1
00:00:00,120 --> 00:00:02,920
Speaker 1: Although the school holidays are in full swing. Still that

2
00:00:02,920 --> 00:00:05,120
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that the country's children are getting the food

3
00:00:05,120 --> 00:00:07,800
Speaker 1: they need at home. New Zealand children are still going

4
00:00:07,920 --> 00:00:10,280
Speaker 1: hungry at school, and that means they're going through and

5
00:00:10,720 --> 00:00:13,960
Speaker 1: ending up years behind other children in key subjects. The

6
00:00:14,040 --> 00:00:17,200
Speaker 1: data that shows this ongoing issue for us all also

7
00:00:17,280 --> 00:00:20,880
Speaker 1: ranks New Zealand poorly for food poverty. The health researchers

8
00:00:20,880 --> 00:00:24,520
Speaker 1: behind this just published analysis argue that government needs to

9
00:00:24,600 --> 00:00:27,840
Speaker 1: double the number of children served by its newly revamped

10
00:00:27,920 --> 00:00:31,120
Speaker 1: lunches in school scheme. It's no surprise that hungary students

11
00:00:31,120 --> 00:00:33,879
Speaker 1: struggle to learn. Food poverty has been cited as a

12
00:00:33,880 --> 00:00:38,120
Speaker 1: big barrier in New Zealand's scoring under the OECD's Program

13
00:00:38,240 --> 00:00:42,159
Speaker 1: for International Student Assessment. A comparison between that and two

14
00:00:42,240 --> 00:00:45,280
Speaker 1: other global data sets has allowed a team of researchers

15
00:00:45,320 --> 00:00:48,760
Speaker 1: to look at the link in greater depth. After analyzing

16
00:00:48,840 --> 00:00:53,000
Speaker 1: food and security levels after subject specific scores, the team

17
00:00:53,080 --> 00:00:56,200
Speaker 1: reveiled to start trend, any degree of food and security

18
00:00:56,480 --> 00:00:59,880
Speaker 1: was associated with much lower academic performance, a pattern that

19
00:01:00,040 --> 00:01:04,520
Speaker 1: held across all subjects, age groups, and surveys. Professor Boyd

20
00:01:04,560 --> 00:01:07,080
Speaker 1: Swinburne from Auckland University as a co author of the

21
00:01:07,080 --> 00:01:09,760
Speaker 1: study I'm referring to, and he says he didn't expect

22
00:01:09,840 --> 00:01:13,160
Speaker 1: the effect size to be so large. In all, it

23
00:01:13,200 --> 00:01:16,800
Speaker 1: equated to a learning gap equivalent to hungry students trailing

24
00:01:16,880 --> 00:01:20,600
Speaker 1: two to four years behind in subjects like maths and

25
00:01:20,720 --> 00:01:25,520
Speaker 1: reading by age fifteen, and even after adjusting for socioeconomic indicators.

26
00:01:25,760 --> 00:01:27,920
Speaker 1: Something else born to the study is that there's also

27
00:01:28,120 --> 00:01:31,520
Speaker 1: a grady in effect. The more severe the food and security,

28
00:01:31,760 --> 00:01:35,520
Speaker 1: the greater gap in scores compared to kids with no

29
00:01:35,680 --> 00:01:39,600
Speaker 1: food insecurity. The problem doesn't just affect hungry children finding

30
00:01:39,600 --> 00:01:42,640
Speaker 1: it harder to concentrate in class, but other factors, including

31
00:01:42,760 --> 00:01:47,119
Speaker 1: parents keeping their kids home rather than facing stigma at school.

32
00:01:47,720 --> 00:01:50,040
Speaker 1: It's all very well to blame the state of New

33
00:01:50,120 --> 00:01:53,200
Speaker 1: Zealand's curriculum or the size of classrooms confronting our teachers,

34
00:01:53,440 --> 00:01:56,320
Speaker 1: but when you may well address some of the demonstrably

35
00:01:56,360 --> 00:01:59,480
Speaker 1: poor outcomes shown in the study by simply ensuring that

36
00:01:59,480 --> 00:02:02,720
Speaker 1: our children are well fed and literally well catered for

37
00:02:02,800 --> 00:02:06,920
Speaker 1: at school, what on earth are we waiting for? For

38
00:02:07,040 --> 00:02:10,000
Speaker 1: more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge, Listen live to

39
00:02:10,120 --> 00:02:13,320
Speaker 1: News Talk Set B from five am weekdays, or follow

40
00:02:13,360 --> 00:02:14,919
Speaker 1: the podcast on iHeartRadio,