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"Beloshkurenko - who says she also wants to give something in return to people in this country who gave me an opportunity' - is director of Home Services at the Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty. She oversees Project Metropair, the nonprofit's free home-repair program for low-income seniors. It installs grab bars, smoke alarms, window guards, door locks, chains and peep holes."

"Last May, The Children's Hunger Project started in co-founder Sam Jordan's kitchen in Melbourne and began packing meals for 27 impoverished students at Riviera Elementary in Palm Bay. The fast-growing non-profit now feeds about 500 kids who qualify for free or reduced-price lunches at a dozen elementary schools."

"Hunger among some students has become so common that one elementary school teacher keeps a bagful of Froot Loops near her classroom door. When kids arrive with clothes too ragged or dirty -- or don't come at all because they lack clothing -- schools make sure they have something decent to wear."

"Students who go through the program will attend Montgomery College after high school. After earning an associate degree from the college, they then transfer to the Universities at Shady Grove to earn a bachelor's degree through the University System of Maryland. The coaches provide one-on-one support for students through the years, with mentoring, campus visits and tutoring help from start to finish. The program is geared toward African American, Hispanic and low-income students - groups typically underrepresented on college campuses."

"Sixteen new housing units, which are available to low-income people who are at least 62, are now open after a winter and summer of construction, said Phil Grandmaison, senior projects director for SNHS. This project means that SNHS has about 790 apartments available to seniors in 23 complexes in the Granite State and one in Berwick, Maine."

"A total of 823 Whatcom County students were homeless last school year, according to the most recent data sent recently to the state Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction. That total for the 2011-12 school year was just two more than the number of homeless students in the county's public schools reported in the previous year - but well above the pre-recession total of 516 students in the 2006-07 school year."

"It is clear chronic student truancy is a symptom of family dysfunction rooted in poverty, yet the solution proposed by Snyder and DHS is to further impoverish poor families. This policy exacerbates the very problem it purportedly aims to solve while creating more work for already overburdened school district and DHS employees."

"Nearly 200 students enrolled in colleges and universities in the District were surprised to learn late this summer that they would receive thousands of dollars from a new scholarship fund started by Mayor Vincent C. Gray and the D.C. Council using extra money in the budget. The new scholarships were awarded to graduates of D.C. high schools who are from low-income families, as determined by the federal student aid application, and in good standing at their school."

"Education is a vital means for breaking the chains of poverty, something on which leaders of all political perspectives agree. The Michigan Department of Human Services' new rule, which took effect Monday, could be viewed as a way to ensure children on welfare don't waste their chance for an education. The MDHS is monitoring the school attendance of children on welfare ages 6 to 15 years old. If any of them are found to be consistently absent from class, their families will lose their cash assistance."

"The last thing high poverty school districts need is to lose resources to provide programs and services to support students who need extra help to achieve. That's why Grand Rapids schools pulled out all the stops this summer and in the days leading up to Wednesday, Count Day, to get students in class. All public schools in Michigan were required to count the students attending their schools. That figure determines 90 percent of the state's per-pupil funding."

"Dockery said the core of the grant would be spent on schools where more than 40 percent of the students receive free or reduced lunches, a measure of poverty in Fairfax. She said that although Fairfax County is one of the most affluent in the nation, nearly 42,000 students live below the poverty line and as many as 2,500 are homeless."

"The importance of the school breakfast program comes against a backdrop of rising child poverty and a push by advocates to have schools serve breakfast early in the school day -- but after the bell has sounded. Those advocates say many schools have been unable to get children to arrive early enough for breakfast before that first bell rings, so it's important to serve it in the first few minutes of the school day -- during morning announcements, attendance and other warm-up activities."