<\/p>\n
Growing up in West Virginia, Jennifer Garner<\/a> remembers the moment she began to notice the divide: some classmates stayed behind in elementary school while she moved on to the next grade.<\/p>\n \u201cI was raised in a middle-class family surrounded by generational rural poverty,\u201d the actor, 53, tells TODAY.com.<\/p>\n It wasn\u2019t until later that she made the connection. Children whose parents were professionals seemed set on one track, while kids from the \u201chollers,\u201d isolated communities in the state\u2019s mountain valleys, were on another.<\/p>\n Unknown to Garner at the time, some of her peers were going to bed hungry, but she didn\u2019t realize it because their bellies appeared full. It was the result of low-quality, processed foods they were eating, which made them puff out even as their bodies lacked proper nutrition.<\/p>\n Not only did Pat and Bill Garner place a strong emphasis on their daughter\u2019s education, but their kitchen was consistently stocked with fresh produce from the family garden and other nourishing ingredients.\u00a0The American Academy of Pediatrics\u00a0<\/a>emphasizes that early nutrition is vital for brain development, warning that deficiencies in essential nutrients such as iron, zinc, and iodine can have lasting effects on cognition and behavior.<\/p>\n \u201cWe cannot expect kids to go to school and thrive and learn without making sure they have food in their bellies,\u201d Garner says, pointing out that an estimated 17 million U.S. households face hunger. That reality inspired her to co-found Once Upon a Farm, an organic baby food company that partners with Save the Children to bring nutritious meals to children in food-insecure communities across the country.<\/p>\n