Physical, Emotional & Academic Support

Books & Breakfast is a before-school program offering a nutritious breakfast and homework assistance to Evanston students in need of additional support. B&B exists so that every student enters their classroom physically, emotionally, and academically prepared.

A typical day at the reinvented B&B program usually includes a good morning hug, a healthy meal, time with an individual tutor, and the reward of game time. Books & Breakfast is expanding our work to impact more of the students who need it the most. Just as it began 30 years ago, it remains a community effort.

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Our Vision

Books & Breakfast envisions an Evanston community in which every child is understood to be a valued and connected part of the community, where every school community reflects this reality, and where every child is able to reach their full academic potential. B&B envisions an Evanston community that is actively committed to just and equitable outcomes for all its children.

Statement on Educational Equity

To support all Evanston students in achieving their full potential, Books & Breakfast commits to building just, inclusive, and equitable school communities in District 65.

Modeling through Action

Since 2013, Books & Breakfast (B&B) has partnered with Evanston School District 65 (D65) to advance educational equity, disrupting the impact of systemic racism on Black and Latinx students and filling the gaps in resources for students who qualify for free or reduced price lunch. Books and Breakfast commits to:

Honor and build upon the strengths of every student.
Welcome and engage families as essential partners in our work and mission.
Ensure that all board members and staff examine and change practices, policies, and processes that contribute to and perpetuate racial disparities, and the disparities of those who have been marginalized in society by their identity, cultural, or economic status and support volunteers to do so as well.
Attract and retain a workforce that is diverse in skills and experience and reflects the demographic diversity of our students.
Ensure that all staff, board members, and volunteers receive ongoing training that promotes an understanding of racial identity and cultural competencies, and identifies and addresses implicit and explicit biases.
Involve community members, including parents and families, civic and faith-based leadership, and the community at large, as active collaborators and problem-solvers on acknowledging and addressing racial and educational equity.
Acknowledge the systems of power that grant privilege and access unequally in Evanston and in our schools and hold ourselves accountable to working in partnership to make lasting change to those systems.
Encourage substantive learning to build cultural consciousness and to proliferate pro-equity policies and practices by all of our constituencies and audiences.
Advocate for public and private-sector policy that promotes cultural equity.
Generate and aggregate quantitative and qualitative research related to equity to make incremental, measurable progress toward cultural equity more visible.