s wedding. It is inexpensive, uses local ingredients, and has good nutritional value (at least the way MCC provides it with chicken and veggies). There have been many studies showing how good nutrition aids early education but it’s also removes a financial barrier to education. If the children are provided a meal that’s one less meal the family has to provide for them – meaning that it’s easier to send them to school than to send them to work in the rice field. I often heard that from villagers directly during my first term in Cambodia and it’s apparent in the statistics too, attendance improves significantly.

Currently, the breakfast program is initiated alongside community organizing to get parents and local leaders involved. MCC then slowly begins to reduce our contribution to the breakfast program as the community slowly increases it’s contribution. The goal is a sustainable transition where the community provides breakfast for students…but it’s not always feasible in improvised communities.